9 Kings: How to Win with a Mad Bomber Mono Deck Build

To win a run in 9 Kings using only Mad Bombers, draft duplicate Bomber cards to merge star levels, stack attack speed perks to eliminate long throwing delays, and anchor all units across the back two grid rows. Because a mono build eliminates defensive frontline units like Soldiers or Paladins, you must destroy incoming waves at range before melee troops can reach your fragile backline.

Core Mechanics and Weaknesses

The Mad Bomber lobs explosive projectiles that deal burst area-of-effect (AoE) damage upon impact. Overlapping blasts easily wipe out tightly clustered infantry formations. However, relying strictly on Mad Bombers introduces three severe mechanical vulnerabilities:

Slow Attack Cycles: Wind-up animations and projectile travel times create wide delays between volleys, allowing fast enemies to close the gap unchecked.
Low Durability: Mad Bombers have minimal base health and no protective armor, causing them to fall quickly if engaged in melee combat.
No Built-in Frontline: Running a single-unit deck sacrifices dedicated meat shields, meaning any breach in targeting immediately exposes your primary damage dealers.

Card Drafting and Deck Thinning

Keep your deck thin by rejecting alternative combat units. Drafting unwanted infantry or secondary ranged troops dilutes your card pool, reduces how often Mad Bombers appear, and wastes gold needed for star merges. If offered cards that do not improve your explosive damage or attack rate, spend reroll currency or select neutral economic perks instead of taking clutter troops.

Draft Option	Priority	Strategic Justification
Mad Bomber Copies	Essential	Merges duplicate cards into higher star tiers, increasing base health and blast damage.
Attack Speed & Cooldown Perks	High	Shortens the delay between bomb volleys so fast runners cannot cross the field.
Area Damage & Radius Perks	High	Expands blast shockwaves to ensure overlapping explosions hit entire waves.
Utility Walls & Traps	Situational	Stalls aggressive bosses and rushing units without consuming combat unit slots.
Alternative Unit Cards	Skip	Pollutes future shop offerings and deprives Bombers of merge opportunities.

Grid Placement and Formation

Deploy Mad Bombers exclusively along the bottom two rows of your board. This positioning forces enemy units to traverse the maximum board distance, giving your artillery time to complete their throwing animations.

Staggered Depths: Alternate units between the back row and the second-to-last row. Staggering prevents enemy cleave attacks and AoE spells from eliminating multiple Bombers at once.
Central Heavy Hitters: Place your highest-star Mad Bombers in the central columns. This gives them wide firing angles across both left and right approach paths.
Perimeter Anchors: Keep baseline, un-upgraded Bombers on the outer edges to divert flanking enemies and provide side-lane suppression.

Progression by Campaign Year

Adjust your spending and perk priorities across the campaign to match expanding enemy formations:

Years 1 to 3

Focus entirely on securing duplicate Bombers to achieve level-two merges by Year 3. Base-tier Bombers struggle with low attack speeds and frail health pools. If shops do not offer Bomber duplicates early, avoid wasting gold on speculative rerolls. Save your currency to meet interest thresholds so you can purchase multiple copies once they appear.

Years 4 to 6

Enemy wave sizes expand significantly during the mid-game, maximizing the return on investment for AoE damage. Reinvest combat earnings into perks that boost blast radius, projectile flight speed, and flat damage bonuses. Applying flat damage bonuses across dozens of grouped enemies in a blast radius clears mid-game swarms reliably.

Years 7 to 9

Pivot your draft priorities toward boss elimination. Final Kings possess massive health pools that survive standard explosive damage. Invest late-game gold into percentage-based damage scaling, critical hit multipliers, and cooldown reduction perks to maintain focused, sustained single-target burst against bosses.

Countering Problem Matchups

Adjust your tactics when facing specific enemy archetypes:

Swarm Regiments (Skeletons, Light Infantry): Clustered infantry march in tight formations. Overlapping explosive shockwaves naturally wipe these waves out in seconds without requiring formation shifts.
Cavalry and Fast Rushers: Mounted units can cross the board before a second bomb volley lands. Prioritize early attack speed perks to reduce throw intervals, and place a sacrificial, lower-star Bomber one tile forward to absorb the initial charge.
Long-Range Artillery and Towers: Fortified enemy structures can outrange standard bomb arcs. Draft movement speed or range expansion perks so your Bombers step into firing range and release their payloads before taking sustained damage.