Techies/Guide

Nuker/Disabler
Techies spends most of the game stacking mines across the map and pushing, however during the laning phase he does wonders as a safe-lane support as his mines can secure his carry's lane from gank attempts, and Blast Off! helps turn them around. On top of that, his attack range of 700, the highest base attack range in the game, means that he can easily harass the enemy off-laner nonstop, without aggro-ing creeps. His low base damage is offset by his ability to spam it.

You should always keep an ear out for one of your traps going off and ping it to your team mates, especially if the enemy survives the explosion with low HP and a nearby ally can go finish him off.

There are debates over maxing Stasis Trap or Blast Off! second or third, but Proximity Mine should definitely be maxed out first, as it will become your main source of last hits once the laning phase ends. On top of that, your already placed Proximity Mines level up as you level up your skill, which means that mines placed early can still dish out 750 Magical Damage if the enemy runs into them much later.

Once you've purchased a Soul Ring, never let it go off cooldown, and place Proximity Mine with Stasis Traps stacked on top of them everywhere, turning your half of the map in a minefield that the enemy team will have much trouble navigating. Don't hesitate to place some in unorthodox places instead of choke-points to catch savvy enemies. A good spot is also the runes, as they have just enough vision to tell your team which rune spawned there, or root an enemy hero long enough for one of yours to snatch the rune.

Proximity Mines and Stasis Traps don't trigger if the enemy is under the effects of Eul's Scepter of Divinity, which makes it an amazing item to set up a kill, on top of giving you the much desired move speed and mana you lack.

Aghanim's Scepter considerably increases your damage potential, and makes your ult actually powerful, on top of giving Minefield Sign the ability to cloak your mines. The extra cast range means you can help during fights from a much safer distance. You should always consider getting it at some point.

Once you've reached that point, the enemy should be unable to push toward your base as you clear out waves from afar, and periodically harass their towers with Proximity Mines. Every time you see a team fight break up, place some mines on its edge so your team can safely fall back should the enemy follow them.

Ability Builds

 * You are able to harass early with your and gank/countergank with, dealing huge amounts of magic damage.
 * It is possible to build small nests of mines later in the game to shutdown escape routes for your enemies or create some for your own team.
 * You can farm reliable with your.

Talents

 * Level 10: Most of the time you want some early mana regen, the extra movement speed is nice, but a does the same for 250 gold.
 * Level 15: +200 cast range is nearly an, so it frees an itemslot for lategame. If you are doing well and are not behind in level take the extra cast range, because it helps in teamfights and highground defends. Also note that techies extends most games until you are Level 25 and after this extra XP Gain is a wasted talent.
 * Level 20: At Level 20 you should have your and be able to farm whole lanes with your  or . If you are behind and far from at least three-slotted take the extra Gold, but with a minute shorter Respawn Time you are back after 14 seconds (under normal conditions at Level 20) and only 40 seconds at Level 25.
 * Level 25: You want the 25% Cooldown Reduction 99% of the time. Together with an your  has only a 22,5 seconds downtime.

General

 * Techies are also one of the few heroes able to truly mess with the enemy. Play mind games with them. Do not force yourself into any habits, while making sure you continually adapt to theirs.


 * Due to their skill set, Techies is best played as a roamer or off-laner in the laning stage. The high nuke damage provided by their traps allows them to get early kills with well-placed . These traps can make life hard for the enemy supports if they try to zone you out as an off-laner or rotate for ganks, and can be used to get kills on the enemy mid if they attempt to get runes.


 * In general, it is best to place your mines in areas where the Fog of War prevents them from being spotted until it is too late. Examples of this include at the top of stairs that transition from low to high ground, inside of trees and juke paths in the jungle, and inside of Roshan's pit.


 * Keep track of your enemy inventory to see if they have a . If you see one, alert your allies and try to retrieve it as soon as possible.


 * The get revealed when there is an enemy within an 400 AOE and triggers if they stay in the AOE for 1.6 seconds.


 * They cannot be stacked on top of each others, so they are best hidden in the trees near popular walking paths. Their cause is securing space for your carries to farm, catching off fleeing low HP heroes and revealing position of your enemies, but more often than not they will serve to weaken full HP hero before they try to gank your lane.


 * As they become visible to the enemy when they are in range, you need to stack them like a Venn diagramm with a covering the middle part, so if an unaware enemy walks into the Stasis radius, he gets rooted and all three mines should explode. By creating a lattice of Proximity Mines and Stasis Traps pairs, you can ensure that the enemy will get hit anyway if he force-staffs himself forward.


 * It is highly recommended to max out this skill first, and spend most of the game laying Proximity Mines down across the map, preferably in unexpected places, where the enemy is likely to go when he runs away from a gank. As a rule of thumb, you should never have this spell off cooldown.


 * However, you should nt spend the entire game planting them outside of lanes. As a single level 3 proximity mine can clear out an entire creep wave they make the bread and butter of your Gold-per-Minute, and they also deal huge damage to towers, so you should spend a fair amount of time pushing lanes and taking towers quietly when the enemy team is busy somewhere else.


 * Proximity Mines still trigger if an invisible enemy walks over them, letting you know when one of them is coming your way.


 * A great combo is to wait for the enemy to walk into a Stasis Trap stacked on top of a Proximity Mine, then Blast Off! on top of him and place another Proximity Mine right as the first one explodes, netting you 2200 Magical damage before damage amplification/reduction.


 * Stasis Trap is an unorthodox trap that can root multiple enemies for up to 5 seconds.


 * They really shine when stacked together with a Proximity Mine, as they ensure that the enemy will take the mine's explosion (since both mines have the exact same activation radius), on top of giving time for your team to come finish them off.


 * Remember that a Stasis Trap going off also disables any other Stasis Traps within its radius. Be sure to separate your Stasis Traps accordingly so that you do not end up wasting them.


 * Stasis Traps do not disarm enemies, so ranged enemies can still destroy Proximity Mines while rooted.


 * Most of your time should be spent stacking those mines across the map to ensure your team the upper hand if a fight breaks out near one of your minefield, as those do great to catch up fleeing enemy heroes. If you're feeling dangerous and you trust that your team will get the upper hand without you, place traps behind the enemy team to cut their retreat.


 * is one of the strongest abilities in the game at level 1, dealing 300 magic damage on top of silencing its victims for 4 seconds. It also allows you to deny yourself by using it when under 50% of your max HP. Be careful when using it at barely 50% HP as surviving with a sliver of health often means that the enemy will kill you with his next attack.


 * No matter which spells you decide to max out first, you should definitely take at least 1 level of it early, preferably at level 1.


 * is an excellent ability to use during team fights since its jump means you don't even need a Blink Dagger to surprise the enemy team. While it can be tempting to wait for enemies drop to low HP and finish them off with it, remember that its silence lasts a long time so it is best used early in a team fight.


 * It's also a great ability to gank and net kills early. As Proximity Mines can be placed instantly, a tip is to place one right as you land, as the enemy often won't notice it, netting you some easy extra damage, if not outright doubling it.


 * While is convenient to deny yourself when under 50%, remember that you can use it above 50% to jump through terrain uphill to safety so you can teleport home, in case you see enemy heroes coming for you.


 * Remote Mines are Techies' most powerful nuking spell, allowing them to kill virtually any hero in the game given enough time to plant the required number of mines.


 * Unlike Proximity Mines, Remote Mines aren't automatically triggered by enemy units walking within range, and they can be stacked on top of each others. This allows Techies to place them in the middle of lanes and in high-traffic areas, activating them only when a kill is assured. Be creative with when and where you place your traps, as Remote Mines give you more control over when and where you can deal your damage.


 * Remote Mines provide vision in an 800 radius, so they can be used as pseudo-wards to give your team map vision.


 * Due to its cast range, you can safely throw them during team fights, before using Blast Off! They become much more dangerous once level 3 and with Aghanim's Scepter.


 * With standard 25% magic resistance, Remote Mines are able to deal 225/337.5/450/(562.5) damage. Remembering these values or aligning health bar markers with them allows you to guarantee kills with relative ease on most enemies.


 * Level 3 remote mines with Aghanim's Scepter also clear out non-super/mega creep waves in one blow, however you might rather not use them over Proximity Mines due to their increased mana cost, unless the extra cast range is more important in this situation.


 * Minefield Sign, combined with Aghanim's Scepter, allows Techies to place mines that are not revealed by True Sight.


 * Remember that you must move exactly to the spot where you wish to place the sign, and that its effect radius is only 125. This means that you must effectively place your mines right on top of the sign in order to shield them from detection.


 * The long cooldown on the sign means that you must make the most of each placement, as placing the sign means that it is unavailable for placement again for another 6 minutes.


 * Minefield Sign can be used to play tricks on your opponents. When using it to defend your base, you can place it in a covering area but spend your time placing traps in other lanes. This way, enemies who know that you have Aghanim's Scepter get discouraged from attacking down a lane, when in fact there are no traps there.

Items
Starting Items:
 * gives Techies health recovery in-lane, mitigating harassment damage.
 * allows for a quick way to regain your health after an early kill or escape attempt using.
 * Multiple stacks of provide Techies with the mana needed for early-game  and.
 * is a necessary purchase for all teams at the start of a match.
 * is useful for planting mines in a lane or at rune spot before the enemy heroes have a chance of reaching them.

Early game:
 * gives them mana, damage, and health. Combined with Soul Ring, they can be dropped to get more mana out of its active.
 * is your most important early-game purchase, as it allows Techies to continue planting mines over extended periods of time.
 * fit Techies well in combination with a Soul Ring to compensate for their mines' mana cost, or to give mana to use without risking of dying/getting killed before they can deny themselfs. Like Null Talisman, it can be dropped prior to using Soul Ring's active in order to restore more mana.
 * as an alternative to picking the +20 movement speed talent.
 * is good versus early harass and gives good mana regeneration.
 * is extremely important on Techies, as the hero has to be globally mobile in order to plant traps in unexpected areas. The heroes' strong defensive potential allows them to instantly fortify a tower's defenses, discouraging the enemy from pushing.

Core:
 * drastically increases Techies' effectiveness across the board. become a much bigger threat due to their increased damage, and Techies can place them from farther away, allowing them to be used tactically in teamfights and allowing Techies to place traps more safely. Additionally,  becomes a usable ability, allowing Techies to use the sign to place guaranteed undetectable traps or to trick the enemy into avoiding an area that does not have mines.
 * gives Techies more mana and mobility, and can also be used to quickly displace themself either to escape or to push enemies into your stasis traps (especially Gem carriers).
 * provides Techies with a bigger mana pool, scaling mana regen and more base movement speed, allowing the hero to be more mobile and plant mines more frequently. As well, the active ability can be used to disable an enemy (either to place a mine at their feet to deal nuke damage when they land, or deploy a to stun them for a longer duration), or to provide temporary invulnerability and a self-dispel if the enemy jumps on them.
 * reduces the cooldown on all of Techies' abilities, allowing them to place traps more frequently. With Octarine Core, Techies can place up to 70 on the field, compared to the default 55. Together with the Level 25 Cooldown Reduction Talent they can have up to 90 mines and their  downtime gets reduced to 22,5 seconds. Techies cannot lifesteal with their mines, however they can lifesteal with, but since the damage to themself is applied after the damage to the enemies, it will only have any noticeable effects when they are already missing some health. Their health will never be above 50% after using it. By using the +400 Blast Off! damage level 25 talent and landing  on all 5 enemy heroes, they can completely negate any damage to themself, if their health was bellow 50%. Keep that in mind when trying to deny yourself with Techies, if you are carrying an Octarine Core.

Situational:
 * gives Techies a great amount of health and mana, as well as tremendous regen, allowing them to place mines more frequently. The respawn timer reduction stacks with the one from your lvl 25 talent, and Pocket Deny can be used to deny yourself if you don't have time to do it with.
 * is a great survival item, as it allows Techies to become temporarily invulnerable to physical damage when focused by the enemy. This can buy them more time to use, or to attempt to lead the enemy into mine traps.
 * gives Techies much needed Intelligence as well as armor. The aura and active can be used in teamfights to hinder the enemy, reducing their ability to spread out from your area-of-effect nukes.
 * is a very powerful intelligence item, providing a lot of mana and a very strong disable that is useful in any situation. It allows Techies to provide additional lockdown in teamfights.
 * gives Techies additional pushing ability, provides more health and mana, and the True Sight from the level 3 Warrior can spot enemy Sentry Wards, allowing you to place traps with confidence.
 * s are a useful regular purchase on Techies, not only for de-warding enemy Observer Wards but also for destroying their Sentry Wards. Eliminating their Sentries from play can allow you to place traps in areas that they once considered safe, and forces the supports to buy more Sentry Wards, slowing their item progression considerably.
 * If you built one or two in the early game, you upgrade them midgame to a  to amplify your damage.
 * can be useful to purchase on a roaming Techies, as they often pass by runes on their way to set up traps. This allows them to replenish their mana and set traps over extended periods of time.
 * are an alternative to due to their low cost, passive health regen, increased armor and increased movement speed. Techies are the slowest hero in the game, so increasing their base movement speed allows you to be more mobile when planting traps,
 * is a strong utility item, as it allows Techies to cloak themselves when traversing areas with possible ward coverage. As well, it can be used to help teammates initiate or can drastically increase an ally's magic resistance for a short period of time.
 * is a situational item, but can drastically improve Techies' mobility.
 * is largely situational, but has strong utility if used properly. The item itself grants tremendous scaling mana regen, allowing Techies to passively regain mana while placing mines in enemy territory. The active can be used to reset the cooldown on, reducing its downtime from 180 seconds to 15.