Fanmade Lion Rangers Battletome

[EMMachine]

Hi,

A part of one of my projects is a Lion Rangers Army. The models I actually own are 3x10 White Lions, 1 Dragon Noble in White Lion Design, 3 White Lion Chariots and 6 War Lions.

I posted a Twitterpost ( @EMMachine27 ) yesterday (with the unpainted models) because I didn't finish any models during during last weeks and wanted to post something.

Now I have the problem. Lion Rangers don't have battlelines or Leader, so they are only playable as Allies, in Order Armies or Path to Glory (Dragon Noble, White Lions, White Lion Chariot).

To get the army somewhere playable in Matched Play I need some Battlelines. Perhaps Freeguild Archers or Glade Guard in case of Rules because why would you take close Combat units when you already have White Lions. Perhaps I will look if I can make a conversion of White Lions and the Army of Shadow Warriors.

The bigger problem are the War Lions. The Warscroll that would be the closest are the Frost Sabres, in case of Order Warscrolls Gryph Hound.

 

Now I thought, perhaps I could write something like an unofficial Lion Rangers Battletome.

I have a PDF Document (made with Google Doc) with Warscrolls, Skirmish Table, Path to Glory Table and Pitched Battle Profiles.

I don't know, how you guys make the official looking design. In my case it's quite plain and instead of the way GW handelt the Description and Command Unit Upgrades I uses a Design more similar to the 40k Design.

To give a little Overflow.

• White Lions simply got a "Battleline if"
• White Lion Chariots got a "Battleline if" similar to the Scourgerunner Chariot of Scourge Privateers, get a WAR LION Keyword, and the option for a Champion (when having more than 1 model, because 1 model champion spam isn't good design )
• White Lion Noble is a Dragon Noble with a little weaker Enchanted Shield (Lion Cloak)
• White Lion Trainer should be a little in function of the Beastclaw Raiders Hunter (with less Range), but could alternativly also be like the Bloodstoker.
• War Lions are a little mix of Frost Sabres, the War Lion Rules of the Chariot (and perhaps a little "Storm of Magic" (WHFB)
• White Lion Hunters should be the equivalent of the Freeguild Archers or Glade Guard in this case but more a mix Highborn Archers (AoS Compendium and White Lions)

What do you guys think so far. Would such a army be possible, what units are too expensive or too cheap. Actually don't know what could be made for Allegiance Abilites, Battalions or Champion Reward Tables. What units would be interesting, too?

Perhaps with a little advertising on Twitter or Facebook for Modelprojects, Lion Rangers could get a little love from GW, too.

 

Edit:

Is this the right place for content like this or is there a better place?

Edited May 7, 2018 by EMMachine

[EMMachine]

So, just corrected an error (but leaving the Version number). At first I wrote the document partly in german, but thought, why not using the english rules because this way I can post it here. But sadly I left a translation error.

To add some information. At first my White Lion Noble was quite a Warscroll clone of Korhil (leaving the "bodyguard" out) , but after I made my Model out of the Dragon Nobles kit, I desided to change it.

There are two things.

1. You would need Korhils model after its quite impossible getting a nice one handed axe for a generic Aelf Model and second
2. His Command Ability gave +1 to Wound against Monsters (do we really need this for a Army where the close combat infantry wounds on 3+?)

I think I could make an extra warscroll (with slightly higher points) where the model can have 2 Weapons (for a version 1.1).

Another thing I thought after posting the PDF.

Perhaps I have made the Hunters a little expensive. 2 Units that could have a similar role are Black Arc Corsairs and Spireguard.

Black Arc Corsairs are better in Close Combat, have halve the range but more shots in the Shooting Phase, a similar save (costing about halve of my hunters)

Spireguard is better in close Combat, has a similar weaponrange (4" less) and also a similar save (costing 20 Points less)

Perhaps I could make the White Lion Hunters about 20 Points cheaper.

 

Perhaps you have some other suggestions.

My only real goal with this is to encourage a little creativity and give some of the smaller factions a little more flair.

[kenshin620]

While cool, I think Lion Rangers are a little one dimensional atm. I can easily see them getting refolded back into a unified aelve faction. While you could try to finagle a battletome out of them, I think thats almost like trying to make a battletome out of Maneaters. Then again I did really like someone's suneater fan army (thats basically expanding the fire eater ogor, a single model!).

Maybe since White Lions are far more about brute strength, maybe their ranged unit should use throwing axes rather than bows? Perhaps white lioness riders that trade power for speed?

 

As for warscrolls that look like official ones, theres this website.

 

https://runebrush.pa-sy.com//warscroll/

 

[Melcavuk]

Hey, I'm the guy slowly working on the Suneater Battletome so here's what I could pickup from a quick look

Allegiance abilities, what are they?
Relics, prayers etc?

Missing key word HERO on both hero choices
Could do with 1 utility hero choice (either a banner, a priest, or something similar)
Could possibly do with a mounted hero choice

The lion trainer has the ability for lion rangers to reroll saves, make sure it specifies Lion Trainer as whilst he is a lion ranger aswell it isnt written as a keyword dependant abiblity.
The blanket increase charge range on the Tamer for units in range rather than a specific unit could make it somewhat overpowered by daisy chaining units, either make it a command ability or only for units wholley in range

In terms of naming I know you had little to work with in terms of what was already there but everything having the word lion in it might be a bit excessive, try and vary it up a touch as the unit names tend to all blur together when trying to remember which white lion is which.

Could do with a support unit, be it a monster, artillery piece or long ranged unit potentially. Something with a bit of kik

 

Otherwise it looks good, perhaps a little bland in terms of variety but you didnt have much to work with to start.

 

[awcamawn]

9 hours ago, EMMachine said:

You would need Korhils model after its quite impossible getting a nice one handed axe for a generic Aelf Model and second

Very cool! I like this idea! Just wanted to chime in quickly and mention that if you can't get a Korhil model, the Eternal Guard/Wildwood Rangers kit comes with a one handed axe intended for the Wildwood Ranger champion. If you're looking for an aelven one-handed axe it's a good option imho: 

6 hours ago, kenshin620 said:

maybe their ranged unit should use throwing axes

Could be onto something here, I think. Short range, but with rend and 3+ or even 2+ to wound?

6 hours ago, kenshin620 said:

white lioness riders that trade power for speed?

Now we're talking! Lion cavalry! I've seen some really cool conversions where people have put the Sisters of the Thorn onto wolves to great effect, and I think the same could done with lions.

9 hours ago, EMMachine said:

My only real goal with this is to encourage a little creativity and give some of the smaller factions a little more flair.

Yes please!

 

Aaaaaand.... I'm off to shamelessly plug Wanderer models in some other thread! Excelsior! 

[EMMachine]

First thanks to all feedback until now.

Before going through all of this first to remind. There should be a existing "backup" Warscroll to use, if not using this battletome. I'm not really playing right know but I can't force people to play against unofficial rules so in best case the army should be playable (as a mixed Order Army) even under Matched Play Conditions, (better without compendium warscrolls, because after seeing the Dark Aelfs Legacy List, those units won't be available they are reworked.

14 hours ago, kenshin620 said:

While cool, I think Lion Rangers are a little one dimensional atm. I can easily see them getting refolded back into a unified aelve faction.

It's the problem of many subfactions, coming from WHFB, at the moment. The Lionrangers would really be really good Ghur Aelves with their wild look.

14 hours ago, kenshin620 said:

Maybe since White Lions are far more about brute strength, maybe their ranged unit should use throwing axes rather than bows? Perhaps white lioness riders that trade power for speed?

8 hours ago, awcamawn said:

Could be onto something here, I think. Short range, but with rend and 3+ or even 2+ to wound?

As I quite like the idea of throwing axes. The point is, there are not many warscrolls using them (I could see what I have in my Duardin Bits from my WHFB Dwarf Army). Do you really think that an aelf can get this much force into a throwing axe, if even dwarfs only wound on 4+? Perhaps a boost when fighting monsters knowing where weakspots are. And what should be a backup warscroll? Black Arc Corsairs? Freeguild Guard?

14 hours ago, kenshin620 said:

As for warscrolls that look like official ones, theres this website.

Thanks, this is good to know. Perhaps in a later state I can redo the warscrolls, but I think as long I don't have a fix status I should stay with the doc because its a little quicker to make the updates at the moment.

9 hours ago, Melcavuk said:

Allegiance abilities, what are they?
Relics, prayers etc?

Don't know, yet. But still can use Order Allegiance abilities so the priority isn't that high right now.

9 hours ago, Melcavuk said:

Missing key word HERO on both hero choices

Yeah, shame on me for that one. Don't know if I should fix that as a quickchange without changing the version or as part of the new version.

9 hours ago, Melcavuk said:

Could do with 1 utility hero choice (either a banner, a priest, or something similar)

A priest or a totem could be interesting. I mean, in the GA:Order they are descriped as some sort of Monastery Order (sounds a little like my Order of the Yellow Rose). But I don't actually know, what they should get as Abilities,yet.

9 hours ago, Melcavuk said:

The lion trainer has the ability for lion rangers to reroll saves, make sure it specifies Lion Trainer as whilst he is a lion ranger aswell it isnt written as a keyword dependant abiblity.
The blanket increase charge range on the Tamer for units in range rather than a specific unit could make it somewhat overpowered by daisy chaining units, either make it a command ability or only for units wholley in range

Hm, the White Lion Trainer was suppost to train the Warlions. Don't know how he should make Lion Rangers re-roll saves. Perhaps I should call him a Tamer instead.

Like I said, its the rule that the Iceblow Hunter gives to the Frost Sabres (in that case on the frost Sabres Warscroll). And I already weakened the rule by 4" and make the bravery effect a wholly within effect.

Still can make him more like the Blood Stoker, that he whips a unit of WAR LIONS giving them a effekt (if I take his Effect instead it would be 3" to Run / Charge Moves and re-roll wound Rolls of 1 for the Lion Attacks.

Or how about the Beastmasters effect for Hydra/Kharibdyss. Rolling 3 dice discarding the lowest but causing a Mortal Wound on a triple. (but could be a little week for a HERO Choice)

What would sound better?

9 hours ago, Melcavuk said:

In terms of naming I know you had little to work with in terms of what was already there but everything having the word lion in it might be a bit excessive, try and vary it up a touch as the unit names tend to all blur together when trying to remember which white lion is which.

Hm, should be the least problem to change that after I shouldn't mix the Pitched Battle Profiles or something like that. Only took those names because of the existing Scrolls.

9 hours ago, Melcavuk said:

Could do with a support unit, be it a monster, artillery piece or long ranged unit potentially. Something with a bit of kik

Hm, one unit I could think of in case of a Monster would be a Manticore (I know, it was a Dark Elves creature in the old world and actually only used by Slaves of Darkness), but its the closest thing to a Lion that we get.

8 hours ago, awcamawn said:

Very cool! I like this idea! Just wanted to chime in quickly and mention that if you can't get a Korhil model, the Eternal Guard/Wildwood Rangers kit comes with a one handed axe intended for the Wildwood Ranger champion. If you're looking for an aelven one-handed axe it's a good option imho: 

Strangely I missed out this one (or it was the different look). Actually I should have some of these because my Archers in the "Faithful of Eloni" Project used the Eternal Guard bodys.

 

8 hours ago, awcamawn said:

Now we're talking! Lion cavalry! I've seen some really cool conversions where people have put the Sisters of the Thorn onto wolves to great effect, and I think the same could done with lions.

Hm, there was a point where I thought about something like that. The point is, the only GW Lions avalable are in the Chariot Box (with 2 of them), so you need to buy many chariots, building many swifthawk Agents Chariots to use the Lions.

The question is, what sort of Cavalry it could be. Making them 5 Models like Dragon Blades or Drakespawn Knight would make them really expensive. Perhaps 2 or 3 Models similar to Demigryph Knights? Actually I would need to give my Lions some bigger bases if I want to use them as Cavalry.  (Actually I used 60x35 mm Bases for the 6 Lions I based, but I think in case of Cavalry I would need at least 75x42mm Bases). Hm, Sisters of Thorn legs do really have a similar design. First thought were legs of Dragon Blades, but these are quite different in design.

Or making it a little strange (even I have seen this in a Total War Warhammer Youtube Video), Lion Rangers riding on Horses.

8 hours ago, awcamawn said:

Aaaaaand.... I'm off to shamelessly plug Wanderer models in some other thread! Excelsior! 

No problem. My Alarielle praying humans use many Wanderers bits (see in the link above). I really should finish more of those models, too.

And to be fair, Lion Rangers have more in common with the wanderers than the Sisters of the Watch/Sisters of Avalorn with there magical firebows (would actually see these girls as Eldritch Council or Phoenix Temple not really as Wanderers).

 

But after all of this, 1 problem stays. What will I use as Battleline when I only use official Warscrolls? That was the point of taking the Archers in the first place?

If I look through the existing Warscrolls we have the following Order Battlelines:

Aelfs: Bleakswords, Darkshards, Dreadspears, Sisters of Slaughter, Whichaelfs, Reavers, (Dryads), Glade Guard, Namarti Thralls.

Duardin: Warriors, Longbeards, Vulkite Berzerkers,

Human: Freeguild Archers, Freeguild Crossbowmen, Freeguild Guard, Freeguild Handgunners, (Liberators)

Seraphon: Skinks, Saurus Warriors

Using the Skinks Warscroll would be a little wierd, Duardin doesn't really match. and the only Warscroll that could have some sort of Missile Weapon without beeing a bow would be Freeguild Guard with Militia Weapons (their range is a little high).

And playing Lion Rangers as Namarti Thralls would be a quite bad solution .

Any Suggestions?

Edited May 8, 2018 by EMMachine

[Thundercake]

I think backup warscrolls is a good idea. If you go with a short range throwing axe unit, they could count as freeguild bows/handgunners/etc., glade guard, or arkanuat company, just something that is ranged and universal order battleline. For the lion cavalry, i'd go with demgryphs, makes the most sense to me.

If you are looking for axes, both fyreslayers and marauder horsemen have throwing axe weapon profiles and i believe model options for them as well.

[kenshin620]

There could also be an expansion to the different magic realms. Surely not all lion rangers hail from a place where magic doesn't affect them/affect the local lions. Kind of inspired by warcraft cards. Even if elemental lions aren't really a thing, perhaps there are lion rangers that are more connected to Ghur.

Spoiler

 

 

Another thing could be lions that lost their master so they charge forth with reckless abandon with little care to their self preservation, like slayers. 

[Bueno]

On 07/05/2018 at 11:43 AM, EMMachine said:

 

I don't know, how you guys make the official looking design. In my case it's quite plain and instead of the way GW handelt the Description and Command Unit Upgrades I uses a Design more similar to the 40k Design.

 

Attached our some template pages i've used to make my battletomes, feel free to use these and edit text/pics etc. This is in PDF (view in two page per view mode) so you can even edit using a free trial of adobe acrobat pdf editor.

If you have access to microsoft publisher let me know and i can send over the base file templates which will be easier to edit.

Phoenix Temple template.pdf

[EMMachine]

4 hours ago, Thundercake said:

I think backup warscrolls is a good idea. If you go with a short range throwing axe unit, they could count as freeguild bows/handgunners/etc., glade guard, or arkanuat company, just something that is ranged and universal order battleline. For the lion cavalry, i'd go with demgryphs, makes the most sense to me.

If you are looking for axes, both fyreslayers and marauder horsemen have throwing axe weapon profiles and i believe model options for them as well.

I actually think, I will make Warscrolls for both Variants (Bows and Throwing Axes) but not building such a unit yet.

The funny thing with the demigryphs is, that those guys actually have 4 wounds. (A little much when we think that the Lion Chariot has 6 Wounds and my Lions do have 2 at the moment (because Frost Sabres have 2). Another point is. Should the Cavalry and the Lions be faster than the Chariot? I mean 2 Riders won't be very different from 1 Chariot if all stats are the same and the move of 9" of the chariot could be the weight of it. There should be a point taking the Lions or the Riders instead of the Chariot. Or the Chariot should be 1" slower?

 

3 hours ago, kenshin620 said:

There could also be an expansion to the different magic realms. Surely not all lion rangers hail from a place where magic doesn't affect them/affect the local lions. Kind of inspired by warcraft cards. Even if elemental lions aren't really a thing, perhaps there are lion rangers that are more connected to Ghur.

Yeah, thats true. It don't have to be "White Lions". The burning one looks really cool, but I don't want to sit on one. At the end its like with Ponyta and Rapidash of Pokemon where you only get burned if they don't like you .

Even Scars Colortheme (Lionking) could look cool.

Actually I bought some stuff today:

Friday I should get another box with 10 White Lions. Hopefully the stuff I want to do works. I think I will try to build 3 Lion Riders (have to make 3 War Lions on Taller Bases in this case, perhaps a Tamer and something I would call a Lion Lord/Lion Noble on Emperor Lion. Bases on the Manticor, perhaps without the wings and a change for its Tail (I'm not really good with green stuff but perhaps I can make a little Fur on its Tail (and close the holes where the wings would be. I still have some White Lions on Squarebase, so when I use some of them too, I can still get 10 more White Lions (perhaps they should be called Lion Guard or something). So be prepared

3 hours ago, kenshin620 said:

Another thing could be lions that lost their master so they charge forth with reckless abandon with little care to their self preservation, like slayers. 

You mean some sort of rule for the War Lions?

Edited May 8, 2018 by EMMachine

[EMMachine]

So, lets go into round 2 with the Battletome 1.1.

Simply wrote some things together

• We have a Lion Lord now that got a Battleaxe and a similar Effect like the Dragon Lord (basicly the Korhil Model or other models with a second Axe.
• The Lion Noble has now a Throwing Axes got up 10 Points
• Both Heros have a Variant with a Emperion Lion
• Lion Trainer is now called Lion Tamer is now a Blood Stoker for War Lions
• The Lion old Lion Hunters are now called Lion Archers, lost 1 Point Bravery, 4" Range of there Bows but got 20 Points cheaper
• new Lion Hunters do have Throwing Axes and a Hunterblade (could be sword or Axe like) and priced like Vulkite Berzerkers
• White Lions are called Lion Guard now
• Lion Chariot got 1" slower
• War Lions got 1" faster
• new Unit Lion Riders
• Emperor Lion added (mostly a Manticore without wings and a little slower.

Don't know if I got the points right but it should be a little more variation her.

Edited May 8, 2018 by EMMachine

[kenshin620]

Another idea is that since the Stormcast also have a lot of lion iconography, maybe there are lion rangers that work very closely with the SCE? And perhaps after a long partnership, some of these lion rangers are rewarded with equipment. Maybe even call them the warhammer equivalent of "Thunder Cats"!

[EMMachine]

6 hours ago, kenshin620 said:

Another idea is that since the Stormcast also have a lot of lion iconography, maybe there are lion rangers that work very closely with the SCE? And perhaps after a long partnership, some of these lion rangers are rewarded with equipment. Maybe even call them the warhammer equivalent of "Thunder Cats"!

Actually never see Thunder Cats (I was about 2 when the series ended).

Hm, you mean, getting some axes of the Vanguard Rangers?

 

Actually I got my Lion Rangers Box today (because of tomorows holliday). so I could build my Lion Riders and my Lion Lord on Emperor Lion today. The Combination War Lion, Wildrider Legs and White Lion Bodies work really good here

Im not so good with greenstuff in case of the Emperor Lion, but I hope it will look less wierd when it has paint on it.

[EMMachine]

So, some small updates. Actually I posted the updates into a blog here.

I uploaded some WIP Pictures of War Lions and the Emperor Lion in the Blog Entry here:

And translated the story about the Lion Rangers Godbeast. The Great Lion Korhil:

 

[GammaMage]

The story is a great start - remember, battletomes are about more than just the mechanics, they're about the army's look and history and lore too. To get people excited about an army it needs good hooks on multiple levels, because people play AoS for very different reasons to each other. But this Battletone is growing on me more and more as I'm thinking about it.

I have panther lancers from Mantic's Kings of War game  and the models are...pretty bad actually, but with a bit of greenstuff patching and some good painting they could make decent female lions. I tossed the riders and saddles though, they were awful.

[EMMachine]

21 minutes ago, GammaMage said:

The story is a great start - remember, battletomes are about more than just the mechanics, they're about the army's look and history and lore too. To get people excited about an army it needs good hooks on multiple levels, because people play AoS for very different reasons to each other. But this Battletone is growing on me more and more as I'm thinking about it.

I know, my own Lion Rangers Army is more a painting project. Don't even know, if this army will ever see a gameboard. I think nobody knows. I still have to look how I make the rest (at best in a generic form, or seeing from various different aelfen kinds).

I made up those 5 lion kinds, so there is something like a rainbow-colored mane, but there could be many more.

If GW gives them some sort of background, I can still have my Fyre-aelfs.

One thing I realized. I was thinking about if I can just add the toppart and buttompart of the warscroll into my document, but the topline gets far to small in the page format, and if I rotate the page by 90° it will get too small for my Emperor Lion Units, so 2 pages would be needed. Putting the entire warscroll into a Google doc, will get quite small, too. So my "layout" will be the easiest way, even it's quite ugly.

[EMMachine]

So, I made a version 1.2 (still without background because the one part I posted isn't really enough for it).

For once, I made some Shadow Warrior like unit again. They are Lion Hunters, too. They have the defensive abilities of the Lion Rangers and the deployment rule of the Shadow Warriors but not the re-roll. The Champion makes a additional Attack like the Shadow Warriors.

The other Lion Hunters unit got the Change change with the champion and the deployment Rule, too.

In Addition a made minor point changed to the Units that contain a Emperor Lion.

I made Lion Noble and Lion Lord on Emperor Lion 20 Points cheaper (after a Chaos Lord only costs 250 Points), and the Emperor Lion doesn't have a flying rule.

And the Emperor Lion itself got 50 Points cheaper. 150 Points for him should be enough. 200 Points could be a little to expensive for him, after he is a non Flying Manticore with slower Movement.

 

[MrZakalwe]

This is very, very cool. Nice work!

[Necroshadow]

Seems the lore they've given them doesn't actively contradict any of your stuff, if the faction focus is anything to go by, so keep up the awesome work I'd say. Considered any allegiance abilities, command traits or relics for them? 

[Kramig]

sorry for necroposting, but this idea was very interesting to me! Is there any update? Did you give up with this project?

[EMMachine]

3 hours ago, Kramig said:

sorry for necroposting, but this idea was very interesting to me! Is there any update? Did you give up with this project?

I think I made some updates inside one of my projects. The latest Version I made was 2.6.2 in January 2019.

Here is also the project were I have some of my models:

Fire, ice, light and shadow. An Aelf collection project.

The frustrating part was when GW removed the Lion Rangers from the product range. There was the plan making an Update after the Cities of Sigmar Release but I never done it.

Edited May 15, 2020 by EMMachine