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Root (formerly known as Ensnare and Entangle) is a status effect that prevents affected units from moving, and from casting most mobility spells.

Mechanics [ edit ]

Attempting to blink while rooted.

Root does not prevent a unit from moving by setting its movement speed to 0. It instead impairs movement in the same way as stuns do. They do not interrupt the move order either, so that the unit resumes moving towards its destination as soon as the root expires.

Root does not interrupt a unit's attack or spell cast orders either. If a unit is attacking or midst a cast animation, getting rooted neither stops it from attacking, nor cancels the cast of the spell. The unit continues executing those orders normally. If the unit's attack target or spell target gets out of range while the unit is rooted, it starts moving towards the target to attack it or cast the spell on it as soon as the root expires, similar to how the unit resumes its move command.

Some sources of root prevent a unit from attacking while rooted. However, this is not a mechanic of root. In these cases, the source abilities also apply a disarm along with the root.

Roots do not interrupt channeling spells, but always cancel the teleports of Town Portal Scroll and Boots of Travel. Some roots may apply true sight over the affected units, while others do not.

A consistent trait of roots is their ability to disable numerous mobility spells. Since a root is not a hard disable, several blink, pseudo-blink and teleport spells are disabled while rooted, to prevent an easy escape. However, although it prevents casting those spells, it does not cancel them when getting rooted while the spell is already cast. In such cases, the unit remains rooted at its new location. A list of disabled spells can be found below.

Rooting abilities [ edit ]

The following abilities root enemy units:





Self-rooting abilities [ edit ]

Some abilities root the caster to prevent them from performing certain orders like moving or attacking.

Disabled by roots [ edit ]

The following abilities are disabled by root: