by Shawn @dotasquaredmag

Yep, it’s finally ‘sappening.’

Techies’ release was hinted yesterday, after a “Hidden Stretch Goal: Techies Unusual Taunt” ‘exploded’ after Dota 2 Compendium donations exceeded the $6,400,000 mark. Bow-tied with a little bomb picture,- cute touch Valve – we get a taunt for a hero that is unreleased.(!) Perhaps, we can expect the taunt animation to be somewhat annoying and rage-inspiring; hopefully, something more than an arm pointed out with laughter. Aside from the taunt, the description states: “Item will be granted to all Compendium Owners when Techies is released after The International.” This of course has people tweeting and posting all over the internet. I would like to remind you, it doesn’t give a specific date or a time frame, for Techies’ release. It only says after The International, which could be a couple of months… Nonetheless, it still has mouths buzzing.

Techies is perhaps the single most interesting hero in Dota 2. I think he can contend alongside Pudge, for the largest gap of emotional polarity within the Dota Community; hate him or love him. He also generates quite the buzz around blog-spheres and forums. It’s quite impressive, even though he isn’t available in game. But, that’s where the fun comes in. For example, certain Dota 2 community figures *cough* Cyborgmatt a.k.a. Matthew Bailey *cough* like to give little cues, perhaps better known as trolls, regarding Techies’ status and/or stage of production. These often explode on /r/dota and twitter feeds, and get their share of laughs, rages, and conspiracies. Take the picture below, which can be found at the end of an Ongamers article written by Cyborgmatt back in February 2014.

What about this one? (Again brought to you by the fabulous Cyborgmatt.)

The above picture was taken by Redditor Ekez42 from a Cyborgmatt twitch stream. (Reddit thread here). This is just a fun little collection of trolls that have been surrounding techies. I don’t believe the storm will be purged, just yet… There will be a huge shit-storm after The International 4. (If not, I will eat my sho – yeah right.) Nonetheless, I do expect Dota gamers to flood /r/Dota, JoinDota, and other sites after The International 4, asking the same old question:

“Where is Techies?”

However, I will say… Looking back on Valve and the Dota Community, perhaps they will start pushing for Techies release to come sooner rather than later. This announcement is a deserved gift. (Especially, when considering the The International 4’s astronomical prize pool is currently sitting on $6,518,099.) The International 3’s prize pool, – which was at $2,874,381 – had a $3,200,000 prize goal, which was the following: “Compendium owners will be able to select the next Hero shipped in Dota 2.” Which, if attained, would have been Techies. Hands. Down.

Enough talk of money! He’s coming peoples, what does this mean to you?

It should mean a lot of things, let’s take a vote:

Take Our Poll

Like Churchill studying German tactics and battle-plans whilst frantically smoking cigars in his bomb-shelter, you should be doing the same. Prepare for war (wo)men! There is no better time to study than now. With the release of the Techies “announcement”, also comes the release in intelligence and word-of-mouth stories from veteran Dota players; who have been in the dark & grimy trenches of Techies Dota back in the Warcraft 3 days. Anyway, some interesting content has recently sprung up:

One is this YouTube video, shown below, entitled: Dota – Tiny & Techies – Don’t Run! We are your friends!

Just as you thought the Tiny (who will now be referred to as Tony) + Centaur combo was overpowered, wait till you see this roaming around in your pub games. The premise is simple:

(Techies + Suicide) + (Tony + Toss) = (Enemy Death + Rage Quotient) / 322

Toss + Suicide is an easy First Blood. From the video, you can see how annoying it is. How can one possibly deal with such shenanigans? Also, remember that Blink Dagger still has 0 mana cost, meaning the same thing can be done with a Blink Dagger. The question still resides: “How would one deal with such nonsense?”

To be honest friend, I have no idea… However here is more information!

Ability: Suicide Squad, Attack!

Techies’ death time is halved when he uses this ability.

Using this ability counts as a suicide, which does not reward normal gold or experience to the enemy team.

Destroys trees in its area.

Gives Techies XP for kills he gets with it.

Cool down from 75 seconds to 180/170/160/150 seconds, respectively.

The cool down used to be 75 seconds, but in the 6.72 patch log, it was increased enormously. So you don’t have to worry about being suicide spammed to death!



Let’s not forget those dreaded mine locations. Here is a video, by DannyGaminGnC detailing how easy it’s to get First Blood with Techies- see below.

Scary…

Fortunate for us, this kind person SomeKindacrazy posted a map of the common “mine” locations for a Techies in the early game; see below or go to the thread.

If you really want to prepare for Techies, practice buying Gems and playing Zues. You could also pick illusion based heroes to scout for mines.

Well, that’s all the information I will give you. This is was a COMING OUT PARTY (article) for Techies and you can expect more in the future.

Important: If you would like to leave some comments, please do so through twitter @dotasquaredmag with the hashtag #Techies. Every response will have a chance for placement within the next Dota 2 Magazine.

May you avoid many mines/suicides in the future,

-Shawn