DOTA 2

Nirgon

YOU HAVE NO POWER HERE
12,925
19,873
Before people think oh techies are completely ruined by sentry/gem.... yes and no. It's really a game of how hard are you trying to keep the techies from spreading chaos, how good they are at monitoring their own remotes and how dedicated the techies are to removing wards and forcing you to buy a gem. No, dust didn't show the bombs much like dust doesn't show wards.

As far as sentries go... there's tons of choke points and little bottle necks on the map. If you destroy a mine or two that the techies put somewhere, odds are they will set a HUGE PILE up in a different spot knowing that you've either got 1 more sentry to spend or already spent it. You get into a game then of the techies really only having to counter ward areas where their bombs get destroyed. The price you pay, by the way, for not warding an area with bombs? Someone will absolutely die instantly if they step on the shit. Needless to stay it makes using your own secret shop (or any shop on the map minus fountain) or picking up runes that much more of a managed situation. Their standard/non remote bombs are quite effective for pushing lanes or just dropping at their feet during fights to damage/standard bomb at feet->suicide combo on a disabled target and I THINK even damaged towers (remotes didn't just standard iirc).

As far as making someone buy a gem? Well, that's another thing you've forced them to do and it requires a mine sweeper to go out and look for fun little surprises... and pub or not, lil supports get picked off np.

I know as a unit in WC2, sappers were instagibbed by invuln/invis but am pretty sure they aren't restricted from invisibility items here. Their suicide also makes getting first bloods great if you line it up. Take your standard kill lane and pepper 650 damage at level 1 on a full impact on a successful disable + T-bone from them. You can even play wisp + techies games :p.

I'm sure I'm leaving stuff out but if you haven't dealt with a hero like them on the map yet and have played the game a little, you should be able to use your imagination and see they are at the very least a pub pick that isn't just completely countered when one person DEDICATES (hint) themselves to sweeping for their shit. They're obviously just another fun addition but you can take them pretty seriously for good results... be prepared to be called out as a troll picker immediately tho.
 

Sutekh

Blackwing Lair Raider
7,489
106
I think you're forgetting that OBSERVER wards also counter techies as well, which normally get placed in matches.
 

Nirgon

YOU HAVE NO POWER HERE
12,925
19,873
Mitigate effectiveness counter? Or completely run out of the gym counter?

They are like TA traps with some free vision too. Those aren't all immediately destroyed completely off the map. It just takes 1 good clump somewhere to kill someone.

Clever techies play makes pubs very interesting imo.
 

Elerion

N00b
735
46
Techies has three problems:
1) It sucks to have him on your team. He is pretty bad, and even worse in the hands of pubs, as most of them will spend half the game mining in the middle of nowhere getting no xp and money
2) It sucks to have him on the other team. It's incredibly unfun to play against a hero who tries his hardest not to interact with you, but then randomly instagibs you from across the map
3) He's rather fun to play, so people will pick him a lot

This adds up to a hero that is in a lot of games and generally makes the other 9 people in that game miserable.

In short, if you dislike Pudge, you will fucking HATE Techies.


EDIT: 4) It's fucking unintuitive to refer to a hero as "they"
 

gmstbfla_sl

shitlord
141
0
Way better than TA traps. Remote mines have like a 900 vision range and last longer than observer wards. Landmines can also block neutral camps permanently if you put them in the right location.

A well played techies isdifficultto counter. True sight only helps so much against him since he can put mines on the top of hills and in unusual locations. At level 11 a single remote mine along with a landmine completely destroys a creep wave, so he is ridiculously hard to push against and a strong pusher himself (landmines deal damage to towers). In team fights he can be amazing, particularly if he get set up. Statis traps are a 6 second AOE stun that has a range almost as large as black hole, is two seconds longer, and he can spam them. Remote mines with aghs are an AOE finger a death, and that's just with one detonating. If you can bait the enemy into fighting on a stack of several, you're looking at an easily won fight, even if you are behind substantially.

You also have a giant detection tax, since every push has to be accompanied by sentries or a gem every step of the way or you risk blowing yourself up. Every chase is dangerous and could just be a bait into a mine stack. Early game you have to worry about suicide attacks which can instagib most heroes at level 1-3. He makes ganking extremely difficult and wrecks smokes. By the time late game rolls around he will have a hex and a force staff, so if you look at de-mining there's a good chance you will end up dead with the gem on the ground. There is so much to the hero that makes him strong. Anyone who thinks they can just buy a gem and win hasn't played with/against a techies that really knew what they were doing.
 

groovy_and_sl

shitlord
53
0
Pit lord and wyvern don't seem too bad.

Techies, arc warden, and oracle all seem fucked up as a person who never played WC3 dota or has any experience with the heroes outside reading their descriptions
 

an accordion_sl

shitlord
2,162
8
Techies has three problems:
1) It sucks to have him on your team. He is pretty bad, and even worse in the hands of pubs, as most of them will spend half the game mining in the middle of nowhere getting no xp and money
2) It sucks to have him on the other team. It's incredibly unfun to play against a hero who tries his hardest not to interact with you, but then randomly instagibs you from across the map
3) He's rather fun to play, so people will pick him a lot

This adds up to a hero that is in a lot of games and generally makes the other 9 people in that game miserable.

In short, if you dislike Pudge, you will fucking HATE Techies.


EDIT: 4) It's fucking unintuitive to refer to a hero as "they"
I agree with all points except 3, hero is not fun to me... and I never got the appeal. I think techies players are the same guys who like jungle naix/doom/furion etc. and go midas first.
 

Cybsled

Naxxramas 1.0 Raider
16,610
13,118
Techies was fun for me because more so than any other hero, you really have to outthink the enemy team, predict their movements, and try control them.
 

Pyros

<Silver Donator>
11,095
2,282
Techies isn't actually horrible, in terms of contribution other than lulzmines. For example, he's a very strong pusher if the enemy team is dead, locked into a fight somewhere else or just can't safely initiate and give up a tower. Mines do insane building damage, with the obvious downside of having to be hugging them to drop the mines on top of the buildings, but if the enemy team gets wiped/don't carry TPs, he can blow up towers in seconds, like faster than Pugna for example. He's also a fairly strong counterpusher, forcing to buy a pipe for creeps to even have a chance to survive or getting high ground vision to destroy the mines before the creeps reach them. In certain defensive positions he can buy you a lot of time from people having to destroy all his shit, for example when doing roshan from dire side, if you spam shit in the river leading to rosh, while easy to destroy the enemy team will have to destroy everything before they can engage, which also gives you a good way to know when they're coming(they can't smoke down the river and pop right at the rosh pit entrance, because they'll walk on mines and explode like a bunch of retards).

The main issue is playing techies requires fairly good understanding of the game, while most people picking techies are gonna be retards. It's a bit like Meepo, if you know how to play Meepo he's fucking disgusting especially in pubs, but if you don't, he's fucking trash tier.

I could see some changes done by IF before he adds Techies to dota2, we'll see. There's few changes I see that wouldn't ruin the hero concept though or simply make him complete trash on all aspects, so meh. In dota1 back in the days, it's also interesting to know that while rare, Techies was sometimes picked as a "deal with this shit" last pick. He forces the enemy team to completely rethink their playstyles and force them into making specific choices all game long that aren't typical choices, similar to how picking Pudge forces the enemy team to constantly consider what is acceptable positionning compared to a normal game. So he isn't like crazy poop, even though he's not particularily good either.
 

Nirgon

YOU HAVE NO POWER HERE
12,925
19,873
Ya its not like he can drop 4-5 mines...

he can drop like... 20?

Everything you said about high ground vision and even just 1 stasis trap/regular bomb can do horrible things to you.... for instance the mirana arrow + sunstrike setups we're seeing could happen with a stasis trap going off (not that anyone would probably try doing this shit with techies in a serious game but we'll see in months to come).
 

Nirgon

YOU HAVE NO POWER HERE
12,925
19,873
First item tp scroll to get out and plant mines
smile.png
 

Cybsled

Naxxramas 1.0 Raider
16,610
13,118
Techies needs mana regen, though. The trick is fast mine laying so you can get a lethal stack, but that eats mana quickly and he is ultra slow. For suicide 1st blood, though, you need boots. Even CM without boots can run away np.
 

Pyros

<Silver Donator>
11,095
2,282
You forget the awesome collision code in dota2. Suicide bomb from 600 range np.

Probably tranq/soul ring rush on him, maybe bottle too, I don't think back in dota1 when I watched there was tranq in the game yet but seems like a good item when you're just running around laying traps and shit.

Anyway while work's being done on him I'm not convinced he's necessarily the next hero. They might also be working on something else in parallel for all we know. Wish they'd go a little bit faster to finish the roster though, once they're done they have plenty of time to relax since heroes are being added pretty slowly to dota in general and they're so close, just need one last big push.
 

gmstbfla_sl

shitlord
141
0
I had hopes that TI4 would be a full roster. For most veterans of WC3 DotA, Earth Spirit is the only truly "new" hero we have seen in the four years since the switch to DOTA2 happened. The platform we have is amazing and is getting better every patch, but it's high time we put this fancy new engine to work and start seeing some new gameplay concepts.
 

nu_11

Avatar of War Slayer
3,083
20,151
hey guys. i haven't really been able to play dota 2 since the end of last year.

I still managed to buy a compendium for this year's TI, but now they want me to "level" it up. I still don't have time to play any dota 2 so I'm contemplating buying the levels. Is it worth it? What level should I go for?