Elusive has been the least-popular defensive Alliance in Dota Underlords for a good reason. It works like the Warriors bonus in the sense that it protects you against physical damage, but it is a bit inferior because of three reasons:

• Like armor, evasion doesn’t protect against magic damage. The problem is that Warriors have two Scaled heroes in their lineup while Elusives don’t, which makes taking the Scaled magic resistance bonus easier for a Warrior strat.
• It’s hard to run an elusive frontline without investing in the full (6) Elusive bonus – the (3) Elusive bonus is a bit unreliable. More importantly, besides Treant there aren’t any good tank/utility Elusives that are obvious frontline candidates.
• Last but certainly not least, evasion has a direct counter: critical hits (Assassins, items). This means that in a meta where (6) Assassin drafts are popular, Elusives suffer.

While the Elusive Alliance has worse utility heroes than Warriors, its biggest selling point is that it has pretty good offensive heroes (two Assassins, two Hunters, one Demon Hunter, one Mage). This allows you to use these offensive synergies in a (6) Elusive draft pretty naturally: Usually Elusive/Assassins, Elusive/Hunters, and since the Natures Prophet change – Elusive/Mages.

Elusive openings are quite versatile but usually revolve around the (3) Elusive bonus and these units:

After the opening, your goal is to reach the (6) Elusive bonus ASAP. It’s a big power-spike in the early-mid game when most enemy lineups deal damage with attacks (Mage lineups aren’t online yet and there are very few high-tier AoE damage heroes). Use this timing to give yourself a good mid game and economy. What Elusive heroes you go for depends mostly on the shop, but you should always keep in mind what final build you’re aiming for especially when it comes to decisions which units to three-star.

If you plan to go for a (6) Elusive build, you generally have three main options:

• Elusive Assassins
• Elusive Mages (new)
• Elusive Hunters

The oldest and arguably strongest of the Elusive builds might be considered the “core” build. The reason it works well is quite simple: two of the strongest Assassins in the game are also Elusive (Phantom Assassin and Templar Assassin). This means that they benefit from the (6) Elusive evasion bonus, making them much more survivable than they are in theory. A three-star PA with the 50% evasion and ideally Mask of Madness is one of the hardest carries in the game.

What third Assassin you go for is situational. The option above is relatively standard because:

1. You are vulnerable to magic damage
2. You lack control

So, the Slark + Tide (2) Scaled bonus and the AoE stun of Tide are extremely welcome in an Elusive draft.

The build doesn’t require you to get to lvl10 (or even lvl9 in some cases) – three-star upgrades are more important – the first priority being PA followed by one of the Druids, Slark, and in longer games even TA. Theoretically, you could go for Viper (with Puck) or Sand King for more control.

In case you get to lvl9 or 10 you have different options. The easiest one is to go for Medusa and the Scaled Ace bonus, possibly even (4) Scaled on lvl10. This will also allow you to get (3) Hunters with Medusa, Wind, and Mirana:

Another option is to include (2) Demon Hunters if you were lucky enough to get a fast three-star Anti-Mage in the mid-game (if you don’t it’s best to swap the two-star AM for something more impactful):

That said, Elusive + Demon Hunters isn’t as strong as it used to be because your main carry (Terrorblade) doesn’t benefit from the Evasion bonus. This means that upgrading PA is definitely a higher priority even when you have TB.

Elusive Hunters is arguably the weakest variation because of a few problems:

• Even though you have two Hunters, it’s hard to fit the third Hunter into the lineup synergistically before the late game and as a result, you deal less damage than with the Assassins variation in the mid game.
• Hunters don’t benefit from the evasion as much because they are backline heroes by design (compared to Assassins, who jump on the enemies and are exposed to danger). At the same time, they need a tanky frontline with a lot of control, and besides Treant, the other elusive heroes don’t fit this description.
• Last but not least, Hunters are vulnerable to Assassins themselves, which means a few Assassin players in the lobby could ruin your midgame.

Because of this, Hunters are more commonly played as a late game tetriary synergy with Medusa for an Elusive draft. That said, if you want to play Elusive-Hunters from the start your mid game lineup will look similar to this.

Elusive Hunters Early-Mid Game:

Unlike Assassins, Elusive-Hunters don’t benefit from three-star upgrades as much, so the goal would usually be to reach lvl9 and ideally lvl10 for a super late-game lineup like in the example below.

Elusive Hunters Late Game:

Even though going for (6) Elusive (6) Hunters is possible on lvl10, we wouldn’t recommend it because of the flaws mentioned above. A more diverse draft like the one above is generally more versatile and stronger. (If you don’t have the luxury to reach lvl10, you can sell the Drow Ranger to include the Sand King on lvl9.)

Elusive Mages were theoretically possible before the latest patch, but they were an underwhelming build. Since the change to Nature’s Prophet, however, Elusive Mages are quite viable – he deals extremely high magic damage with his new skill Wrath of Nature and benefits a lot from the Mage magic resistance reduction bonus.

The early-mid game core of the build is (3) Elusive (3) Mages with Treant and NP:

CM is the important non-Elusive Mage because you really need the mana regen aura. In this example, Lina gives you the (2) Humans synergy, but in the late game you would usually want to swap her for KotL (unless going for 6 Mages). The most important Elusive hero in this build after the (2) Druids and Puck is Windranger for the simple reason that she has a nuke that deals high magic damage.

Early-Mid Game Example:

You have two options from that point – to go for (6) Elusive + (3) Mages or (3) Elusive + (6) Mages.

(6) Elusive (3) Mages:

In the build above the spread-out positioning is good vs other AoE builds. If you’re fighting Assassins it’s better to box-up in the corner.

Out of the units above Luna is the least important. Her main job is to give your DK some damage reduction, but you can easily do fine with any other sixth Elusive hero.

The best 10^th hero is Medusa for the (3) Hunters synergy (especially if you have a three-star Wind) or Lich for the Mages Ace effect and additional magic damage.

Example by Bebe:

This lineup runs PA instead of Luna – with MoM and a three-star upgrade she definitely presents a real threat even without the Assassins bonus.

Another example with (3) Assassins instead of Hunters:

Here the lack of KotL (or good items) is not great, but the (3) Assassins bonus helps. Giving crits to PA and TA is good, but the main idea is to benefit from Viper’s passive thanks to already running other Dragons – it deals magic damage and benefits from the Mage debuff a great deal.

(6) Mage (3) Elusive:

As mentioned, going for (6) Mages is also possible as shown above. A three-star Nature’s Prophet will deal extremely high damage with the (6) Mages bonus, but bear in mind this build severely lacks control which is much more noticeable when most of your lineup is squishy. Because of this, it’s fair to say this is not the strongest (6) Mage build in Dota Underlords right now.

For more general tips about which items to pick you can check out our Dota Underlords Items Tier List.

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