Master the art of kiting/orb walking/attack-moving in League of Legends.
Our League of Legends How to Attack move (Orb Walk and Kite) guide contains a complete walkthrough on how to kite enemies and improve both your damage output and survivability in a team fight.
If you’re starting to get serious about climbing the ladder in League of Legends, then you’ll definitely need kiting/orb walking/attack-moving (whatever you want to call it) in your repertoire of core mechanical skills.
Orb walking applies predominantly to those playing the ADC role as it’s so essential to their damage output, but it also applies in a broader sense for other roles aiming to land their auto-attacks and stay on the move.
One of the many ways you can tell if an ADC knows their stuff is by the way they aggress on you in a teamfight, or how they handle themselves on the backfoot. If they weave in and out of range while still letting of a barrage of auto-attacks, then you know they’ve mastered orb-walking.
Getting kiting right is key to improving your League of Legends game as it allows you to gain distance from the enemy while still damaging them and potentially sidestepping their attacks. Stay completely still while auto-attacking as an ADC – or other damage oriented champion – and you’ll be taken out in seconds. Staying on the move can make a world of difference to the outcome of a fight!
How to Attack Move in League of Legends
There are three main ways you can attack move in League of Legends and we’ll take you through all the possibilities below.
Using the range indicator
First off, press Escape, select the Hotkeys tab on the left, scroll down until you see “Play Attack Move Click” and “Player Attack Move”. Set the former to A, and the latter to X. Of course, it’s up to you, especially if you own a mouse with thumb buttons, but these keys are decent starter options.
Press [A] and you’ll bring up the radius of your auto attacks. Left click somewhere within this space and your champion will automatically auto-attack the target closest to you.
In practice you’ll want to press [A], then left-click near the enemy champion you want to kite. This will cause your champion to auto-attack them automatically. Once your champion has attacked, immediately right-click to move away from them a short distance until your auto-attack is ready to go. Rinse and repeat this method.
There will be moments where one enemy champion is just behind another, and you want to attack one or the other while still using this technique. Press Escape, click the Game tab on the left, scroll down and check the “Attack move on cursor” box. Now, your champion will auto-attack the target closest to where your cursor is positioned – not the closest champion full stop.
This is especially useful in the midst of a hectic teamfight where you want to select your targets carefully. Otherwise you may just end up hitting tanks who love soaking up damage, and forgetting about the vulnerable damage dealers or low health targets in the background.
Using [X]
So, we bound X to “Play Attack Move” in the step above. Pressing this key will make it so that you’ll attack the closest target to your left click. This is essentially a slightly lengthier process than the method above, but it does allow for greater precision. It’s also worth pressing Escape, selecting the Interface tab, scrolling down, and checking the “Show Attack Range” box. This way, you’ll also see your attack range radius while you’re attack-moving.
Video by Noxro
Right click accuracy
The simplest method of the lot, but definitely the easiest to get wrong. All you have to do is right-click the target, then right-click away.
You’ve got to be accurate when right-clicking as missing, or even selecting the wrong target, can disrupt your rhythm and get you killed. Get it right though and you won’t have to worry about any extra key presses, plus you’ll only be increasing your mouse accuracy in general.
Using [SHIFT]
Hold down [SHIFT] while right clicking and your champion will attack the closest target to the point at which you’ve clicked. Just bear in mind that it won’t show your range circle.
Once you’ve auto-attacked the opponent, release [SHIFT], right click away from them, then press [SHIFT] again and repeat.
Make it muscle memory
If you’re not used to attack-moving it can be difficult to put it into practice in the heat of the moment, but keep going and it’ll eventually become second nature. We’d recommend jumping into the new Practice Tool, spawning a Training Dummy in and peppering it with attack-move shots until it’s become engrained.
Don’t forget your abilities
Kiting is predominantly about right-clicking on or near your opponent and away from them in quick succession – but don’t get too caught up in the process. If you’ve got a Champion with a dash ability, make sure you use it in conjunction with attack-moving to make yourself even more unpredictable, and so you can dodge enemy attacks more easily.
- 1. Beginner Champs – LoL: Best Beginner Champions guide
- 2. Hotkeys – LoL: Best hotkeys and keybindings
- 3. Fast Levelling – LoL: How to level up fast
- 4. Mouse Settings – LoL: Best mouse DPI and settings guide
- 5. Aphelios – LoL: Aphelios guide
Pro Highlights
We’ve linked a video down below by Wall E LOL which showcases pro player Uzi kiting their enemies to great effect.
Pay attention to the mouse constantly clicking on or near the enemy, before clicking away as soon as the auto-attack animation has completed. Also, it’s not only the auto-attacks that make the difference, it’s the combination of auto-attacks and abilities that can turn the tide of battle in your favour.
