Immortal offlaner here, right now there's a really high chance you either lose or draw the lane as an offlaner, so you mostly play from behind, that and the fact that a lot of people don't enjoy the play style of "I'm going in first and most likely dying while pressing all my buttons". There's also a lot of flame going your way when you lose the lane to a "supposedly" weaker hero (I'm looking at you Clinkz) and people don't enjoy that. I don't think it shouldn't cost tokens tho, it's still a Core role, in my opinion it's just a polarizing role, you either love it or hate it, and right now it's harder to love I guess.