So we all know how boring it is to grind the arenas, in a pool of thousands and thousands of players hoping to get the featured or the basic champ. So why not make the basic/featured champ arenas into an alliance event where each alliance competes for either the basic or featured champ (choice to do one or the other, but not both).
The champ would be the final milestone and the brackets would be determined by the alliances total rating. So let's say, hypothetically, you're in an 8mil alliance, the cutoff would be 125m, that's roughly a little over 4m each person. I think your alliance mates would be more willing to grind out 4mil each player knowing that they would DEFINITELY get the champ, instead of doing it in the current setup and sitting back and hoping they make the cutoff, and then they miss the cutoff and it crushes their hopes and dreams and they vow never to do arenas again and post on forums how "unfair" the system is.

Of course, the cutoffs could be changed depending on the desirability of the champ, newer champs would be higher than the older ones. The milestones in between could be a mix of shards, gold, units, etc., as they are currently offered in the arena and increase as you hit the higher milestones.
Just an idea that I had while I'm here sitting at work, grinding arena. LOL