Attack Damage

Attack damage is the amount of damage a unit is dealing with an unmodified basic attack; the base values are different for every hero. The total attack damage of a unit is the sum of main attack damage and bonus damage. Attack damage is reduced by armor.

Base attack damage
Base attack damage is the part of the main attack damage that never changes throughout a game. It consists of two values, a minimum and maximum amount. Every time an attack is issued, a random value between these two extremes is chosen. The best example for this is Chaos Knight since his base damage varies between 29 and 59. The difference of 30 is always part of the total attack damage, no matter how many attributes or how much bonus damage is acquired.

Main attack damage
Main attack damage is the damage value shown in white numbers on a hero's statistics consisting of the base damage with the damage granted by a hero's primary attribute on top. The only way to improve a hero's main attack damage is to increase its primary attribute. Attribute points can be increased by acquiring levels, as well as specific skills and items. This also means that the value of items granting attribute points differs depending on whether it is equipped by a strength, agility or intelligence hero.

The formula to calculate a hero's main attack damage is:


 * main attack damage = base damage + primary attribute points.

Attack damage of heroes

Bonus damage
Bonus damage is the damage value shown in green numbers on a units's statistics. Whenever an item or skill shows a +damage value, e.g. Phase Boots (+24 Damage), it increases the bonus damage of the affected unit.

The formula to calculate a hero's bonus damage is:


 * bonus damage = sum of flat bonuses + sum of flat reductions.

Attack damage types
There are several different types of attack damage, which determine how much damage a unit's attack does against certain armor types. Each of the 4 different attack types does either reduced, increased or unchanged damage against each of the armor types, on top of it being also manipulated by the armor value of the target.

Example

A hero with 100 attack damage attacking a siege unit which has 0 armor deals 50 damage to it, because the attack type "hero" deals 50% less damage against the armor type "structure", which is the siege creeps' and all buildings' armor type. If the siege creep would gain 5 armor, the 100 damage attack would deal (100 * 0.769 * 0.5 = ) 37.45 damage. The same attack would deal 76.9 damage to a unit with any other armor type, since attack type hero deals full damage to them.

This table shows how much damage each attack damage type deals against against each armor type, and which units use which attack damage type