Goblin Drill

A 4-Elixir Epic building that can be dropped anywhere in the arena, Goblin Drill burrows underground on deployment and resurfaces about a second later, hitting nearby troops with a burst of area damage before settling in to pump out a Goblin every 3 seconds until its 10-second lifetime runs out. Its Evolution, Whack-A-Drill, lets it submerge and pop back up near the enemy tower twice more as it loses health, dropping bonus Goblins each time. An August 2026 balance change stripped the base card's guaranteed Crown Tower damage in exchange for stronger spawned Goblins, while the Evolution's bonus-Goblin counts have swung through several buffs and nerfs since its 2024 debut.

• Goblin Drill is a 4-Elixir Epic building that arrived on 11 July 2021. It can be placed anywhere in the arena — even right next to the enemy's tower — and immediately burrows underground, bursting back out about one second later. At tournament standard it has 1,313 hitpoints, though that health also drains on its own at roughly 20 hitpoints per second once it's active, and the whole structure disappears 10 seconds after being deployed regardless of how much health remains.

• When the Goblin Drill breaks the surface, it blasts the immediate area for 84 damage, punishing any troops standing on top of it. After that it stays put and pumps out a single Goblin every 3 seconds for the rest of its lifetime — the Drill itself never attacks, so every bit of its ongoing damage comes from the Goblins it spawns rather than the building.

• The Goblins that climb out of the Drill are individually fragile but quick: at tournament standard each one has 202 hitpoints, moves at Very Fast speed, and only fights at melee range. Their very first swing lands in just 0.4 seconds — nearly three times faster than their normal 1.1-second hit speed — so a freshly spawned Goblin can often land a free hit before the enemy reacts.

• EvolutionThe Evolved Goblin Drill costs the same 4 Elixir and starts with identical stats, but adds an ability called Whack-A-Drill. Rather than surfacing only once, it burrows back underground and pops up again at a new spot near the tower it's attacking each time its health falls to another third — first at 66% health, then again at 33% — two extra appearances in total. Each of those resurfacing events also drops off bonus Goblins on top of its regular 3-second spawn cycle: currently two extra Goblins on the first resurface and one more on the second, which makes a fully evolved Drill very hard to clear out with just one card.

• EvolutionHow many bonus Goblins the evolved Drill drops on its second resurface has swung back and forth. In February 2026, Supercell doubled it from one Goblin to two after the Evolution had been struggling to find a place in the meta. The buff worked too well — Evolved Goblin Drill jumped to the top of the competitive Ranked meta — so Supercell reverted it back down to one Goblin on the second resurface only three months later, in May 2026, while it looked for a different way to balance the card.

• In an August 2026 balance update, Supercell removed Goblin Drill's guaranteed Crown Tower damage entirely — it had previously always dealt a flat 26 damage to a tower the instant it surfaced beside one, so a Drill that gets destroyed the moment it pops up now deals no tower damage at all. As partial compensation, the damage on its spawned Goblins was increased by about 4%, up from their previous 120 damage per hit (roughly 109 damage per second).

• In April 2025, Supercell slowed the standalone Goblins card's first attack from 0.4 to 0.6 seconds to tone down Goblin Gang, but specifically excluded Goblins spawned from other cards from that change — Goblin Drill included, alongside Goblin Barrel, Goblin Curse, Evolved Goblin Giant, and Evolved Mortar. That's part of why Goblins coming out of a Goblin Drill still swing for their first hit in just 0.4 seconds today.

• The Drill's pop-up hit also knocks back anything standing on top of it, which is enough to interrupt the charge windup of units like Battle Ram, Prince, Dark Prince, Ram Rider, and Evolved Royal Recruits — canceling their bonus charge damage before it connects, often trading well for just 4 Elixir. The Drill also doesn't leave empty-handed when it dies: once it's finally destroyed, it drops a couple of extra Goblins right where it stood.