X-Bow

X-Bow is a 6-Elixir Epic building that, once placed, locks onto whichever enemy tower is in range and fires on it automatically for as long as it survives (up to 30 seconds before it needs replacing). Its huge range lets it reach the enemy tower from well behind the river in the right spot, which is what makes it the backbone of slow, grindy 'siege' decks — the X-Bow itself can't hit air troops, so the whole deck is built around cheap defensive buildings and cycle troops that keep it alive while it does the damage. In August 2026 Supercell rebalanced X-Bow's attack: it now hits harder but slower, fixing a bug where it wasted shots on ground troops that died right at the edge of its range. The net effect is a small increase in overall damage output rather than a real nerf or buff.

• X-Bow costs 6 Elixir, is an Epic-rarity Building, and only targets ground units — it has no way to answer air troops on its own, so every X-Bow deck needs separate anti-air cover.

• X-Bow has an 11.5-tile range, one of the longest attack ranges of any card in the game, and takes 3.5 seconds to deploy before it starts firing.

• Once it locks onto a tower, X-Bow keeps firing for up to 30 seconds before it needs to be replaced or reinforced — a key reason siege decks try to protect it rather than let it die and restart the clock.

• As of the August 2026 balance update, X-Bow fires more slowly but hits much harder: at level 11 it now deals 58 damage every 0.4 seconds (about 145 damage per second), up slightly from before the patch.

• Before the August 2026 patch, X-Bow hit for 43 damage every 0.3 seconds at level 11 (about 143 damage per second) — this is now out of date.

• X-Bow was first playable during Clash Royale's limited regional soft-launch on 4 January 2016 (iOS only, in a handful of countries including Canada, Australia, and the Nordics), roughly two months before the game's worldwide release on 2 March 2016.

• The classic X-Bow deck plants the building safely behind a wall of cheap defensive cards — commonly Tesla, Archers, Ice Spirit, Skeletons, and Knight — while Fireball and The Log clear out anything trying to rush it, letting the X-Bow slowly grind down a tower from range.

• X-Bow decks are typically beaten with air troops (since X-Bow can't shoot back), fast-cycle pressure, or spells like Zap that can re-target it, plus cheap defensive buildings such as Cannon or Tombstone to distract it while the tower finishes it off.