Warriors/Sons of the Lion

[Guardian of the Rage]

Hi all,

 

I'm a long time BA player though I have made a couple of forays into Codex marines. I have always found the 'unadulterated' feel of the C:Sm book to be appealing since I have no wish to use this particular army in a tournament setting. I also think that i want the army to be entirely 'mine', by which I mean they will adopt a fighting style and have a 'look' which comes very much from my own ideas rather than from those laid down in fluff.

 

Allied to this, the army's look must be converted (even if it is simply kit-bashed) so that the models have a a definitive feel to them in the same way that SW and BA do. This set me looking at the various plastic kits throughout the rest of GW (and a few other places besides) for inspiration. I settled upon some plastic bits that I have seen from the High Elves; the Lion Chariot. The central theme of the army would be lions; this kit has several plastic lion symbols/banner tops 2 large shoulder pads, 2 cloaks and even 2 lions! This would be further supplemented by some of the space wolf bits from the new sprues; anywhere that things could not obviously be identified as 'wolfy'. Even if they can (like the heads on the back of the thunder hammer) then some simple trimming down of the length of the 'nose/jaw' and the ears will quickly sort this out.

 

With this settled in my mind, I moved on to what type of civilisation would they be based on? The most obvious would be african, specifically tribal warriors etc. This sat rather well with me immediately as they are not really represented in Fluff by any of the major chapters at present and would also provide a good reason for all of the random teeth and markings on the SW sprue bits! This would also provide the basis for their names, maybe some tribal markings/paint and their homeworld which would be sub-Saharan africa.

 

With regard to the Warfare types, I thought about what I knew from watching documentaries about lions (and topped it up with some wikipedia 'knowledge'). How would the way Lions hunt transfer into 40K? A direct transfer was never going to be possible as the males which live in the prides don't really do a lot other than lag behind most of the time. Still i was starting to see a way through; smaller more nimble units (the lionesses) would move up to engage the enemy and/or trap him in place whilst keeping away from anything too big and powerful. There would also be a couple of more powerful (the males) if a little slower units to arrive later and destroy what the lighter ones could not.

 

While this was a little bit of 'bodge-in' I was thinking that if lions had to fight enemies of the imperium, this is how they might do it. The Lionesses would be units like landspeeders, bikes and tacs in rhinos whilst the Males would be things like vindicators, Assault terminators and Ironclad dreads while some units like Assault marines and sternguard in rhinos might switch roles depending on the situation. I can't help imagining this with the 'Male' unit of TH&SS terminators being called upon. 'Where are the Terminators!?!' - 'They are at the back grooming themselves because its too hot in those suits!!' I digress.

 

So things are beginning to come together, I also thought that maybe they fully appreciated the wisdom of the codex astartes but have struggle constantly against their own nature to maintain its practices, particularly when it comes to things like siege warfare; I don't envisage this being common on sub-Saharan plains.

 

I have nothing yet on prior engagements and likely enemy's thus Ideas would be very welcome. In addition, what do people think so far? A good start or a little odd?

 

Many Thanks in advance,

Kind regards,

GotR

[Shinzaren]

Lion Warriors, cool. I like the idea. You can even call your companies, "Prides."

 

You can definitely use you lighter, faster units to harass, harry, and generally hamstring more mobile enemies, all the while prepping to open a can of Whoop A** with your Devastators, Termies, Land Raiders, etc etc. Its a viable strategy, and good one. In trying to imagine how these tactics would work in a siege, don't worry about it. That is the true beauty of the Codex. It lets you vary from it where you think you want to be unique and different(mobile warfare for you), and still fall back on its time tested wisdom and tactics other times. In a siege, they would just follow codex doctrine, and do as Gulliman taught.

 

You could also use those Lions you picked up, possibly using the "Counts As" rule, having them share the same combat profile as Fenrisian Wolves. Then they could follow your Lions into battle.

 

In looking for enemies, I always think about who I fight most of the tabletop, and who I really like. For me it is, in both cases, Eldar. So I had my Shadow Keepers fight Eldar. Perhaps that helps for you? Is there a non-Imperium army you really like and want to fight?

 

Depending on the name, it might conjure up the wrong idea. When I see Son/Warriors of the Lion, I think of Lion'El Johnson, Primarch of the Dark Angels. If you went DA geneseed, then that would be perfect