What are “On-Hit” Effects and How Do They Work?

On-hit effects, also known as attack effects, trigger upon the Champion’s basic attack. They influence only your basic attacks and amplify them with various modifiers. 

To better explain how exactly these work, we’ll go over the three categories listed in the League of Legends wiki: On Attacking, On Hitting, and On Disabling.

Let’s start with On Attacking.

These are triggered when the Champion completes their basic attack windup.

Examples for this category of on-hit effects are Guinsoo’s Rageblade, Kraken Slayer (stacking), Phantom Dancer, etc. Runes such as Fleet Footwork (stacking) and Hail of Blades also fall under this category.

On Hitting are effects triggered when a Champion’s basic attack hits the enemy.

These can be mitigated if the basic attack is invalidated with dodges and blocks. 

Braum’s passive Concussive Blows is an excellent example of a Champion’s in-built on-hit effect. 

There are dozens of items in the game that fall under this particular category, which encompasses most of the on-hit effect modifier in general. 

On Hitting, items can be passive or triggering. A great example of a passive item would be the Blade of the Ruined King, while a triggering item is embodied in items like Trinity Force. 

Runes such as Demolish, Electrocute are also on-hitting. 

The final category is On-disabling effects that trigger whenever a Champion applies a specific Crowd Control effect. 

Dead Man’s Plate is a good example, while Runes like Aftershock and Cheapshot are among the On Disabling group. 

Final thoughts

As we can see, on-hit effects are very versatile, and just about any Champion class or role has some way of obtaining an on-hit item/spell/rune. Champions that work best with these effects, however, are strong-hitting Fighters and ADCs. I recommend going for a full-on-hit build with Gangplank, Jax, Yi, etc. These benefit significantly from these items that amplify their attacks and some of their spells as well. 

Tell us what you think about these peculiar effects in League. Are they overpowered? Should they be removed? We always love to hear your thoughts, so don’t miss out on letting us know everything you think.