Hey everyone this is yarn from Orange Juice

Elixir Collector's and spawners are passive buildings that allow you to build an elixir advantage over time

A direct advantage is gained overtime with an Elixir Collector

An indirect advantage is banking elixir by planting a spawner on the map

Using a pump forces your opponent to address it, otherwise if it's left ignored

They risk being at an elixir disadvantage

This advantage allows you to punish them with high cost combos, or rapid cycle cards

Placement of the pump is critical at being able to pump up effectively

Placing the pump behind your arena tower is good against decks that don't have miner

It's also a very good placement if they have poison

Planting it in the back limits the range they can poison your side of the map

It gives you more options to place defending troops without being captured by poison

Always plant the elixir collector near the tower with higher health

This can force your opponent to attack the other side

If your opponent ignores it, you’ll be able to passively build for a strong push

When planting it beside the King’s tower, the most likely positions the Miner is coming from will either be here, or here

Planting your defending card here is best to counter the two most likely miner positions

This is the Miner gamble position, if the Miner is planted there, and you leave him alone, he’ll activate your King’s Tower

If a Miner is planted on any of these positions, and you want to push the other side with a Musketeer

She has the range to reach these tiles

This placement is good at protecting the pump from the Miner

He’ll be targeted by both towers

Rocket won’t be able to target both the crown tower and elixir collector

But this position is vulnerable to poison

It allows your opponent to poison your pump, tower, and front of field to support their push

The Elixir pump can also allow you to double pull cards that target buildings

If the elixir collector was low on health

You don't lose much elixir

You also gain an opportunity to manipulate your opponents units to activate your King's tower early

This doesn't work if the elixir pump is 1 tile in the other lane

If you're in a pinch, you can use them to distract or pull units away from your tower

Knowing when to pump is critical for great pump play

If you're at an elixir advantage

Or you know your opponents counter to your pump is out of rotation

It's a good time to pump

You shouldn't pump if you don't have any units to defend

Generally after a huge positive elixir trade, it's safe to pump up

Shoutout to MRacing for discovering you can counter Triple Musketeers with Guards & Ice Spirit

Spells are another common way to deal with the collector

However, it can leave you with an elixir or card disadvantage

If that's your only way to attack the pump

Miners are a direct counter to the pump for a positive elixir trade if you have one

Be mindful to always switch up your placement so it's always harder to counter your Miner

Spawner cards are a great way to get constant pressure onto a lane

Your opponent will need to address the spawner

Or face chip damage dealt to their tower

You can also use spawners to apply pressure to both lanes simultaneously

They can be difficult to deal with if you don't have the correct cards in your deck

Splash units such as Bomber do well against spawner decks

Like the Elixir Pump

Placement is key when using spawner type cards

To pressure a certain lane

You'll want to plant your spawner in the middle and offset it towards the lane you want to pressure

If you have one spawner in the lane, and you're able to cycle to a second one

You should place the second one behind the crown tower so they don't get easily countered by spells

Poison and lightning are your greatest enemies

The Tombstone can be used like a defensive structure

In most cases you can treat the Tombstone like you would a Cannon

For example you can pull a Giant with a maximum distance using a 4 - 3 plant

Its great for distracting single target units, slowing down their push so you can mount your defence

Each Mortar attack is very slow, but strong

A single Skeleton can distract the Mortar

The Skeleton spawns are also amazing at absorbing Sparky blasts

It's also great at distracting the Princess

You can also perform a surprise defensive tombstone by placing it directly under the enemy

By doing this, you can push the unit out of range and also surround them with the Skeletons that spawn

You can even push back the Royal Giant with the Tombstone

You can't even do that with a Cannon

Or it can simply be used to force a Musketeer to retarget, for a positive elixir trade

If you couldn't plant the Tombstone in time to pull the Hog, it's effective as a clutch defense

Planting it last second, the spawned Skeletons deal quite a bit of damage to the Hog

Shoutout to Woody the Mortar Mauler from Reddit Alpha for these tips

Volunteering his time to help me compile the script for this video

For those of you who don't know him, he's one of best Mortar and Tombstone players in the game

You can catch him on Twitch by following the link in the description below

Hope you enjoy his replay

Thanks for watching

Stay tuned, for more quality OJ