Troq Bashar, the Well-meaning Beast

A beginner's guide to learning the basic gameplan and strategy of Troq Bashar, the Well-meaning Beast.

Beginner's Guide to Troq Bashar, the Well-meaning Beast

Troq is a well meaning minotaur that likes to smash things and drink lots of Giant Growth potions. He isn't too bright so he lets smarter people do the thinking for him.

Troq's like for smashing stuff really shines through his innate (Giant Growth). Giant Growth allows him to attach successful blocks to his character card (up to two) and for each card attached Troq's normal throws and normal attacks do +1 damage. Once he has two attached blocks any further successful blocks will be discarded (Troq still draws a card though).

Troq is a Grappler and out of the Grapplers he has the fastest throws on average. His throws are very damaging when he is fully grown. Troq also has efficient face cards that have great utility. Troq just likes to play single cards or small combos for maximum smash effect.

Troq's stature also comes through in the amount of HP he has. At 95hp he has the second highest starting health in the game.



The card on the left is Troq's fastest normal throw and fast it certainly is. At speed 2.0 it will outspeed nearly every throw in the game. Troq also has high ranked normal attacks. His normals are slow however, ending in .8. What is especially exciting about Troq's throws is it is his easiest way to take advantage of his innate. If Troq throws then follows up with an 8 normal and is fully grown he will deal 20 damage to the opponent. This is amazing for a Grappler with those blindingly fast throws.



Troq's face cards all have great utility. For starters his J attack, Bull Rush, is the respectable speed of 2.2 at 7 damage for the single card. It is an ender so it will never do more then 7 damage but it can beat out a lot other attacks and allow Troq to put on some pressure.

Bull Charge is a lot slower at speed 3.4 but it does 10 damage. It's main use most of the time is for sticking on the end of normal attack combos when Troq has no other follow ups or as a dodge follow up when Troq isn't fully grown.

The cards utility doesn't stop with just two different attacks. It also has the special ability Troq Armor (maybe Troq learned a trick or two from Onimaru) which allows both sides of this cards to beat faster normal attacks. This opens up Bull Charge to be used against characters that like to normal attack a lot.



The fabulous Up Hawk, Troq is so big and strong that he can fly for a bit (at least Troq thinks he can).

Up Hawk is a great card. The fast speed of 0.8 allows Troq to beat many scary combo starting cards which will keep him safe from aggressive opponents. It also does a decent 9 damage.

This is Troq's fastest attack and will cause the opponent great despair as their high damaging options keep getting outsped.



Troq continues his domination of normal attacks with his Lockhorn Skewer throw. It's special ability says it beats normals of speed 5.0 or faster. The opponent needs to attack with more then wimpy normals if they want to hurt Troq.

Lockhorn Skewer is a very good card. 15 damage on a speed 2.4 throw that grabs fast normals? Troq will take as many of these as he can get.



Troq keeps of the good speeds on his Eagle Totem ace attack. It requires two aces but does 20 damage and is at the all important speed 1.0. This attack is one of Troq's scariest tools. The opponents fear of this attack can potentially allow Troq to get in more throw wins. When Troq is fully grown a throw win does just as much damage as the Eagle Totem so make the most of this threat.

Troq's Beast Unleashed Super throw is his highest damage move (as it is will all Grapplers). It is a 0.0 speed throw that does 45 damage for three aces!! that's a lot of damage especially since Troq can put the opponent in the deadly dodge/super throw mix up that if he gets right the opponent can't do anything about it (unless they have a joker of course).

There is one downside to Beast Unleashed it requires Troq have two attached blocks and when he plays it he returns both attached blocks back to his hand. This means it takes awhile for Troq to set up Beast Unleashed and Troq very seldom gets a second chance to land Beast Unleashed if the first one misses.



Troq has one last ability, War Stomp, and this one isn't a combat ability. During the draw phase Troq can discard this card to draw a card, Knock Down the opponent, and the opponent discards a card. Troq can not use this ability if he himself is Knocked Down.

This card is fantastic. It has the Troq theme of lots of utility. Being able to draw a card is good, Knocking down the opponent is good, making the opponent discard a card is awesome. War Stomp allows Troq to put serious pressure on the opponent and if he stores a lot of them up he can play them all at once and wreck the opponents hand. This works especially well if the opponent has gone very low on cards or if they've just spent a lot of cards to power up.

The downside to it is it's on a dodge card. Troq is already low on dodges to begin with. He has 8 total dodges in his deck and this amazing ability is on half of them.



Troq is not without his weaknesses. As said before he doesn't have many dodges. Also even though his face card attacks have great utility and solid speed they only deal 7 and 9 damage. Which is a lot lower then other characters can get off of their combos that connect.

Troq also has a hard time building a hand. His innate is both a blessing and a curse. It is good for the first two blocks but after that it is just hurting Troq's hand building. This translates into it being harder for Troq to get his very valuable aces (because it is harder for him to power up) then every other character in the game.

There you have Troq Bashar. If you want to play a character that just likes to smash stuff with very strong throws and don't mind the hand building weakness you should give Troq a try.

-This guide was posted with permission of the author, ClanNatioy.