Techies Guide by Danza Macabra - Argentina

I created this guide basically in my exclusive way to play with Techies. (Please, remember english is not my natural language).

The objective of this guide is to show how wrong are many people about Techies, this is an excellent hero, useful in early, mid and late game.

With the build i wish to show you here, gem and wards arent be a problem when playing with Techies.

Now.. i want to throw some light about a few things... first, i believe Techies is not just a hero like the rest, he needs another gameplay style, more strategic.

A style that sometimes, depending on the game, you are gona need patience, good reflex, speedy hands, etc.

Talking about the weak points of Techies, we can say his base attack is very low, in addition to a animation attack not really easy to master for a inexpert. This complicate last hitting creeps.

At the same time, is a weak hero, with a low life and mana at the start, but in the contrary of most of the people think, this are not a really weak points for him, remember is not just another hero.

The strong points... if things go good, you can kill practically the entire enemy team just pushing one button. The mines can be use to control the map. He's excelent giving support to the team but also capable of managing himself and be a terrible killer, generating paranoia, like i want to show next.

May be this guide results a little dificult to understand, because the way im gonna write it (and english is not my home language), but i hope the main idea is clear.

1. Techies and the Keyboard

This is very important. If you select a group of units in Warcraft, and push Ctrl + Number (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6...) the next time you touch that number, you can select fast and easy that group of units. Use this to explode your Remote Mines in the map, quiclky and efficiently.

Here goes a tactic, imagine you have 10 Remote Mines on the mid lane. Select 5 of them and press Ctrl + 1, then select the other 5 and press Ctrl + 2. Boom first the number 1 group, probably the enemy is gonna think that was all and advance for a second round. When they are near show them they are wrong (sounds badass), then press 2 and explode the others.

Also you have a very useful command at your disposal, as you may know, you can only have 15 Land Mine's at a time. Using the command -mines you can know exactly how much Land Mines you have actually active on the map.


2. About the item build for Techies

I believe there is 4 basic items that you need in any game you play, since they apply to the basic statagies you need to use all the time.


- Force Staff
- Threads
- Euls
- Guinso

Good, now... the Force Staff, what an item, excelent for Techies. In personal, i try to rush this item the most quiclky i can. Before threads or anything else.

On this item depends the way you escape from gank, asisting the team, win kills (and cause fear) including other things. Combined with Euls you can do beautiful moves and plays.

The basic way to use this item should be evident, and is the point i base myself to say that eyes and gems are not going to be a problem.

Situation: Plant bombs on mid, the players keep distance from our bombs preserving their lifes. What we do? Easy, wait the opportune moment and push one of them on your bombs.

Explode in case they are Remote Mines and thats it, kill in the bag.


They have gem or using wards? Someone is gonna try to "disarm" your bombs, ranged hero or not, and is your work to assure the bombs are well placed so they need to take care about them, other way they cant go forward in the map.

When this happens, the enemy is gonna expose again to your Force Staff. Repeat the same operation and make him fly in one second.

The good of this tactic is repeating it all the time, the enemy team enters in a paranoia state and they wont advance on the map, and if they do, its gonna be with a %100 distrust and scared. This helps a lot for porpouse of winning game, even the imposible ones, with total comodity.

In adition this doesnt supouse a issue in the late game, since the damage the Techies can do is practically ilimited, and with the combination of Bombs + Force Staff you can kill the most hard enemy without any problem.

Is good to remember... a lot of times the enemy just touch your mines without the need of doing this, but stills depending on how you place the bombs. I speak of this late in this guide.

Have in mind that Force Staff can be used on any Hero or Creep. We can use it to escape, push away an enemy, save a friend, push a partner so he can reach the one escaping, or use it like the Venge's ultimate, but of course with a shorter range, logic.

Force Staff makes you pass trough trees, creeps, etc. We can pass trough river to land without the need of walk to the entrance. It have's a lot, really, a lot of uses.

Another advantage, for which is an excelent item and applicable to many heroes, is that Force Staff works like a Kelen's Dagger, but without the weakness of being unusable when taking damage.

You can use it to escape from Furion trees, Clock's trap, push away a Slark that is hooked to you, pass through the stun of Raigor, etc.

If we are in Roshan and a enemy hero goes to bother us, wait him to get close enough and use Force Staff on him, with that you can take him out of the Roshan spot.

Also is very satisfactory when someone chases you up to your fount, or may be, that games that things arent going well (just for the moment) and the enemy is just messing around in your base or fount, push one inside. That is gonna make them take their attitude in consideration.

Euls is very good to combine with Force Staff.

A clasic use, lift an enemy preventing him to break your balls... but that isnt all.

With Techies you can lift an enemy escaping with low hp, for example, and while he is in the air quickly put a Remote Mine under him (suitably, since the Land Mine can take time to boom and may be we are not close enough to make in time). The time is short, but enough to do it.

When he fall's down just explode and magic, he die.

Now... the cooldown for Euls its higher than the Force Staff, so, if you use it be sure you are not gonna need it for something else, something more important... like escape from a gank or help a teammate to escape.

Help a hero ally is easy, use Euls on the enemy, but dont forget you can use Euls on yourself. This can looks useless, but have's a lot of utility and many times makes the enemy get angry.

Some uses, from already, result very useful. Also to other characters when using Euls on your self.

Supouse we distract and receive a gank... lifting 1 hero of the 5 chasing us can be useless, and may be we are in a place where Force Staff isnt vere useful, or... we need a few seconds to use Force again.

Sometimes Euls can give you that margin of seconds you need to reuse Force Staff. Use Euls on you and while you are in the air use Force Staff on you. Just when you touch the ground, all of them are gonna use stun or anything else. But... you are going to go out of there surprisingly. Then escape as you can, take advantage of fog, whatever.

The most useful of this is the surprise element. This is also applicable with Kelen's Dagger in case you buy that one. Use Euls on you and when it finishs you blink, and bye... problem solved.

Euls also gives your enough time, most of the times, to reactivate Kelen's Dagger if you are taking damage.

And again!, Euls also is very useful against annoying ultimates like Rupture, or if a Slark catchs you invisible, lift yourself while the effect fade. Uses... they are a lot of them.

One more use, for example. Imagine you have a very low Hp, 10 for saying a numer, and you see a skill or a hit from a hero is going to kill you and you believed you were safe, or maybe better, the enemy thinks you are already dead.

Using Euls on you prevents taking damage, use it and evade that last hit that is going kill you.

Threads, i choose this instead of Travel or Phase because of the versatibility, since is what i want out for Techies.

I use a lot the "trick" of change the attribute of the Threads depending o the situation. Sometimes making appear more life from the galley can be useful, or mana to place one more mine, or use Force Staff to save you.

I think Threads are about that, playing with the attribute as the situation calls.

Also combined with Euls you have a very decent MS (Movement Speed), and pushing you with Force you are gonna move very fast all over the map. The attack speed is a good extra.

Guinso, well... It complements the rest of the items in all the situations, to assist, to escape, whatever. In addition, the mana you get from it, the mana regen of Guinso + mana regen of Euls, its gonna make very dificult that you run out of mana.

Now we have only 2 free slots... we can use them for a dust or gem in case of necesary. Carring a gem with Techies have's an advantage that also i speak later.

Another items that adapt very well:

- Kelen's Dagger
- Scepter

The Dagger i use it with the same end like Euls and Force Staff, escaping and at the same time, moving faster around the map. Is also useful to appear surprisingly and push an enemy with Force Staff on your bombs.

Scepter, more Life, Mana and Damage. The improved ultimate allows you to put Remote Mines within a larger range, and a good increase of damage. Im not sure, but sometimes i believe it makes you leave them on the ground just a bit faster, something very difficult to notice.

From now, there is more situational items that can be adecuate, like Necronomicon Level 3, Dagon, Manta, Shiva, Assault Cuirass (the aoe armor reduction can be very nice to increase the damage your mines do), etc.

Carring gem can seem to be a bad idea, they can focuse you just to take it away from you, but that is just what you want, they going to you. Use the gem as a "bait".

A lot of invisible heroes like Gondar or Nerubian Assasin gonna try gank you up to the weariness. A Gem helps you to see them coming and watch if they get close to your Remote Mines.

Another useful tactic to know if one invisible hero is patrolling or passing trough your Remote Mines, is add to the group of Remotes one Land Mine or many. Be aware, and if you see a Land Mide explodes, blow your Remotes.


3. About the skill asignation

I think it doesnt exist a unique way to put the skill of a character, you need to find what style suits you the better, same for the build. Also, for each game, maybe you need to do these things diferent, take another way, buy another item.


My way to choose at first is:

1- Land Mine 1
2- Attribute Bonus 1
3- Land Mine 2
4- Attribute Bonus 2
5- Land Mine 3
6- Remote Mines 1
7- Land Mine 4

Up to there i always go like this, but from now depends on the game, which heroes are on my side, and on the other side. Maybe you feel better with a level of Stasis or Suicide.


It can be:

8- Suicide Squad, Attack! 1
9- Stasis Trap 1
10- Attribute Bonus 3
11- Remote Mines 2
12- Attribute Bonus 4
13- Attribute Bonus 5
14- Attribute Bonus 6
15- Attribute Bonus 7
16- Remote Mines 3
17- Attribute Bonus 8
18- Attribute Bonus 9
19- Suicide Squad, Attack! 2
20- Attribute Bonus 10
21- Suicide Squad, Attack! 3
22- Stasis Trap 2
23- Stasis Trap 3
24- Stasis Trap 4
25- Suicide Squad, Attack! 4

It's just a posibility, the good thing is assign based on your needs in the game.

If you do the things right, you aren't gonna need to suicide, the idea of playing like this is to use Suicide as a Last Resource, and not the classic "Go and Explode" that, in my particular case, i dont see so good results.

One level of Stasis Trap is enough to create an escape, stop a push (in addition to Land Mines and Remote Mines), anticipate the enemy, etc.

Atribbute bonus can look useless to you, i believe is not. Atribbute improves many aspects of the hero, though is in a minor way.

That extra life helps you to keep Techies alive, the mana to leave more bombs, the damage to last hit creeps, and maybe to succeed a crazy last hit to kill an enemy escaping and take away with you a kill.

Dont forget about the armor, attribute also improves your base armor and many players dont care about it (i say it for the damage reduction)


4. Gameplay style

With this kind of assingnation, the idea is stay in the lane, and not going around leaving bombs that yes, maybe gives you 2 or 3 kills, or more.

But if doesnt happen, you cant recover the time and level you loose.

Try to last hit creeps, put bombs where the enemy can access to you. That way you are protected.

When you have Land Mine level 2 or 3 you can try to one mine to kill a few creeps.

Also, when you have Land Mine Level 4, there is a very effective way to kill creeps and win a lot of gold. Put a Land Mine Level 4 near the creeps, then quickly, hit one time each creep that have full hp. When it explodes, the damage its gonna be enough to kill all the creeps.

In general when you do this, the mage creep still alive with practically nothing of hp, hit it once, also enough to kill it.

By means of these method, try rush Force Staff as fast as possible. Put some Remote Mines and do what i tould you.

Its very effective change the place you leave your Remote Mines, though playing like this, you can stay all the game at the mid lane without fear... if someone get close to you, it is going to die.

A key tip, when you have the opportunity, leave your Remote Mines more forward on the lane, each time more near of the enemy base. This way they doesnt expect them, and in addition shortening they posibilities to move freely in the map.

Places to put bombs?. Of course, rune (though is a very know spot), neutrals, exit and entrance of jungle, secret shop, etc.

Always stick or move near the places you have bombs. This point is basic if you want things to go right.


5. Combination with other heroes


The idea is very simple;

Spectre: When she use Haunt, look with attention if there is heroes killing neutrals and what path they choose to escape or gank. Take in count that places, when you have time, plant some bombs in that places.

Vengeful Spirit: A very classic combination, Venge stays on your mines and swap an enemy hero on them.

Maiden: If she assing Regenetarion of Mana since early, you will gain a nice mana bonus to do your work with comodity.

Ezalor: Same as Maiden, with his skills to recharge mana he allows you to leave more and better bombs. Also the innate ability to push the lane of Ezalor allows you to plant your mines forward in the lane.

Batrider: Same use as Venge, instead he uses his net.

Stone Giant: If you are the kind that like Suicide, this is another classic combination. Tiny throws you with Toss on a grupo of enemy heroes and you Suicide. Also this can be usefull to get near a zone surprisingly (like with Dagger) and use Force Staff on a hero and take him to your mines.

Pudge: Again, same as Vengeful or Batrider, leave him some mines in good place so he can hook an enemy and make it explode. In addition, is better have it on your side since hes natural resistance to your mines. Everytime i play with Techies there is a 80% that someone of the other team pick Pudge. Anyway, nothing you can solve with a few more mines.