500 Under 50: Rangers of Ithilien

Dave: Recently I've seen a few posts pop up on Reddit (r/MiddleEarthMiniatures), Facebook or a few comments from some of my friends who aren't (yet) playing SBG about how they can affordably get into the game. Now, most of the time, people are more than happy to lend advice, and it's often very good. But often, you see people recommending out of production (oop) models that are going to bring costs up, or complex lists that new players might not understand.. Or another common one is just suggesting Rohan or Mordor, since that's what you get in the starter set. I'm not saying any of those are bad, and it's great to see people happy to dispense advice to new players!

What I want to achieve in this short series, is a way to get 500 points on the table, for about £50 and for the force, for the most part, be all directly available from Games Workshop or commonly appearing on eBay/Facebook Marketplace for a reasonable price, I will however endeavour to make sure the bulk of the list comes from GW. I won't be including Rule Books in the price, as they will always be an investment, and a cost you will eventually have to make one way or another.

The first list I want to look at is the Legendary Legion “Rangers of Ithilien. If you're new to the game, you might be wondering what on earth a “Legendary Legion” is. In a nutshell, it's a restricted army list where you are only allowed certain models (and sometimes only certain equipment on those models), but in return you are given some extra rules to let you theme your army better.

The Rangers of Ithilien are really cool, because where normally no more than 33% of your army may have bows, any models lead by Faramir, Madril or Damrod are exempt from that limit! You'll also gain the ability to move through woods and forests unhindered, so a really great way to have a nice ranged army that can still have some combat potential. A downside to the Legendary Legion, is that this is no longer considered a “Minas Tirith” army list, so the Army Bonus of +1C is lost.

So, lets get down to business, for this list you will need;
Ranger Captains: Faramir, Madril and Damrod - £20 for the pack of 3
1 box of Rangers of Gondor - £26 for a box of 24 models, of which you will need 23.
Frodo, Sam and Gollum – Roughly £10 from eBay, but depends when you search etc.
Total cost: £56, if you get your 2 GW items sent to your local store and collect yourself.

And here's the list I've thrown together;
Faramir with Bow
8 Rangers of Gondor
4 Rangers of Gondor with Spears

Madril
3 Rangers of Gondor
2 Rangers of Gondor with Spears

Damrod
3 Rangers of Gondor
1 Rangers of Gondor with Spears

Frodo Baggins with Mithril Vest, Sting and Elven Cloak
Sam Gamgee with Elven Cloak
Smeagol

This list's main focus, if it wasn't already obvious, is fighting at range. Every one of your models, aside from Frodo, Sam and Gollum has a bow, and will hit on a roll of a 3+ if they stay still. You're going to want to get into a good position and defend it, as a downside of this list is its low-ish defence value. I'm actually working on this very list for a cheap and fun Good army to get on the table myself, so if anyone has any questions regarding painting or playing the army, feel free to comment and I'll get back to you!

Thanks Dave! We look forward to more articles in this series, especially in the run up to Christmas! It is worth noting that a Rangers of Ithilien LL won a 500 point Good v Evil tournament last weekend but that list would require mounting Faramir, an extra box of Rangers and a mounted Captain! Maybe that would be a nice next step if you decide to collect Dave's list.