LoL Auto Attack Guide: Attack-Move, Kiting and Windup Cancels

Most players who can't kite are using the slower of the two attack-move keys. Auto attacking also has settings that change how it picks targets, and exactly three ways to fail.

League of Legends Guide

Auto Attacking

Attack-Move and Kiting

Auto attacking looks like the part of League with no depth in it, and it's the part with the most settings attached. Two of them decide whether kiting feels natural or impossible.

Standing Still Attack-Move The Cursor Setting Attacks Track How an Attack Fails FAQ

Standing still means your champion picks its own targets

When idle, a champion automatically acquires the nearest enemy inside its acquisition range and starts attacking. That's a setting (Game tab) and you can turn it off.

You can also suppress it in the moment with hold position or the stop command (both cancel every standing order until you give a new one). Both are worth binding if you've ever auto attacked a minion you were specifically trying not to push.

Attack-move comes in two flavors

The standard attack-move key shows your attack range indicator and then waits for you to click a point or a target. Attack-move click does the same job in one motion, using wherever the cursor already is, and never shows the indicator.

Most players who feel like they can't kite are using the two-step version under pressure. The one-button version is the same command with the pause removed, and switching is usually worth one uncomfortable evening.

One setting changes which target it finds

By default an attack-move scans for the nearest enemy to your champion. Turn on the cursor option and it scans around your cursor instead (provided something is in or near attack range), falling back to the default when it finds nothing.

That's the difference between reliably hitting the enemy you're pointing at and reliably hitting whichever minion happened to be nearest your feet.

Once an attack starts, it doesn't miss

Basic attacks track. The target can flash, dash or walk anywhere they like after the attack has begun and it still lands, because there's nothing to dodge in the usual sense.

Two attacks surprised us: they fire in a direction and can be sidestepped. They belong to Graves and to Twitch under his ultimate (both travel fast enough that it almost never happens).

Exactly three ways an attack fails

• It gets parried (dodged, blocked or blinded), which deletes it outright.
• You can't declare one at all (you're disarmed, channeling or otherwise locked out).
• The windup gets interrupted: you issue another order too early, the target blinks out of your vision or becomes untargetable, or one of you walks too far away.

That third one is the self-inflicted category, and it's most of the damage people lose in a fight. Canceling your own windup with a movement command is invisible in the moment and enormous over a whole game.

To be fair, there's a floor under it. The final game tick of a windup (0.033 seconds) can't be canceled by anything you press, and at high enough attack speed the whole windup fits inside that window. Part of why kiting feels easier once your second attack speed item lands is that there's barely any animation left to interrupt.

Some champions skip the problem outright. Empowered attacks from Nasus, Jax, Leona, Vayne, Darius and roughly thirty others carry a windup that can't be canceled at all: crowd control won't stop it once it has started, and neither will leaving range. Death and polymorph are most of what does.

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Frequently asked questions

What's the difference between attack-move and attack-move click?

The first shows your range indicator and waits for a click. The second fires immediately at the cursor position without the indicator.

Can basic attacks miss?

Only to a dodge, block or blind. Once started they track the target wherever it goes, apart from two direction-fired exceptions.

How do I stop auto attacking minions?

Turn off automatic attacking in the Game settings, or bind hold position and stop.

Why do my attacks not go off while kiting?

You're likely canceling the windup with a move command before the attack completes.

Should attack-move target the cursor?

If you want to choose your target rather than take the nearest one, yes. It falls back to default behavior when nothing is near the cursor.

The short version

Bind attack-move click, turn on cursor targeting, and stop interrupting your own windups. Those three changes are worth more damage per fight than any item in the shop.

For the timing underneath it, our attack speed guide covers windup and recovery, and our on-hit guide covers what a landed attack is carrying.

Which attack-move setting do you use? Let us know in the comments below.