More than a decade ago, when I was the head technical person for a major EIFS producer, we undertook an interesting project. The purpose of the project was to identify the characteristics of an ideal type of sheathing to be used as a substrate for EIFS, with the hopes that we might locate or develop such a product.
Below is a list of things that were on our "wish list." It's a pretty ambitious roster but if there were such a material, it surely would solve a lot of substrate-related problems and would make for much better EIFS wall assemblies.