I've killed raiding SC's with indy commanders wielding Ethereal Cross bow. Just put 40 of the cheapest possible chaff as bodyguard around him, and the commander will get two (hopefully three) shots on the SC. Combine a few such groups, and you have a cheap hunting group. Does work wonders against those Vine/Eye shield + Frost/Firebrand SC's, but pretty much suck against SC's with some massive AoE spells.
I've found the Ichtyids to be the nice for such a cheap bodyguard unit, as they even have a change to web the target, and they have a mapmove 2 (so you can try to outguess the SC movement, move the hunters to position and hope for the best). And if led by a Ichtyid commander (although their precission is nothing to call home about, but with CBM the chance to deviate is low), they can go underwater to hunt stuff there too.
One additional bonus with the Ethereal x-bow is that it is "safe" to craft even with a hostile Arcane Nexus up. Not that it os of any great importance, but everything counts
Re: Leveraging Magic Bows
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