# Dota Auto Chess

> Drodo Studio's free Dota 2 mod Dota Auto Chess passed 8 million subscribers by April 2019.

- Owner: Drodo Studio
- Kind: Game
- Sector: Gaming
- Seed date: 2019-01-03
- Peak date: 2019-02-16
- Spread Score: 57 (Notable), v1.2
- Mechanics: Creator relay, Platform jump, Dupe economy, Underdog, Press loop

## Summary

Dota Auto Chess spread through Dota’s free Arcade and streamers from several game communities. Drodo prepared translations and a player-reference tool in January. Gamesight later traced its selected creators’ earlier games, documenting a broader relay than Hearthstone alone.

## Timeline

- 2019-01-03 — Drodo Studio (Open web) — Drodo Studio posted DOTA AUTO CHESS to the Steam Workshop.
- 2019-01-13 — PC Gamer (Press) — PC Gamer reported the mod reached 100,000 concurrent players that day and had over 670,000 subscribers. (100K concurrent)
- 2019-01-13 — Matthew Bailey (X) — PCGamesN linked a Twitter explainer of the mod by Matthew Bailey.

The full timeline, metrics and sources are on the case page, or via the Pro API (https://howitspread.com/developers).

Canonical URL: https://howitspread.com/cases/dota-auto-chess

Cite as: How It Spread (2026). “Dota Auto Chess.” Case HIS-00460. Spread Score v1.2: 57/100. Updated 2026-10-13. https://howitspread.com/id/HIS-00460