How to Manage the Elixir in Clash Royale

Hello players! I'm  presenting the first part on the Strategy Guide on How to Manage the Elixir so you can improve your gameplay!

This is a guide for new and experienced players!

How to Manage the Elixir in Clash Royale

Contents 
1. What is an Elixir Advantage?
2. All Ways to Gain an Elixir Advantage
2.1. Spells
2.2. Interactions with the troops
2.3. Elixir collector
2.4. Huts or Spawners
3. Three Features for Administering the Elixir
3.1. Elixir Bar (Leak)
3.2. Tower Life Points
3.3. Time

1. What is an Elixir Advantage?

An advantage of Elixir is when your total Elixir is greater than your opponent's. This includes the Elixir in your bar as well as the cost of the troops you have in the arena.

It is said that a total of 5 Elixir is the advantage needed to win the game. This means that it is essential to try to manage your Elixir so that you can crush your opponent.

Note : Although an Elixir Advantage is of extreme importance, there are other important aspects that can weigh in the game despite the Elixir Advantage.

2. All Ways to Get an Elixir Advantage!

There are many ways to get an Elixir Advantage, and some are more complex than others. They will be covered in order of ease and understanding of the advantage you will get.

2.1. Spells

This is the easiest to calculate. You can get an advantage by spending less to clear a troop with a spell than your opponent spent to insert the troop into the field. 
All it requires is simple math. 
Examples:

• Spend 2 Elixir for The log knock down the Goblin barrel of 3 Elixir for a positive exchange of 1 Elixir.
• Spend 3 Arrow Elixir to subtract the 5 Elixir Horde for a positive exchange of 2 Elixirs.
• Spend 4 Elixir for Fireball crush the Elite Barbarians for a positive exchange of 2 Elixir.

2.2. Interactions with the troops

The way the troops interact with each other will also help you gain an Elixir advantage if you play the right troop at the right place.

There are three ways in which troops will interact to help you gain an advantage:

• Death by Death
• Death by Counterattack
• Death by Answer

Death by Death

The Death-to-Death interaction is where the troop you place will clear the enemy troop, but will die in the process. To gain an advantage, you need to spend less Elixir defending than the cost of the enemy troop.

Examples:

• Spend 3 Elixir for a Mega minion to clear a 4-Elixir Baby Dragon for a positive exchange of 1 Elixir.
• Spend 2 Elixir for Fire Spirits to 3 Elixir minion for a positive exchange of 1 Elixir.
• Spend 2 Elixir for a Ice Golem to cool a 3 Elixir Skeleton Army for a positive exchange of 1 Elixir.

Death by Counterattack

The interaction Death by Counterattack is where you put a troop that will defend the enemy attack and it stays with the whole life, or almost all. Allowing you to support this troop, or use the troop as support for another card, strengthening your counterattack.

As your opponent spent Elixir with his boost, but your troop is full of life, they will have to spend more Elixir to clear this troop, giving you an advantage. 
Examples:

• 3 Elixir Skeletons Army to defend a 3 Elixir Miner. With most of the Skeleton Army still alive, your opponent will have to spend more Elixir to get rid of him.
• PEKKA of 7 Elixir to defend a hog of 4 Elixir. With life full PEKKA and your opponent spending 4 Elixir on the Run, you will be able to support PEKKA with an Elixir lead.
• Valkyrie of 4 Elixir to defend a Gang of Goblins of 3 Elixir. Use Valkyrie as your victory condition to make a difficult jerk to be stopped.

Death by Answer

Much like Death by Counterattack , except that you do not support the defending troop, but your opponent still has to spend Elixir to fight their defender.

Achieving an Elixir advantage in this way depends on your opponent making poor card choices to gain an advantage. This turns out to be an unsecured way to gain an advantage, but it is important to realize this action.

This can be a smart move if you want your opponent to go offense when you're ready for it. 
Examples:

• Spend 3 Elixir for a Mega minion to clean the Princess on the bridge. If your opponent defends with a Ice spirit this generates an advantage of 1 Elixir. If he defends with a Musketeer, this does not become an advantage.
• Spend 4 Elixir for a Furnace to heat up the Minion of 3 Elixir which then requires a response. If he defends with Poison or Fireball, this becomes an Elixir advantage (-1 for Minion and +4 for Spell).
• Spend 3 Elixir for the Minion to eliminate a Hog Rider. If your opponent defends with Zap, this would be an advantage of 2 Elixir. If your opponent does not defend with anything, it becomes a neutral exchange.

2.3. Elixir collector

The Elixir Collector is really simple, but it also has an aspect that many people do not think, and that can cost the game.

The simplest part with the Elixir Collector is that you invest 6 Elixirs for a total of 8 Elixirs over a period of time. This is an advantage of 2 Elixir (That's simple). This is not the only aspect of how the Elixir Collector gives you an edge.

Elixir Collector and Elixir Rate

The biggest advantage of the Elixir Collector in my opinion, is not the advantage of 2 Elixir but the fact of having a faster Elixir rate in the duration of the Elixir Collector. 
Normally, you get 1 Elixir every 2.8 seconds (1.4s in 2x Elixir). When you have an Elixir Pickup in the Arena, this increases your Elixir rate to 1 Elixir every 2.1 seconds (1.1 in 2x Elixir). This means that if you can get an Elixir catcher and keep it safe, you'll get an Elixir Rate faster than your opponent, which means you can enter the troop first. If you know how to use this advantage, you can use this to overload your opponent.

Warning
If the enemy has the Fireball or Poison, still use the Elixir Collector while you can save some health at the nearest Tower because you will still have an Elixir Rate faster than your opponent. In addition, playing the Elixir Collector has the advantage of forcing your opponent to go on the offensive anytime you want. This gives you control at startup, in addition to gaining an Elixir advantage.

2.4.  Hut or Spawners

When it comes to Spawners, math is starting to get complicated. Ultimately, you need to know that if a Spawner is not eliminated, it can produce massive value if it is not treated correctly. They allow you to defend while you press your opponent.

Because of the mechanics of the Huts, they can be used to gain an Elixir advantage if your opponent does not have a good way to clean them, or does not know when to absorb damage, and when to defend.

3. Three Features for Administering the Elixir

In addition to gaining advantages of Elixir through the means mentioned above, there are other features you can use and master in order to manage your Elixir to ensure you have the advantage.

These additional features are:

• Elixir Bar
• Health Tower
• Time

3.1. Elixir Bar

When you are with 10 Elixir, you stop generating and will not continue generating up to 1 second after placing your next card (more on that 1 second later). This is called leakage or Elixir bleeding.

If you leak a lot, and your opponent does not leak any Elixir, you may get a disadvantage simply because it took too long to play your card.

By making sure that you never, or rarely let Elixir leak, you can give yourself that advantage. 
Server 1 Delay : Clash Royale said in a comment on Reddit, "There is an intentional delay of 1 second built in to the deployment of the card for all players, which helps to soften different degrees of latency around the world."

Important : Due to this server delay of 1 second, if you do not want to leak Elixir, you have to play your cards at least 1 second before you complete the last Elixir of the bar. 

Note : If you are using the Elixir Collector, the bar must be in 1 Elixir before not to lose the Elixir that your pump generates.

3.2. Tower Life Points (HP)

The second feature you can use to manage your Elixir is the health of your Tower.

Important : The only Health Point that counts is the last in all of your Towers! All other Life Points are only a means to reach the last, but only the last Life will give you a crown.

One of the differences between a good player and a great player is how well they use the health of their Tower as a resource, allowing an enemy troop to do damage to a Tower instead of defending so they can save Elixir.

Examples:

• Use a 3 Elixir Mega minion to defend Tower instead of a 3 Elixir Cannon. The Hog will do damage to the Tower, but you can then support the Mega minion for a push that will be difficult to stop, since the enemy has spent 4 Elixir in a now dead Hog.
• Instead of defending yourself against a Miner who is in a Tower with a decent amount of life, rush into the other lane, or drop a tank like PEKKA or Golem to build a shove. By doing this instead of defending the Miner, you have more Elixir in the field and it can become difficult for an opponent to stop you.
• Defend Electro wizard with Skeletons and let him attack your Tower once. By allowing him to hit the Tower, you gain an Elixir 3 advantage that can be used to punish your opponent later.

Important : It takes a lot of practice to know when you can afford to take any damage in your Tower, and when you should focus on defending. By mastering this principle, you will truly become a master at the Arena!

3.3. Time

The last topic we will cover when it comes to managing your Elixir is the Time feature . When it comes to time, troop placement and troop speed play an important role in how you can use time as a resource to gain Elixir.

Positioning your troops : By placing your troops in different locations, you can gain more Elixir than your opponent in order to have more troops in the field when they reach the bridge. By placing a slow troop on the bridge, you essentially have 0 seconds to gain more Elixir in order to support your troop, but if you put it behind the King's Tower, you have 16.8 seconds to build Elixir, which allows you force an even stronger push with the additional 6 Elixirs that you generated in the time it takes for the slow troop to reach the Tower.

Troop speeds : Slow troops give more time to generate Elixir before they hit the bridge, while faster troops give some time, but maybe not enough to actually make it advantageous.
Example : When placing a Giant on the bridge, you have 0 seconds to win the Elixir before your main push has begun. By placing a Giant behind the King's Tower, you have 16.8 seconds to win the Elixir before your shove has begun. By the time your giant reaches the bridge, you have built an additional 6 to 12 Elixir (1x and 2x Elixir) that you can use to defend the other lane or to support your main thrust.

Many thanks for reading this guide! If you've come this far, you should now have the tools you need to manage your Elixir.

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If you have any questions, feel free to leave it in the comments!

Want to learn by watching? I did the caption from the first part on How to Administer the Elixir and you can follow in the video below:

How to Administer the Elixir - Basic and Advanced Techniques - Clash Royale