It's easy to underrate melee in Deadlock, since heroes deal most of their damage with guns and abilities. Yet melee swings decide duels at the breakables, help you last-hit troopers, and punish an opponent who commits too eagerly to a brawl. Let's break down how light and heavy attacks work, what the parry window is, and why melee matters in lane. Master these basics and you'll stop treating melee as a panic button and start using it deliberately — both in the early lane and in late-game scraps.

Light and Heavy Attacks

Every hero has two kinds of strike. The light melee is a quick swing with modest damage and a short windup; it's handy for finishing a trooper or jabbing an enemy at point-blank range. The heavy melee is triggered by holding the melee button: the hero performs a visible wind-up and then lands a far stronger blow that also shoves the target back slightly. The heavy hits harder, but its long wind-up is exactly what leaves the attacker exposed.

A heavy wind-up can be cancelled if the enemy breaks away or you change your mind. That matters: skilled players feint the wind-up to bait an opponent into parrying too early.

The Parry Window

Parrying is the key melee mechanic. If you press melee at the moment of an enemy's heavy attack, you parry it: the attacker is stunned for a few seconds and takes damage, and you come out of the exchange ahead. It's essentially a reading game — the heavy attack telegraphs itself with a wind-up, and a sharp player waits for exactly that beat.

Because of this, hand-to-hand exchanges become a small duel of nerves. Mindlessly spamming heavy melee is dangerous — it's easily punished by a parry. Light attacks can't be parried, so in close quarters it's often safer to work with quick swings and save the heavy for a guaranteed moment.

Parry timing is worth practicing ahead of time: the wind-up animation differs slightly in length between heroes, and it's easier to get used to in calm situations — trading with creeps or early in the lane, when the cost of a mistake is low. The better you read an enemy's wind-up, the more confident you feel in any brawl, and the more often you turn their aggression back on them.

Last-Hitting and Denying with Melee

Melee is also useful for farming. A point-blank strike is a clean way to last-hit troopers and scoop up souls while you reload or conserve ammo. A heavy hit on your own retreating trooper helps you deny — robbing the enemy of some souls if they can't secure them in time. In lane, careful melee control of the creeps often yields a small but steady economic edge.

Finally, melee is a pressure tool. The threat of a parry makes an opponent approach more cautiously, and a well-timed heavy can flip a seemingly lost exchange at a breakable or on the walkways.

Quick Tips

Don't open an exchange with a heavy attack against an attentive enemy. Use light melee for finishing and fast jabs. Keep a parry "in your pocket" against heroes who love to brawl. And remember that the wind-up can be cancelled — a feint often wins the duel before the first blow lands.