Blade Mail

A hero's reflective shield, an ingenious and tactical item that not only protects your hero but also turns enemy damage against them in the most daring cost.

Upgraded Item | Armor

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2300

A razor-sharp coat of mail, it is the choice of selfless martyrs in combat.

A hero's reflective shield, an ingenious and tactical item that not only protects your hero but also turns enemy damage against them in the most daring cost.

Base Combat Stats

+ 18 Damage

+ 7 Armor

Recipe

Abilities

Active: Damage Return

For 5.5 seconds, the damage returned from all sources is increased by 85%.

Mana: 25

Cooldown: 25

Passive: Damage Return

Everytime you are attacked, you return 20 damage plus 20% of the attack damage dealt to you.

Additional Insights

Damage Return is calculated before any kind of reduction.
Damage Return doesn't reflect damage from other forms of Blade Mail.
Returned damage type is the same as it was received.
Offering a defensive option that doubles as an offensive tactic. It's particularly effective when activated at the right moment during engagements, deterring enemies from targeting your hero or punishing them for doing so.

Statistics

The statistics below shows the percentage of hero builds which contain Blade Mail as a core or non-core item for each role. These statistics are based on our hero guides.

Itemization Strategy

Fist Fight! Yes you read that right this item is heavily favored by cores who are highly to be targeted to return more a significant ammount of damage as he fights through the opponents, Best for hereos like Axe and Legion Commander and only think off like that cause if it's not their specialy the cost is not worth going for.

Heroes with Blade Mail as Core Item

A core item that combines well with Berserkers Call. Allows you to accelerate your farming speed even further. It is especially strong against high dps right clickers and uncontrollable high AoE damage, e.g. Eclipse.

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Centaur Warrunner

A core item that provides armor as well as extra damage output

A core item that uses your high HP pool and Ghostship rum buff to reflect damage back to enemy heroes.

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Legion Commander

A core item to get you kills with Duel and snowball in the game with the extra damage.

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Primal Beast

A core item that uses your high HP pool to reflect damage back to enemy heroes. When you choose to build Blade Mail, get it as your first major item and rush Eternal Shroud and BKB afterwards to make it more effective.

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Clockwerk

A core item that makes it difficult for enemy heroes to fight back against you when you trap them inside Power Cogs. Also provides damage from the armor gain.

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Undying

A core item that uses your high HP pool to reflect damage back to enemy heroes. When you choose to build Blade Mail, get it as your first major item and rush Eternal Shroud and Aghanim's Scepter afterwards to make it more effective.

Heroes countered by Blade Mail

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Bloodseeker

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Dark Willow

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Death Prophet

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Disruptor

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Hoodwink

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Invoker

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Leshrac

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Shadow Fiend

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Outworld Devourer

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Sand King

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Skywrath Mage

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Snapfire

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Techies

Rectangular image of Dota 2 hero Windranger

Trivia

The concept and mechanics of Blade Mail have their origins in the original Defense of the Ancients (DotA) mod for Warcraft III. In DotA, Blade Mail was known as 'Return Damage', featuring similar mechanics where it reflected a portion of the damage taken by the hero back to the attacker for a duration.