Dota 2 Mechanics - Armor

Introduction

Often considered as one of the hardest  MOBA games, Dota 2 is one of the most popular games in the world. Apart from the million casual players all over the world, Dota 2 is also one of the biggest esports that has tournaments with prize polls as much as $34,000,000.  However, in order to even have a chance to get a slot for these events, you need to know the ins and outs of this game. As you probably guessed, this is easier said than done.

Even after you finally get to know every single hero and item in the game, there are many mechanical aspects of the game that are also very important to know. One of them is the armor. Even though it's often underestimated, stacking armor can be a game-winning decision, especially if it's done in specific scenarios.

With that said, let's take a look at everything you need to know about the armor in Dota 2.

Necessary information about the armor

The easiest way of describing the armor in Dota 2 is as a stat that reduces the physical damage you take from different sources. Every single hero has an unusual amount of starting armor, as well as overall armor growth. Some heroes start with a lot of armor such as Terrorblade, for example, but there are also others that have 0 armor.

As the game goes on, every hero in it will slowly increase its armor. The most efficient way of increasing your armor is to get either an item that provides armor or items that give a lot of agility. That's why you will often find that the agility heroes have more armor than the rest. Currently, every single agility point increases the armor of the hero by 0.16. 

Apart from items, the armor can also be increased or decreased by certain abilities.

Base, Main, and Bonus armor

There are three big groups of armors in Dota 2 - base armor, main armor, and Bonus armor. The first one is the fixed value that every single hero stats with. Even though it might be tricky to understand it at first, the base armor is basically the uncolored number next to the armor sign. 

On the other hand, the main armor is the bonus amount that you get by stacking agility. Depending on the hero you play, this number can vary a lot.

Lastly, we have the bonus armor, which is the value that is display with green numbers. Although it seems very similar to the main armor, there is one big difference between them. If the hero has illusions, they will only benefit from the main armor, which in most cases, means that they will be susceptible to damage.

Conclusion

Stacking armor is a good idea, but it depends a lot on the situation you're in. Sometimes, it might be just a waste of money, especially if you face heroes that deal magical damage.