History of Clash Royale's Most Polarizing Card

Clash Royale has added many controversial cards over the year, and Xbow is one of many. You either really love it or really hate it. Xbow is a very controversial siege win condition that was very hated even when balanced. Although considered high skill by many, is undoubtedly very unfun and unhealthy for the game. This is the history of this card and why it remains to be in a statistically underpowered position today.

Chapters:
00:00 Intro
00:56 Sponsor
01:57 2016
09:12 2017
12:41 Tesla Gets Buffed
14:35 2018
15:12 Draw Rate
18:20 The Downfall of Xbow
21:56 2019
24:56 2020
27:47 The Xbow's Final Change
29:15 Final Thoughts

Music List:
Fungal Wastes - Hollow Knight
Ruin Tower (Dead Sea) - Chrono Cross
Dreiton - C418
Forest - The Last Guardian
Auric Wilds - Guild Wars 2
Aria Math - C418
Infinite Amethyst - Lena Raine

[ofirnadel]

You forgot to mention the era when ice golem made troops and buildings immune to spell damage, indirectly buffing xbow

[Jozhin_s_Bazhin]

The part of Xbow that takes skill is when you have to make it connect trough 4 minitanks in mid-ladder.

[Coraledge]

I think we can all agree the xbow is a card

[UserMatt]

I bet they're gonna make evolved x bow that shoots inferno tower beam considering the mortar evolution

[KogasaTatara]

The 2016 April Fool's update also introduced a mortar that fired level 15 goblin barrels at max level.

[gems_cr]

30:40 It’s actually not bad for us for xbow to be on the weaker side because then the meta won’t actively try to destroy it. High skill cap deck than can succeed on the down low. Though I wouldn’t recommend learning how to play it in this day & age as it’ll take months or even years to master every matchup.

[thehr]

5:56 I like how an April Fools joke for the Mortar ends up being a reality 7 years later.

[sadiqabbaszade]

I am not even x-bow main, and probably no one ever will read this comment, but for what it is worth, I think x-bow one of the most skilled decks one person can ever play. I never respected people who beat me in tournaments with meta decks while being in the midladder themselves, but I always respect x-bow players who have to memorize 27834 predictions and millisecond timing plays just to get their x-bow to connect for 0.2 seconds before getting stroke by lightning or zap or crap. X-bow requires more skill to play than playing with your fav streamer's meta deck, and I will fight for this opinion

[fireboltchamploo]

Can't lie, I took like a 4 year break from Clash Royale and I was so lost coming back to it a couple months ago. Watching these videos are both educational and entertaining to listen to while working, keep up the badass content Gratz!

[MisterySB]

One thing I thought you could've mentioned was the broken pump + mirror + archer queen mini pekka deck that was dominating the meta for a little while when aq and mirror were overpowered

[JereMania]

Hog 2.6: defensive deck that exists
X-Bow 2.9: look at what they need to mimic a fraction of our power

[Michelletto]

These videos are so relaxing, I stopped playing this game but coming to see what's new and see the history is great. The Minecraft music and everything else you put also hits different at the end of the videos, It gives these videos such a great send-off. Thank you for making all of your videos man and I hope you only grow from here

[bcnm-bs]

Tip: never play hog rider to counter xbow when the timer on the xbow is 3/4 clocked in. If you do the hog rider will jump the river and for the fraction of a second the hog is in the air the xbow will lock on to the tower

[armokil]

0:42 hearing someone say ‘2020’ as if it was ages ago hurts me so much. i still feel like it was only a few months ago man 😭

[dzbrio]

I don't even play clash royale anymore but your content is so fantastic. I get so much nostalgia thinking back through the history of the game with your videos. Thank you for satisfying this niche interest so damn well.

[dark_matter]

I don't understand why people STILL hate Xbow so much. It's so bad. I literally never lose to Xbow whenever I face it, and I'm playing around 7800 trophies. Half the entire card selection in the game counters it, and the meta archetypes are all extremely oppressive against Xbow. But most of all, how is playing against Hog EQ with evo FC any less boring than playing against Xbow? Playing Xbow takes an extreme amount of skill and like the video points out, it's not worth it. Literally every other deck is easier to play with easier success. Playing Hog is literally as much of a snoozefest as it gets. Every single card/evolution that gets added has been hard countering the Xbow. So if you can't beat Xbow, I'm sorry to tell you, but you're trash at this game.

[sk_]

Xbow deserves a buff 🥹

I appreciate you making a long and comprehensive video on this! My personal opinion is that Xbow is inherently a very weak card in its current state, so the archetype has success due to either the merits of broken support cards in the meta itself, or simply the best players and their skill level. I would love to see my favorite card get a buff one day, but I don't foresee it happening anytime soon, solely due to how much hate the archetype gets from the community.

[RandooGaming]

I love it when the content creator puts the sponsor on its own segment, it makes it very easy to skip

[eamoncasey]

It’s crazy to see how fundamental changes to the game did more to the card’s success more than any balance changes ever did

[eclipse]

As someone who's been around the game for a long enough period (Currently not active in it anymore), I wonder if you'll do a video on Sparky.

It's been a card that has been so... under the radar for as long as I remember it. I even remember giving it a rework idea to make it much more flexible that people liked.

But... nowadays, Idk it's fate, or if it's been touched at all, so I'm curious to see how it went.