OK, no one shot an arroweater unit as no one hit with fire an immune to fire unit. So, just remove the offensive +2 damage after an arrow eating and just lower its nora cost.
But that removes those interesting situations where you really get to punish the use of Blasts and other AoE ranged attacks. Having something like a Pincushion discourage such things makes Arrow-Eating Champions that much more valuable, but only in a strategic sense. It lets Underdepths approach a mass of ranged units, but only under those specific circumstances, and only if the opponent doesn't want to pepper the Pincushion, and that means giving both players options and more strategy. Breath of Ash is all well-and-fine, but anti-ranged damage is Underdepths' thing, and having the option to use your own ranged damage, supported by Arrow Eater and Elusive units prevents Underdepths from being the "mandated" () melee, anti-ranged faction. Plus, K'Thir Forest is their primary quarry, and having to dance around your own Breath of Ash, no matter where you place it, is just silly.
Elusive and the other abilities should change rather than arrow eater, considering they were implemented much later into the game. Also arrow eater has a tactical advantage: not letting other factions stack their range units and letting UD rush with their melee units. Without arroweater what is left for UD to force other factions into a melee 1vs1, 2vs2, etc. ?
Arrow Eater is being discussed because it is the weird one with no counterplsy and secondary clause that almost never comes into play. Keep in mind that this isn't about individual unit changes but just the ability structure so you are likely to see more elusive around. At the same time, the proposals are partly intended to help the counter rush/attack as well.
To me Arrow eater should not have a counter to it. Other than the ranged unit has to reduce their attack range. It is similar to a loss of life attack...their is really no counter to it other than causing them to miss. If you merge precision with arrow eater than UD will loose that faction identity. Much like as an ST player I do not want to see other factions ice guarding or using gales.
I love that Arrow Eater doesn't really have a counterplay (other than not using ranged damage, or using Dragonclaw, etc., or casting Coward's Reach, as suggested above). When using an Archer Battlegroup, one has to allow for the possibility of encountering Champions with Elusive, Arrow Eater, or even just Evasive. But now that I reread Proposal 3, I kinda like it. It makes thematic sense, with, say, Pincushion; it is punctured by arrows, but literally eats them and vomits the splinters back at you, as it runs, screaming, across the battlefield to murder you in ways not readily imaginable. I vote no changes, for the time being. Maybe let's see how the game develops from here; maybe there will be a time where Proposal 3 fits the game, best. But for now, I'm going to enjoy having happy, masochistic Pincushions (just without Masochist) and tyrannical, unassailable Vothsair, who can't be kited; there are already plenty of ways to "cheese" expensive units, and especially large units, and at least the Vothsair have the current iteration of Arrow Eater going for them.
theres no counterplay to scrapper either other than death by spells which also applies to arrow eater. dispel isnt easy to do, even less spot dispel. far too many abilities on champs that need to be spelled to take them out. as i said before arrow eater is fine, they are actually countered by any and all melee.
and most of those counters could probably be used against arrow eater too. scrapper - ranged and melee cant kill it (all champs in the game fall under these categories) arrow eater - melee can kill it (everyone has masses of melee) seems to me like arrow eater is easier to counter than scrapper.
1. Scrapper can be dispelled 2. Scrapper can be CC'd to prevent an attack that procs scrapper 3. You can just take the DR% with a grain of salt and hurt it anyway. 4. Precision ignores the DR% of scrapper 5. You can generally just position outside of attack range since every scrapper is a melee unit. 6. Loss of life works 7. You can use AOEs to ignore the DR% Arrow Eater 1. You can use loss of life 2. You can melee it 3. You can use AOE's 4. Most arrow eaters are made to be deadly at close range (see ireguard, reaver, Vanguard, Pincushion)
Assuming you did want to remove the "uncounterable" nature of arrow eater, I feel like the best approach is to untether 'arrow eater' from the defense-vs-ranged part, which would give you more control over the costing / individual champion designs. ie. something like this for phalanx-ish: Arrow Eater - Any ranged damage from attacks done to a champion within 2 spaces is split and shared equally with this champion. This champion gains +damage equal to the damage it received. or something like this for standalone: Arrow Eater - When this champion is attacked from range, the attacking champion is feared for 3 turns. This champion then gains +3 damage and regen 3 for 2 turns. If this champion already has regen, it heals for 3. You could then pair with elusive / evasive as necessary, or whatever other abilities. Gives a wider scope for what kind of champions could come with arrow eater. Question for sok: Do you think the damage / cost difference between reflection and damage shield is well balanced?
I don't know, I feel vothsairs/pincushion would all be shoeboxed with an arrow-eater nerf. I mean damn what do they do? they hit hard? Big deal, everyone hits hard and adds some sort of utility too. They aren't even tanky.
Mm I can't recall a time any arrow eater champ was actually a problem, even when they felt scary you can always handle them. Pincushion is played because he is hard anti-ranged AND soft anti-melee, and he's still not op.
I think you if you are going to make changes you should definitely consolidate elusive with arrow eater, but make it like intimidate so its not a noob trap.
Only little problem with arrow eater is when it gets combined with majestic in splits. i disagree that evasive sucks, if it forces the enemy to use spells to stun it, its not bad. same with nokhan do, its annoying as heck if you dont use a aoe / spell spam deck but a more basic attack build. but thats my problem i tend to use basic attack decks. and i hate fighting majestic arroweaters, its an annoying combo, then add some damage shields on it also to be real pesky
To pick nits just a little, the +dmg aspect does matter because the UD player can for example defuse defensive strikes, ca:ranged, deflect (I think?) and etc. and get damage. It's not used super commonly (and a good player won't turn on their defensive strikes etc) but it still comes up and does matter a bit. Also isn't loss of life a direct counter? I haven't played in a while so maybe there's less lol in the game now. I like proposal 2 alright but would make it closer to 75% of damage or like -6 dmg if we're trying to reduce percentages. I like that voths are terrifying and really make you perk up and think of creative ways to kill them (saying this as not a UD player!)