We knew the Techies were heading to Dota 2 at some point, but a hidden stretch goal for the Compendium has offered yet more confirmation that we’ll be seeing them sooner rather than later.

The Dota 2 Compendium for TI4 is now at $6,419,238, and a hidden stretch goal for $6.4 million has just been revealed. It reads:

“You’ve triggered a hidden mine! Techies Unusual Taunt: Performs a special Taunt animation with added visual effects. Techies will also Taunt enemies in their Death Cam when killed by you. Item will be granted to all Compendium owners when Techies is released after The International.”

Techies are a hero simultaneously heavily requested and utterly feared, insofar as their entire gimmick is covering the map with hidden mines and occasionally blowing themselves up with a suicide bomb. Oh, and that suicide bomb? That’s not an ultimate. The ultimate lets you put down remote mines that only blow up when you trigger them, and they hang around for eight minutes. They are going to be very, very annoying, particularly if your team has no idea how to buy sentry wards.

While this stretch goal isn’t exactly shouting TECHIES ARE THE NEXT DOTA 2 HERO, it certainly indicates that we’ll be seeing them hit the game before too long. The International is due to finish on 21 July. I expect we’ll be hearing more about the Techies sometime shortly after that – although at this point, I’m not sure if I’d rather see Techies or one of the other unreleased heroes. Still waiting on Abyssal Underlord, guys!