Monster / Warmachines / Magic in the Elf army - I need your creativity!

[Max Jet]

During the process of building my Dwarf army I thought about large models. Not the small organ and blast cannons, rather something big and unique. Something that stands out, yet fits the theme of my advanced and underground dwelling engineering obsessed dwarf force. From the ice cold mountains should come something unique, should it not? Well I thought about large and glorious steam tanks I could build out of plasticcards. Driller tanks, that can burst from the ground and maybe a giant Mammoth Mutant, fit to carry the Dwarven general.

Well now comes my Elf army. What large and impressive miniatures can you put into an Elf army? A dragon? that has been done to death. An airship? What should it look like? A Zeppelin? Lame.. By the way it needs to be something on the ground, that can be attacked like any other troop. Forrest Monsters? The problem is.. look at the Elf armour. They are clearly from a sophisticated civilized country with a sewer system and roads. It doesn't fit.

So now I ask you for your creativity! Give me the most awesome, impossible, hilarious, beautiful, magical and dreamlike ideas for large stand-out models for an elf army. A civilized in magical cities living Elf folk. Other than the neutral dwarfs fit to be fielded by the good guys (so no gas thrower or hydras please)

[mattjgilbert]

Some kind of insect? That or elementals showing the elf sympathy for magic and nature.

[cornonthecob]

Elementals sound good

[Autumn Leaves]

Elementals would be excellent :-)

[Max Jet]

Elementals would be excellent :-)

I have allready spoken with mattjgilbert on this and while I think it fits to Elves, it shows a little bit too much nature influence for city dwelling Elf people.

You mean something like that right? http://fc05.deviantart.net/fs47/f/20...by_d1sk1ss.jpg Could you think of a way to flesh them more out? And please keep em comming! Every idea will be used somehow.

[eldargal]

I've given this issue some thought myself in regards to my Saphery High Elf noble family themed army. I don't claim anything as particulalry original or inspired:

Tamed monsters. As Max Jet says, most 'High Elf' types give the impression of being elite urbanites. Feral monsters don't seem quite right, but I favour the idea that the Elves advanced magic and knowledge allow them to keep larger monsters as we may keep pets. So it wouldn't be unusual to see hippogriffs, chimerae and whatnot sauntering around the grounds of an Elven estate. Obviously you would want to avoid fel or evil monsters (unless you have a fel or evil army). This is also a great excuse to buy all the fantastic monster kits there are out there, from GW to Raging Heroes.

Arcane constructs. Again with the unparalled control of magic I could see Elves utilising a lot of magically animated constructs for various tasks (I always found the magic broomsticks in the Blood Elf areas of WoW quite a nice touch). It would make sense they would utilise them for warfare as well. Statues, giant suits of armour, perhaps even some more abstract sorcerous creations.

Airships. I've given these a little thought, but not a whole lot (I'd leave them to the Dwarfs) but they could/would come under arcane constructs. I imagine them taking a more natural form than a zepellin, imitating the form of an eagle or dragon. They could have a crew or be unmanned (see constructs).

Buildings. City-dwellers like their comforts, why not take them with you? Floating or even walking keeps, wizards towers etc. Perhaps a little bigger than you were thinking of, but I'm quite fond of the idea myself. I had some rules somewhere for a variety of floating buildings of various sizes that 'counted as' monsters. Unfortunately the rules and modelling and whatnot were all quite difficult so I shelved it indefinitely and then I lost the rules. There was a corpse-cart like buffing waystone thing that floated above the ground and a wizards tower that was hard to hit but fairly fragile and could be upgraded and equpped like a wizard.

Elementals. Not too keen on these either, elementals being the relatively unchained essence of nature it doesn't really work with an urban environment. It's one thing to have a trained gryphon roaming about but quite another to channel a fire elemental and not having it go setting fire to everything or a water elemental flooding the library.

That's all I can think of at the moment, I realise it isn't very detailed but you should get the general idea. I hope it is of use.

Oh there were some more wacky things like centaur and satyr giants. Which aren't really monsters.

[mattjgilbert]

For a manticore there's always something like hits: http://banelegions.maelstromgames.co.uk/?tag=bnb-021

[AlexHolker]

How about something like the skyships of Eberron: an airship powered by a magically bound elemental?

[darkPrince010]

My personal thought would be big insects, like riding a giant scorpion or Goliath beetle. This depends heavily on your color scheme, but the gloss black armor I'm giving mine is due to the armor appearing carapace-y to me

[The Devourer]

My first though has already been covered by eldargal- Magical machines. I imagine they would be similar to dwarven machinery in purpose however much smoother aestetically and powered by magic. My favourite would be large heavy armoured metal humanoids which are powered and given basic thought by elven magic.