Troops that devour take damage equal to the attack they gain.
I am SO damn sick of losing match after match to damn krakens and sometimes black manacles.
Let’s say kraken casts and triggers a devour on my dragonian rogue with 34 attack. Before it gains any stats from the devour, it takes 34 dmg, then if it lives it gains all the stats it would normaly.
The rogue would still die but it might be able to get in on last hit.
I so second this!!!
I’d suggest utilising an Impervious or Indigestible last troop is a more sensible option.
Sorry but imho this is a daft idea. Devour is a powerful effect, yes, but can be countered, blocked or the troop just mana drained. This proposal adds a hefty downside to the effect, which rather defeats the point.
I like this idea a bunch.
Devour has to be the most OP spell/trait in the entire game. Nothing else is even on the same level as it…
Name another spell that will:
A) Kill any troop no matter how strong it currently is
B) Give you additional attack, armor, health and magic of the troop you devoured
Devour is the MOST hated what I call CHEESY mechanic of this game, and the reason why I have mostly quit playing PvP.
Deathmark has to come 2nd to this.
These spells are cheesy mechanics, it does not make the game harder, it makes the game more RNG based on winning. Strategy should never be based 100% on RNG, these 2 spells do just that. They make RNG is the most important factor in winning matches.
I’m with @Jainus on this one. I understand why players get frustrated by Devour, and I know I have. But it doesn’t “make RNG the most important factor in winning matches”. It actually makes team comps and board control the most important factor in winning matches. The clear example is with Great Maw: One decent mana drain troop and it’s utterly worthless. All Devour really does is prevent you from using a one-size-fits-all team (which is a good thing!).
I’d like to know how you stop lucky 4/5 matches from dropping from the gods above for the other team, to end up having half your team devoured before you get your turn.
You can’t call that strategy, its cheesiness of RNG. Bad board start: RNG, lucky drops: RNG, Devour on 20% working 4 times in a row: RNG. Devour/Deathmark are CHEESY MECHANICS!
Believe me I’ve had my days with Devour.
Today being one of them, 
But, in the end Devour is fairly avoidable all things considered. And though it can make a troop a big baddy in most cases you can just pummel them a bit longer with board control and they just make a bigger puddle when you’re done with them.
I think the problem is just it seems like lately, there has been more focus on RNG based abilities and traits from the devs from a design place. Rather than static, balanced, quantifiable mechanics. In a “strategy” game players want to feel in control and anything that places a victory condition on a “questionable” algorithm is unsettling to the player base. 
Death Curse merely exacerbated the problem and made it blatantly obvious to everybody… AGAIN. 
This idea is a flat out NO
However…Devour steals Barrier.
Okay, so why not have Devour acquire negative status effects as well?
It should probably either gain all of them or none of them, but if you want to “balance” it incrementally without destroying it (this is the general “you” we know the OP wants to destroy it) then just have it gain negative status effects.
FOR SURE you should gain poison when devouring.
P.S. How do you resurrect from being devoured?
In the case of TDS, the trait is “Possession” which technically the act of leaving one physical body and entering another. So at least in the cast of TDS, it makes sense that Devour doesn’t defeat Possession.
Other than that, I’m definitely on board with ALL status effects carrying over, not just the good ones.
I would love to see troops gain deathmark after devouring a deathmarked enemy.
Or just have a “poison pill” trait that poisons any enemy that kills it and death marks any enemy that devours it…
I agree with @Jainus - devour shouldnt receive damage
but i think there could be added few mechanics that would make more sensible defending vs it:
change indigestible trait - instead of just “not getting devoured” - deal damage or kill the devourer.
also as mentioned above - transfering all debuffs from the devoured unit to the devourer would help
yes we all know devour is a pain in the butt, but unless you have less than 150 different troops why is is a prob? the best devour team i face is kerberos/giant spider/forest guardian/ kerberos. dont forget fully traited guardian gives all of them half mana.
i think 1 out of 3 times that group gives me a prob, and dont complain about maw just drain his mana there are many ways to do it.
such as psion(traited and spell), famine, spirit fox, moloch, khorvash, and prob some others im forgetting