Legendary Heroes lead powerful armies while they complete quests, gain experience and acquire special items. As the core of each race's force, Heroes have the ability to advance in levels, learn new spells and abilities and confer special benefits to nearby units.

Heroes are the backbone of an assault force. While it is possible to play without Heroes, it is not wise to do so. Many Heroes have Auras which can give bonuses to surrounding units. As Heroes advance in levels, they become even more powerful than normal units. Heroes also gain spells which can change the course of a battle. In Warcraft II and StarCraft, the focus was on large groups of units, unit match ups, and sometimes unit control. In Warcraft III, the focus is on Heroes, spellcasting, and unit control. Unit match ups and numbers of units come in secondary.

It is important to increase your Heroes' levels so that they become more powerful and are able to research more spells and abilities. This is typically done by exploring with a group of attack units and clearing out nearby Creeps. You also receive experience for killing enemy units and buildings. Consider attacking Creeps for the purpose of leveling up your Heroes and getting additional Hero Items.

Learn how to control your Hero.

Learn about rookie mistakes.

The first Hero is free, only costs 5 supply and comes with a free Town Portal Scroll and a free skill point. Additional Heroes require resources, and come with one skill point but do not have additional Town Portal Scrolls. To build a second Hero, you must upgrade your Town Hall to a Keep instead of a Town Hall. To build a third Hero you must have a third level Town Hall building such as a Castle.

• You cannot train more than 3 Heroes.
• You can only have one Hero of each type. So, if you have a Blademaster, you cannot build another one.
• Heroes can carry up to 6 items.
• Heroes do not leave corpses.
• Global messages are sent to allies whenever a hero dies, regardless of who kills it. It goes by the format: <Hero Name> the <Hero Type> (Hero Level) has fallen. For Example: Marn Thunderhorn the Tauren Chieftain (level 5) has fallen.
• Normal upgrades will not affect Heroes. Heroes are upgraded by leveling up and using Hero Items.
• The maximum Hero level is 10.
• Hero walk speed is capped at 400.
• Once your Hero is level 5 he can only gain experience from other player controlled units. Don't Creep unless you're after the items or have other Heroes under level 5 to level up.

Hero Magic Resistance
As special units, Heroes enjoy a limited magic resistance against enemy spells. Negative spells cast on a Hero last a shorter duration and do less damage than if cast on a regular unit. If a Night Elf Demon Hunter and a Night Elf Archer are both stunned by an Orc Tauren Chieftain's War Stomp ability, the Demon Hunter will recover more quickly than the Archer. Likewise, if both Demon Hunter and Archer are attacked by a Human Archmage's Blizzard spell, the Demon Hunter will suffer less damage than the Archer. Some high level Creeps have Hero Magic Resistance.

Shorter Spell Duration
Many spells last for a much shorter duration on Heroes than units. These spells include: Sleep, Entangling Roots, Bash, Storm Bolt, War Stomp, Cyclone, Ensnare, Purge, Cripple, Hex, Banish, Silence, Frost Arrows, Drunken Haze and Stasis Trap

Reduced Spell Damage
Spell damage versus Heroes is reduced by 30%.

Hero vs Hero Combat
Try whenever possible to focus your attack force on an enemy Hero and finish it off but do not attempt to kill the enemy Hero at all costs. Know when to focus your attention on the other supporting units instead. If the enemy Hero starts running around or running away, disengage and focus your attack on the nearest enemy units.

If the enemy focuses their attack on your Hero, command your Hero to run away. Command your Hero to run in circles around friendly units. Your other units will attack the backs of chasing units. If the enemy keeps up this chase without responding, you will be able to finish off the enemy units while they chase your Hero in vain. Remember, if the enemy player tries this trick on you, stop chasing.

Multiple Heroes
Statistics show that new and lower level players usually only build one Hero. Early in their playing careers it's easier to learn how to play using just one Hero.

As they learn how to play the game, move to higher levels, and become better at controlling the game, most top level players build two Heroes. There are several benefits of building multiple Heroes:

When you only have one Hero the enemy can focus fire on it and take it out and you no longer have any leadership for your army. With multiple Heroes it will be more difficult for the enemy to remove your Heroes from battle.

Some Heroes complement each other well especially with Auras. A good example is the Undead Dread Lord and Death Knight.

Most players do not build three Heroes because of Food limits, cost, and it is more difficult to control all three Heroes. But, in games that last a long time, you should consider building a third Hero when your other two Heroes become fairly high level.

Remember experience sharing when teaming up with allies' Heroes as well. If you plan to stick together, your team will need to kill a lot of Creeps to level up all of the Heroes in your party. Seek out and kill all the Creeps you can find. Some teammates prefer to not share experience and want to level up on the Creeps by themselves. You should probably ask if the player wants to team up early on before going over there. Keep in mind you receive a bigger experience bonus for killing enemy players' units than Creeps.

Creeping/Fighting Separately from your Hero
Heroes can gain experience separately from other units in your army. For example some Footmen can be killing some Creeps across the map while your Archmage is back in town buying things at the Arcane Vault while still gaining experience. Other possibilities include using a Hero to harass an enemy town while your army is off Creeping at the same exact time.

Knowing this information, it's a newbie mistake to send your whole army somewhere, when only your Hero is needed. Now you almost always want your Hero in battle with your army, but if you just need to run back and heal or use a shop, just send your Hero. Your units can Creep during that time. As long as you are not ambushed separately from each other, it should be ok. High level players pull this off all the time. You can also use this method with flying units to harass the enemy. Flying units are sometimes better off when they are not slowed down by Heroes. Gryphon Riders could attack an enemy town while your Hero is back at town gaining experience. You can then run away when the enemy responds to the attack.

Introduction
One of the things that make a Hero unique is his ability to gain experience levels and become better over time. Any Hero will gain experience points for every accomplishment on the game map (usually kills) that they or any nearby unit do. When a Hero accumulates enough experience points, they will advance to the next level, and you can choose a new ability for that Hero.

Gaining Experience
A Hero gains experience when he or any unit under his "command" kills an opposing unit. An opposing unit is defined as any unit that is hostile to the player. This includes enemy player units as well as aggressive NPC creatures on the game map.

Kills made when no Hero is nearby result in your Heroes' receiving experience. In team games, even your allies will get a share of that experience. If one Hero is nearby, but another is not, only the nearby Hero gains experience. This is to encourage the use of air mobility in harassing an opponent.

If two Heroes are both commanding a unit that makes a kill, then the experience received from the kill will be split evenly between the two Heroes.

Once a Hero gains enough experience, the Hero will move on to the next level.

Heroes gain experience for attacking buildings with attacks such as towers.

You do not receive experience if any building such as a tower or ancient makes the killing blow.

You can receive experience for killing units of dropped players. This can be very helpful in FFA games. But you won't get experience for destroying their buildings (except of towers, or other buildings with an attack), so unless you plan to build an expansion there, don't waste your time destroying those buildings. You will not get experience if your Heroes are over level 5 (just like Creeps).

Heroes gain more experience from Creeps early on, and less once they hit level 3. Once they hit level 5, Heroes can only gain experience through killing units controlled by other players.

If a player owns only one hero (dead heroes count), and is at tier 2 (Keep/Stronghold etc) or Tier 3 (Castle/Fortress etc), they gain bonus experience of 15% for tier 2 and 30% for tier 3. This affects all experience gain - both creeping and killing enemy units.

Determining Experience Gained
Experience is split up between friendly Heroes in the area. If one Hero is off somewhere else, only the nearby Hero gets the experience. Heroes can gain experience from units throughout the battlefield away from the Hero(s).

The following table lists the experience needed to gain a level.

Your Hero Level	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
Experience Required	-	200	500	900	1400	2000	2700	3500	4400	5400

The following table lists experience received for killing a Hero. So, for killing a level 4 Hero you would receive 220 experience.

Enemy Hero Level	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
Experience Given	100	120	160	220	300	400	500	600	700	800

Creep Experience % Cap
When your Hero kills a Creep you get a percentage of that experience depending on your Hero level.

Referring to the chart below, if your Hero is level 1 when he kills a Creep then he gets 80% of the experience he would get if the victim was not a Creep. If he is level 2 then he gets 70%, Level 3 - 62%, Level 4 - 55%. Notice 5th level Heroes and higher get no experience (0) from Creeps, regardless of Creep level. Once your Hero is level 5 he can only gain experience from other player controlled units.

Your Hero Level	1	2	3	4	5+
Experience	80%	70%	62%	55%	0%

Determining Experience
The XP a hero gets when he kills a non-creep unit is based on this:

GrantNormalXP=25
F(1) = 25
// f(x) = A*f(x-1) + B*x + C
GrantNormalXPFormulaA=1
GrantNormalXPFormulaB=5
GrantNormalXPFormulaC=5
F(x) = 1 * F(x-1) + 5 * x + 5
The chart comes out to:

Levels
When a Hero gains a new level, they will gain several benefits

Boost to attributes. Each Hero will have a factor that will determine how many attribute points go up each level. In this way, spellcasting Heroes have a greater intelligence, while fighter Heroes have higher strength over time.

New Ability. Whenever a Hero gains a new level, they will also gain an ability point. A player will be able to use this point to give the Hero a new skill/spell or to increase the power of an existing spell/skill.

The player will be informed that their Hero has gained a level by a sound, and by a flash of light around the Hero. A small flashing overlay will also appear on the Hero's portrait on the game screen.

Every Hero will have 4 base abilities to choose from, these include:

Skills - Passive abilities that do not cost Mana to use. Once obtained, the Hero always gets the benefit of the skill.

Auras - This is an ever-present command radius around a Hero that imparts benefits or penalties to the units nearby.

Spells - Adds a new useable spell to the Hero's command card.

Each Hero starts with a free skill point.

Ultimate Abilities

Every Hero will have one ultimate ability that they may choose for the first time at level 6. These abilities are far more powerful than the average ability. This ability has only one level, and therefore, cannot be increased in power with additional ability points.

The area of effect of the Aura will be the same for all Heroes.

Units that are affected by an Aura will have a blue highlight graphic displayed around the feet of the unit.

Flying units do not display Aura's, but are affected by Aura's when they are in range.

Hero Names
When created, a new Hero will be given a proper name (e.g. Conan). This name will help you differentiate the specific Hero from other Heroes of the same type (i.e. Paladin, Archmage, etc).

Names are separated by Hero type and are chosen randomly each time a new Hero is created.

Hero Revival
Although Heroes are larger-than-life figures, even they can die on the fields of war. When a Hero dies, it leaves behind no corpse. As its body vanishes, the Hero's spirit returns to the ether, in order to wait recall at a sacred Altar. Each race has an Altar it can build to revive dead Heroes. There is no limit to the number of times you can revive a Hero, as long as you have enough Gold to pay the revive cost. The cost of a fallen Hero depends on its level: the higher the level, the greater the cost in Gold. The ritual to create a new body for the Hero takes a certain amount of time, but at its completion the Hero is revived at the Altar, along with any items the Hero carried.

1. Tool tips over each button display the Name, Level, Type of Hero and the cost for revival.

2. The cost to revive a Hero will be approximatively half the cost for building the Hero plus 10% more per level of Hero to be revived.

3. The maximum cost to revive a Hero will be 550 Gold and 0 Lumber at an Altar and 1105 Gold 260 Lumber at a Tavern.

4. Once revived at the Altar, the Hero will be restored to full hit points and 100 Mana.

5. Hero revive time is capped at 110 seconds.

Hero Revival Cost and Time Formulae

GoldRevivalCost = originalCost * (ReviveBaseFactor + (ReviveLevelFactor*(level-1)))
      but not exceeding originalCost * ReviveMaxFactor
LumberRevivalCost = originalCost * (ReviveBaseLumberFactor + (ReviveLumberLevelFactor*(level-1)))
      but not exceeding originalCost * ReviveMaxFactor
revivalTime = originalTime * level * ReviveTimeFactor
      but not exceeding originalTime * ReviveMaxTimeFactor

ReviveBaseFactor=.40
ReviveLevelFactor=.10
ReviveBaseLumberFactor=0
ReviveLumberLevelFactor=0
ReviveMaxFactor=4.0
ReviveTimeFactor=0.65
ReviveMaxTimeFactor=2.0

Max awaken (Tavern) cost of a hero
HeroMaxAwakenCostGold=1105
HeroMaxAwakenCostLumber=260

When there is a Tavern available in the map, you can also use it to instantly revive your Heroes (neutral and race specific ones) but the price to revive at a Tavern is much greater. Heroes revived at the Tavern are brought back to life with 0 mana and 50% health.

Introduction
Another of the features that differentiate a Hero from a normal unit is his attributes. These three values are only represented on a Hero and will increase over time. These values directly affect how the Hero casts spells, moves, attacks, etc. As a Hero levels, the attributes increase automatically, making the Hero much more powerful as a game progresses. A Hero may also find items that temporarily or permanently increase attribute scores.

Attribute Increases
When a Hero levels, his attribute scores will increase automatically.

Each Hero type (i.e. Paladin, Archmage) will be different in the magnitude that each attribute raises with level. For example, a Paladin may gain two points of Strength every level, while another Hero gains two points of Agility every level.

Primary Attribute Each hero has a primary attribute depending on the Hero's type (i.e. Paladin, Archmage), the first will give a privilege to the Strength while the second will get a bonus thanks his Intelligence. Each point added to the Hero's Primary Attribute also grants him a '1 damage point' bonus (aside of the other bonuses described below).

Strength
Strength is the measure of the physical power of the Hero.

Hit Points: 1 point of Strength = 25 increase in hit points. Total HP is calculated from the formula 100 + 25 * Hero's STR

Hit Point Regeneration: 1 point of Strength = .05 hit points regenerated per a second

Mana Capacity: 1 point of Intelligence = 15 increase in Mana. Total Mana Capacity is calculated from the formula 15 * Hero's INT.

Mana Regeneration: 1 point of Intelligence = .05 points of Mana regenerated per second.

Defense:
1 point of Agility = 0.3 increase in armor
Total Armor = -2 (Base Armor) + 0.3 * Hero's AGI

Attack Rate: 1 point of Agility = 2% increase in Attack Rate

Heroes all begin with 100 hit points before strength bonus is added. Human, Orc, and other non-undead Neutral Heroes begin with 0.25 hit points per second regeneration before strength bonuses are added. Night Elf heroes begin with 0.5 hit point regeneration before strength bonuses, but they only regenerate during night. Undead heroes have a base of 2.0 hit point regeneration and only regenerate while on blight.

Formula for final hit points is as follows:

Final HP = 100 + (25 * STR) + (Item Bonuses)

Formula for final hit point regeneration is as follows:

Final HP regeneration per second = ((Base)* + (0.05 * STR) + (Item Bonuses)) * Ability Bonuses

* Insert 0.25 for non-undead Neutral, Human, and Orc heroes. Insert 0.5 for Night Elf heroes and 2.0 for Undead heroes.

Heroes all begin with 0.01 mana regeneration per second.

Formula for final mana regeneration is as follows:

Final mana regeneration per second = 0.01 + (0.05 * INT) + (Ability Bonuses) + (Item Bonuses * (0.01 + (0.05 + INT)))

All heroes start with -2 armor and their own base cooldown. Every point of Agility adds 0.3 armor. This value is in white and is rounded up. Also, every Agility point decreases the cooldown by 2%. The cooldown is defined as the time between two attacks.

Formula for final armor value is as follows:

Final Armor = -2 + (0.3 * AGI) + (0.3 * AGI Bonuses) + (Item Bonuses) + (Ability Bonuses)

Formula for final cooldown is as follows:

Final Cooldown = (Base Cooldown) / (1 + (*0.02* * AGI) + (Item Bonuses) + (Ability Bonuses))