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Basic attack icon

A basic attack (also called a standard, normal, or auto attack) is the default means by which a unit deals damage. The player orders their champion to perform a basic attack when they right-click on an enemy, or when the "attack-move" command is used (default A); idle champions may also automatically chase and attack targets that venture too close to them, if the option to "auto-attack" is enabled.

Turrets, minions, and most monsters perform basic attacks as their only method of dealing damage.

A basic attack under normal circumstances deals Attack damage icon 100% AD physical damage. A unit's attack timer determines the time it takes to fire a basic attack and wait for a new one to be available; it is reduced by attack speed and reset by basic attack resets.

Acquisition[]

In order for an attacker to initiate an attack, they must first acquire a target. Acquisition occurs when an attacker is ordered to attack a valid target, as a result of an attack command, automatic target aquisition, or the forced action effects Taunt icon taunt or Berserk icon berserk. The attacker will attempt to attack the unit if it is within their Range icon attack range, or attempt to move toward it until their attack range meets its Gameplay radius gameplay radius, and then stop moving and attempt to attack the target. Acquisition of the target will continue until the attacker is given a new target, attacking is canceled by any means, or the target becomes invalid.

Auto-attacking[]

By default, when champions are idle they automatically acquire the nearest enemy unit within their Acquisition range acquisition range as their target. This feature is called automatic target acquisition or simply auto-attacking and can be toggled from the settings > 'Game' tab.

Auto-attacking can be temporarily disabled by holding down the "hold position" key (default J), or by issuing a stop command (default S), which stops all orders including auto-attacking until a new order is manually provided by the player.

Attack-move[]

Attack-move commands allow a champion to move toward a given destination location while scanning for a valid hostile within Acquisition range acquisition range. Attack-move has two modes:

  • When using regular attack-move (default A), the player's Range icon attack range indicator becomes visible and they may select either a location or a target by left-clicking. Selecting a location scans to acquire the nearest target to the champion's position. Selecting a target directly acquires it without scanning, like a normal attack order.
  • When using attack-move click (default Shift + Right Click), the champion performs the above, but without the player having to select separately. The position of the player's cursor when issuing the command is assumed to be the selection position. The range indicator is not visible when using attack-move click.

The "Attack move on cursor" option changes the targeting behavior of attack-move commands. It can be toggled from the settings > 'Game' tab.

  • If this option is enabled: the champion may also scan to acquire the nearest target in a circle around the cursor's position within or near attack range.
  • If this option is disabled, or a target cannot be found using the cursor's position within or near attack range: attack-move commands use the default behavior of the champion's position.

Behaviour[]

General[]

A basic attack cannot be avoided under normal circumstances once the attacker has begun their attack; it also cannot lose its target and it may hit them despite any subsequent changes in position. The following are exceptions to this rule and will cause basic attacks to fail:

  • Parrying effects, which negate the attack's effects entirely:
  • Attacking becomes disabled, rendering basic attacks unable to be declared. This includes (this lists those that have the capability to do so):
  • The attack's windup is interrupted, if the:
    • Attacker is issued a different command
    • Attacker or the target Death dies
    • Target becomes Untargetable icon untargetable
    • Target is too far away
    • Target is no longer in Sight icon sight

Certain basic attacks can be physically dodged (by using mobility spells or quickly moving out of the way) as they do not follow their target after being fired, though they travel fast enough that they are unlikely to be dodged. These are: Graves' Graves' New Destiny New Destiny and Twitch's Twitch's Spray and Pray Spray and Pray.

Champion[]

When a champion is ordered to attack a valid target and acquisition of them continues without interruption (meaning the champion is left to continue attacking the same, valid target on their own), delays may emerge. These delays are caused by potential target checks. The champion may also not perfectly stop to attack the target at attack range, but may finish their movement at a slightly closer distance before attacking.

Due to this behavior, manual cycling of issued movement and attack commands is faster and more precise than automatic orders.

Many champions have abilities that will affect their basic attacks in some way or form. Such abilities are treated like basic attacks, which means they may trigger on-hit effects and/or ability effects.

Minions[]

Minions will automatically attack their closest target by default, but may change targets in a similar manner to turrets.

Monsters[]

The majority of monsters only use basic attacks that deal physical damage, the exceptions are:

Turrets[]

Turrets have armor penetration, and when hitting a Champion icon champion, they additionally deal more damage to any champion for each consecutive attack for each consecutive attack, up to a cap.

The behavior of turrets as well as their basic attacks' damage are described on the corresponding page.

The only exception to the above is the Nexus Obelisk (also called the Fountain Laser) that deals Fear Beyond Death 2 a special type of true damage which ignores all kinds of damage reduction, untargetability and damage immunity effects and its attack does not have a missile travel speed.

Structures[]

Structures can normally only be damaged by basic attacks. However, some abilities that function like basic attacks (e.g. Fiora's Fiora's Lunge Lunge, Trundle's Trundle's Chomp Chomp, Senna's Senna's Piercing Darkness Piercing Darkness, etc.) and certain effects such as Tristana's Tristana's Explosive Charge Explosive Charge and Ziggs' Ziggs' Satchel Charge Satchel Charge are special-cased to be able to target and deal damage to turrets.

Vision[]

Basic attacking while hiding in brush or in fog of war will reveal the attacking unit. If in brush, attacking will reveal all allies within to the enemy.

Damage[]

Basic attacks always deal physical damage, with some exceptions.

The following will modify the attack's total damage to magic damage:

Finally, Corki's Corki's Hextech Munitions Hextech Munitions and Yone's Yone's Way of the Hunter Way of the Hunter can modify the attack's total damage to part physical and part magic damage, and Camille's Camille's Empowered Precision Protocol Empowered Precision Protocol will modify the attack's total damage to part physical and part true damage.

Barring the exceptions above, certain items, buffs, and abilities may cause the attacker to deal additional damage of any subtype on top of their base physical damage. The physical damage dealt by basic attacks benefits from the attacker's Attack damage icon attack damage stat and is reduced by the target's Armor icon armor.

When basic attacking a turret, Champion icon champion attacks deal 100% base AD (+ 100% bonus AD) (+ 60% AP):

  • Physical damage, if 100% bonus AD > 60% AP
  • Magic damage, if 100% bonus AD < 60% AP

Attack speed[]

See also: List of champions/Basic attacks

The rate at which a champion attacks is called Attack speed icon attack speed and is by default capped at 2.5 attacks per second, though certain abilities and runes can modify this value.

Attack timer[]

Attack timer = 1 ÷ total attack speed

Like abilities, basic attacks have an uptime when a basic attack is available, and a downtime when the basic attack is on-cooldown.

Attacks follow a two-phase period called the attack timer, which consists of:

  1. The windup, during which an attacker executes a basic attack.
  2. The cooldown, during which an attacker cannot execute a basic attack.

Starting a windup also starts counting the attack timer.

  • When the windup is interrupted by any means, the attack timer stops counting and resets to zero. A basic attack has not been launched and a new windup may begin whenever allowed/possible.
  • When the windup completes and a basic attack has been launched, the attack timer continues on to incur its cooldown phase.
  • When the cooldown completes, the attack timer also ends, allowing a new windup to begin.

Optimizing movement commands after launching an attack is known as stutter-stepping.

Windup[]

A unit's attack windup is the portion of their attack which must be completed in order to launch it. The attacker must be standing in place, in order to complete the windup.

  • Upon the windup completing for non-projectile attacks, the attack simultaneously launches and hits the target.
  • Upon the windup completing for projectile attacks, launching the attack creates a projectile, which follows and hits the target shortly after.

The windup and therefore the attack is canceled by issuing a different command at any point before the moment of launching. After launching the attack, commands may be freely input without penalty.

Normally, a champion's windup time scales the same as their attack's total time, proportionally to their attack speed given both bonuses and Cripple icon cripples. For champions that are given a windup modifier (a value different from the default 1) by the game rules, the actual duration of their windup is scaled against the expected value by that amount. Base windup time refers to the champion's windup time at level 1 and with no attack speed bonuses.

All champions are implicitly given a windup percent by the game rules, the percentage of the attack's total time that the windup takes up. There are currently two different ways of determining the windup percent — most newer champions use an independent formula while all others utilize a constant. This difference does not affect gameplay.

The original way of calculating the windup percent is  where:

attackOffset is a given positive or negative decimal value.

The updated way of calculating the windup percent is  where:

attackCastTime is a given positive decimal value in seconds
attackTotalTime is a given positive decimal value in seconds, larger than attackCastTime

Champions' windup time generally makes up around 15–30% of their attack's total time, different for each champion.

Assuming:

  • All attack speed values are in decimal form.
  • WindupPercent = the statistic as a decimal
  • WindupModifier = the statistic as a decimal, defaults to 1
  • currentAttackTotalTime = 1 ÷ total attack speed
  • baseWindupTime = WindupPercent ÷ base attack speed

Then to calculate a champion's current windup time, use the following formulas:

  1. General form:
    baseWindupTime + WindupModifier  ×  { currentAttackTotalTime  ×  WindupPercentbaseWindupTime }
  2. If the champion's base attack speed and attack speed ratio are equal, the formula can be adjusted to:
    currentAttackTotalTime  ×  WindupPercent  ×  { 1 + bonus attack speed  ×  (1 - WindupModifier) }
  3. If the champion has no windup modifier and their base attack speed and attack speed ratio are equal, the formula can be simplified to:
    currentAttackTotalTime  ×  WindupPercent
    or
    baseWindupTime  ÷  {bonus attack speed + 1}

Resets[]

The cast of certain abilities and item actives will (forcibly) reset the attack timer to zero. Depending on which phase of the attack the player casts them in, this effect may be detrimental or beneficial to the player:

  • Resetting during the windup means that the current attack is canceled, thus delaying the windup and launch of the next attack.
  • Resetting during the cooldown means that the remaining cooldown is negated, thus allowing a new windup to begin faster than normal.

Hail of Blades Hail of Blades does not consume a stack from launched attacks that have been reset.

Attack_Resets

Attack Resets

The following abilities will reset the basic attack timer after use:

Special Cases[]

Bel'Veth's Bel'Veth's Void Surge Void Surge, Kai'Sa's Kai'Sa's Killer Instinct Killer Instinct, K'Sante's K'Sante's Ntofo Strikes Ntofo Strikes and Footwork Footwork, Gwen's Gwen's Skip 'n Slash Skip 'n Slash, Rell's Rell's Ferromancy: Mount Up Ferromancy: Mount Up, Riven's Riven's Broken Wings Broken Wings, Hextech Rocketbelt Hextech Rocketbelt (Upgraded Aeropack Upgraded Aeropack)*, and Titanic Hydra Titanic Hydra cause the next basic attack to occur more quickly. This is not considered a basic attack reset for Hail of Blades Hail of Blades.

Certain abilities that reset the attack timer will cause the caster to dash before they are able to declare a basic attack again, meaning they will not be able to follow up with their next basic attack as quickly due to the time spent performing the dash. In order to bypass this lockout time, the caster can try to end the dash prematurely, such as dashing into a wall or dashing in place (if applicable). This is the case as the caster spends less time dashing and decreases the amount of time it takes to execute their next attack.

Uncancellable Windup[]

A basic attack that is not Silence icon interruptible is classified as having an Relentless Force 2 uncancellable windup. Basic attacks with uncancellable windups are only stopped by Death death, Silence icon polymorph, Quinn's Quinn's Vault Vault, and in some cases, Untargetable icon untargetability and range. These include:

Untargetability interactions[]

The following table features uncancellable windups that will be cancelled by the target becoming Untargetable icon untargetable during the windup and those that will complete the windup regardless of the target being targetable or not.

Range interactions[]

The following table features uncancellable windups that will cancel from the target moving too far away during the windup and those that will complete regardless of the target's location.

Empowered Basic Attack[]

To see the items and runes that deal bonus damage with basic attacks, see attack effects.

Modified Damage[]

The following champion abilities have their basic attack dealing modified damage:

Bonus Damage[]

The following champion abilities will empower their basic attack to deal bonus damage:

Damage over Time[]

The following champion abilities will empower their basic attack to deal additional damage over time:

Others[]

The following champion abilities will empower their basic attack to give another bonus:

Trivia[]

  • Each unit that can perform basic attacks has a unique firing and recovery animation for their attack's windup and winddown which represents the physical action of drawing into and away from an attack.
    • A champion's basic attack animation may be modified by skins.
    • Turrets only display their acquired target and the fired attack, for game clarity purposes (also, turrets are thematically stationary).
  • Hostile turrets are the only units in the game that visually and unambiguously mark an acquired target, specifically with a line from their apex to their target.
  • In the initial iteration, the icon used to denote basic attacks is reused from an alpha item with unknown effects called Long Staff Long Staff.
  • "Basic" comes from the fact that "attack" used to refer to any hostile action a champion could perform, with "special attacks" referring to ability-based actions. Effects such as Unbreakable Unbreakable used to refer to "attacks" in their in-game tooltips, referring to what we would now distinguish as basic attacks and abilities. The use of "attack" to refer to anything other than "basic attacks" has generally been discontinued, but affixing the term with 'basic' remains.


References[]


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