Clash Royale: 10 Best Classic Challenge Decks (2024)

In Clash Royale, tournament rules are the best way to take an unfiltered look at the meta and prove your skills with your deck of choice. With all cards capped at level eleven, the playing field is even, and you’ll be allowed to battle it out until you win twelve games or lose three, whichever comes first.

Classic challenges are the cheaper Grand Challenge and are frequented by players who cannot afford the entry fee of the Grand Challenge. Though there’s usually lower trophy range players that frequent classic challenges, it’s almost as fun and has its own submeta that you should know about.

10 Royal Giant Monk

An Unexpected Duo That Performs Really Well

The Royal Giant Monk combo is an unlikely partnership between two very average cards that somehow works in Classic Challenges. The Monk is an excellent defensive card and can get the chip damage on opponent towers with his ability, making it especially great against Dagger duch*ess.

The Royal Giant is an excellent win condition with an evolution that Supercell has awarded for free to most players. Combine that with some great support cards, and you have a solid overall deck that has a high win percentage in Classic Challenge.

9 Golem Beatdown

A Solid Beatdown Deck To Overwhelm Even The Best Of Players

The Golem Beatdown deck has re-entered the meta ever since the release of the new tower troops, the Canoneer and the Dagger duch*ess, and has been a strong deck in every gamemode so far.

With the popularity of the Dagger duch*ess, the Golem Beatdown performs exceptionally against it, with the Golem tanking the duch*ess’s Daggers while support cards like the Electro Dragon and the Healer provide some defense. An evolution like the Bomber also does great damage and, since this deck is so easy to use, it’s fairly popular in Classic Challenges.

8 Mortar Miner Poison

Patience Is Key, But Simple Mistakes Can Be Devastating

This deck utilizes the Mortar's chip damage and the Miner's ability to bypass defenses to slowly wear down the opponent. The Poison spell helps clear out swarms and deal additional damage to buildings, but it requires good placement and timing to be successful and can be very rewarding in the right hands.

Patience is also key, as victory often comes through slowly chipping away at the opponent's towers or a sneaky evolved skeleton making it to the princess towers. With the Bats and the Knight, you have good defense against the dominating LavaLoon decks too, making it one of the most viable decks in the meta.

7 Log Bait

Bait The Log And Spell Cycle Your Way To Victory

Log Bait decks specialize in manipulating your opponent's spell usage. By strategically deploying low-cost cards like Goblins and Skeleton Barrel, you can bait out their spells, usually a Log, leaving them vulnerable to heavier hitters like the Goblin Barrel or Princess.

Mastering this mind game is key to outmaneuvering your opponent and securing victory. However, this deck requires a bunch of low-cost cards to ensure a constant stream of bait options and responses to your opponent's deck, so you can efficiently out cycle their counters before they know what’s going on.

6 X-Bow 3.3 Cycle

Chip Away As Much As You Can And Finish With A Rocket

The X-Bow 3.3 Cycle deck is a classic control deck that relies on strong defense and the X-Bow to slowly chip away at the opponent's towers. The low elixir cost allows for a quick cycle of cards to ensure you have the right answer for whatever your opponent throws at you.

This deck is all about patience and outlasting your opponent and, with great support cards, you can very easily dominate in Classic Challenges and counter the LavaLoon and Giant Graveyard decks with relative ease.

5 Mortar Graveyard

A Giant Graveyard Deck With Better Offense

The Mortar Graveyard combo combines the strategic chip damage to the Mortar with the surprise factor of the Graveyard spell. The goal is to use the Mortar to soften up a tower till you get its evolved form, then place it down alongside the Graveyard to successfully overwhelm the defenses with a swarm of Skeletons.

This deck can be very punishing against decks that lack good splash damage or rely heavily on single-target removal. To get the maximum advantage, you need to predict your opponent's placements and reactions to ensure the Graveyard effectively overwhelms them when you drop it.

4 Goblin Drill 2.6 Cycle

Fast And Versatile, A Quality Of Great Cycle Decks

The Goblin Drill is a fast-paced deck that thrives on relentless pressure. The Drill constantly chips away at the opponent's tower health, while cheap cycle cards like Knight, Skeletons, and The Log provide quick defense and allow you to cycle back to the Drill.

This deck lacks a traditional heavy win condition, so victories often come through strategically applying pressure and exploiting weaknesses in your opponent's deck, as ever since the Goblin Drill was nerfed, it has been a subpar card and only survives in the hands of good players.

3 Giant Graveyard

The Most Overplayed Deck Of All Time

The overused Giant Graveyard deck uses the Giant as the main win condition to absorb damage from defensive cards and the opponent's tower, while the Graveyard spell, alongside support cards like Poison and Musketeer, helps clear the way and deal some hefty damage.

This deck is effective against decks that struggle with swarm troops and lacks strong single-target removal to deal with the Giant. The Giant is super vulnerable to the Inferno Dragon or Tower, which are popular in some variations of the LavaLoon deck, so careful timing is necessary in certain matchups.

2 Giant Phoenix

A Colorful Variation Of The Giant Phoenix Combo To Counter The LavaLoons

The Giant Phoenix is a simple in principle deck that combines the tanking power of the Giant with the rebirth ability of the Phoenix. The Giant creates a shield for the Phoenix, allowing it to resurrect if it falls and deal a decent amount of damage.

Support cards like the Evolved Bomber and the Night Witch help deal with swarm troops and high-health troops, while the Void spell is used as the best deterrent to the Little Prince. This deck is well-rounded and can handle a variety of matchups, especially in Top Ladder, but fairs very well in Classic Challenges as well, especially against LavaLoon decks.

1 LavaLoon

Without A Doubt The Most Offensively Capable Deck Out There

The LavaLoon deck is a deck that relies heavily on the Lava Hound and Balloon to deal massive damage. The Lava Hound acts as a tank, drawing enemy defenses and deploying the Lava Pups upon its death, which can chip away at towers. The Balloon serves as the primary damage dealer, with one hit being enough to devastate the opponent, especially if they don’t have a viable counter.

The Barbarians and the Bomber in their evolved forms can practically counter everything in the meta except strong air defense like Inferno Dragon and a building to separate the Balloon from the Hound. There are a lot of variations around to specifically deal with those situations, making it the best deck to use in Classic Challenges and versatile enough to carry on over to every game mode.