Before you can taunt, you naturally need to know what a taunt is exactly. To put it bluntly, a taunt is a cosmetic item that triggers hero animations within Dota 2. Not every hero has one, and they must be equipped from the Armory before they can be activated. Every kind of taunt can be used while channeling an ability, but be aware that taunts have their cooldowns.
Now, there are two different types of taunts among the Dota 2 community. The International Compendium 2015 introduced new taunt variations that can be activated while in motion. Taunts released before that require you to stand still since moving while performing a taunt will interrupt the animation.
But how do you go about triggering taunts, exactly? Well, there are two ways to do so. Assigning a taunt hotkey in the Dota 2 menu is the most commonly known way to do it, so that simply pressing the corresponding key will trigger the animation. However, there are a few different ways for taunts to trigger depending on the taunt you have equipped and the action you’re performing.
Post-Compendium taunts will autoplay, meaning the taunting animation will trigger automatically without requiring your input. There are six possible ways to autoplay a post-Compendium taunt:
- Killing an enemy Courier
- Denying a Rune
- Denying an allied hero
- Being part of an enemy teamwipe
- Escaping at 15% or lower after diving a hostile tower to kill an enemy
- Escaping at 15% or lower by teleporting using a Town Portal Scroll or Boots of Travel
That’s pretty much all there is to it. Binding your taunt to a hotkey is the easiest way to do it, but there are in-game instances where post-Compendium taunts will trigger automatically. Now go out there and defend your Ancient!
