Will the Alpha Legion ever fail?

[Ifrit446]

Well being an Alpha player myself, I have to play the Devil's advocate here. So what if the Alphas never really "lose", they actually lose quite abit.

 

Take for example the following instances that the Alphas lose: Voldorius (slaughtered by the white scars), Legion (can't save a single planet from one chaos artifact), Deliverance Lost (all infiltrators in the Raven Guard die), ALL dawn of war books (Alphas always fail and are driven back), Siege of Vraks (Arkos is captured and his warband is mostly defeated), Serpent Beneah (Alphas lose alot of marines including an unnecessary sacrifice of the FIRST CAPTAIN!!), Alpharius dying to Girlyman.

 

The only thing that I see them doing right is recovering the Primarch Material, and preventing a traitor from their own legion leaking out information...that's really it without going into crazy conspiracy mode. So from what we know for certain, the Alphas are only able to win the small things at the cost of quite many legionaires. And this isn't the Smurfs legion, we can't just replace all of our losses like they can...

 

PS: random observation, but you (the OP) are getting upset because the Alphas were able to wipe out some orcs with the aid of the Bloods??? Isn't that alittle overboard??

[The Colossus]

Okay found it. Actually it does say that it was Alpharius' prediction.

SNIP

 

Taken at face value, it indeed seems as such. It's all written from Horus and Sanguinus' point of views though- the alphas could be planning anything.

And I think that is part of the OP's concern and why some people are strongly influenced to the opinion that the AL have turned into the personal Mary Sue Legion of the 40k universe. Something happens, and more than a few people sit there and go "Well, that is like, totally your opinion. But you need to go deeper man, I know it's radical but I think there was something else going on." Once in a blue moon, there is something about the Alpha Legion that can be taken at face value. Now, what the Alpha Legion exactly did inside the Kayvas Belt, no one really knows. Except that they blew up a planet and that they had orks running left and right into the Blood Angels' guns.

 

And to be fluff-anal on this one, really, really small point, the POVs were Garviel Loken in Horus Rising and Mkani Kano in Fear to Tread.

 

Yeah, I really meant from the POV of the Legions (I.e. Loken and Kano), i just put the primarchs cos its them we were discussing more- to a certain extent, the primarchs view is the legions view (there are exceptions), and this is shown through loken's and Kano's eyes.

 

It's certainly nice having things tied together and hints from earlier books expanded upon. Even if the Alphas seem all-powerful. Although, apparently it didn't all go the Alphas way- they wanted Horus legion, not BA.

[Iron Father Ferrum]

Ifrit, Ranko wasn't the First Captain. He was the Terminator commander. Ingo Pech is the First Captain.

[Ifrit446]

Ifrit, Ranko wasn't the First Captain. He was the Terminator commander. Ingo Pech is the First Captain.

 

My bad, I figured the termie captain was usually the First Captain

[karden00]

It really is too bad that your Primarch got punked by Guilliman. Poor Alpharius, no sense whatsoever of Logistics.

LOGGGGGGGGGIIIIIIIIIIIIIISTICS

 

Courage and Honor and Logistics

[Iron Father Ferrum]

If you're referring to the fight on Eskrador, then you might want to go back and read all the fluff about it a second time. Maybe a third. Because that fight. . . probably didn't happen.

[Kol Saresk]

And even if it did, the Ultramarines still got their butts handed to them. By "normal" Marines.

[Legatus]

And even if it did, the Ultramarines still got their butts handed to them. By "normal" Marines.

No, by the Alpha Legion. Who fight even better without a Primarch hampering their efforts.

[Kol Saresk]

Marines are Marines are Marines. They all do insane, impossible stuff so to me, the Alpha Legion is just as normal as the rest of them. Except the Night Lords. hose guys are completely off their rockers. Might be why I like them so much ;)

[Hyaenidae]

And even if it did, the Ultramarines still got their butts handed to them. By "normal" Marines.

No, by the Alpha Legion. Who fight even better without a Primarch hampering their efforts.

 

*sigh* Again, the battle on Eskador most likely didn't happen, not how we think it did anyway. Nothing from the Heresy has turned out as we thought it did; everything we were told was a lie.

 

Get over it, man. Moaning constantly about the bare handful of defeats the Ultramarines have suffered is getting a bit old.

[Legatus]

*sigh* Again, the battle on Eskador most likely didn't happen,

My point exactly. Even if it was kind of veiled.

[Hyaenidae]

We're already seeing the Alpha's firing shots at each other, and this will lead to one of two things; a civil war of two sides (which will probably result in being the actual war on Eskrador), or the Legion turning in on itself, ripping itself into pieces through backstabbing and double/triple crosses, no brother trusting another; one way or another, the Alpha Legion is on a downward slope that will lead to either half of them dead, and/or broken into hundreds of untrusting cells at war with... well... everyone.

[Azekai]

the Alpha Legion is on a downward slope that will lead to either half of them dead, and/or broken into hundreds of untrusting cells at war with... well... everyone.

Which is, of course, all according to plan. B)

[Wade Garrett]

Okay, now that I've taken time to think about the issue (instead of my previous approach of screaming "ALPHA LEGION! FROM HELL'S HEART, I STAB AT THEE! WITH MY LAST BREATH, I SPIT AT THEE!") I believe I understand why the AL come across as Plot Armored Mary Sues sometimes.

 

Most of the BL stories focus on bolters firing, chainswords roaring, superhumans in power armor charging at one another while screaming mighty oaths...thing is, the way Alpha Legion operates, once it gets to that point the hard part is over. Look at the way things turned out in Legion. If all we had gotten out of it was the very end, where the Alpha Legion out tricks the Cabal and destroys an entire Imperial task force, they'd have come off as a Legion of Khaldor Draigos. However, because we were shown the painstaking effort at recruiting operatives, the spies and counter spies chasing one another around Nurth, the double and triple crosses going on with John Grammaticus, Bronzi, etc., the Alpha triumph at the end came off as the product of hard work, effort, and more than a little luck, instead of "Because the author said so."

 

Where the Alphas start to look really out of control is in the short stories like "The Long Game at Carcharias" and "The Face of Treachery" where we aren't shown the years of deceit, infiltration, setbacks, activating contingency plans, more deceit, and so forth, they skip straight to the "Bwah ha ha! We win everything FOREVER!", and cue the raging. If we could get some more Alpha stories detailing how much work they put into engineering these triumphs, and fewer showings where they walk in, proclaim everything went exactly as they intended, fin, it might calm the rage down.

 

As much as the 40k fanbase every calms down about anything.

[Haranin]

Good points. The LOGISTICS and planning efforts are the big contrasts with other legions.

 

SW or WE might smash a hundred different worlds for the emperor/blood god in the same time the Alpha Legion puts together the initial effort for one world. If the Alpha legion is operating on multi hundred year operations...

[Kol Saresk]

The last I heard, the World Eaters had trouble just smashing one world in a multi-single year period with over 4,000 World Eaters!*

 

*Numbers for the First War of Armageddon may or may not be exaggerated. It is a number from off the top of my head.

[Wade Garrett]

The last I heard, the World Eaters had trouble just smashing one world in a multi-single year period with over 4,000 World Eaters!*

*Numbers for the First War of Armageddon may or may not be exaggerated. It is a number from off the top of my head.

 

To be fair that one world is basically a series of giant fortress hives that exists to produce great big tanks and recruits for the Armegeddon Steel Legion.

 

And the World Eaters failed because of LOGISTICS, specifically flawed management of Warp Energy. Had Angron possesed the LOGISTICAL GENIUS of Roboute Guilliman, he would have been able to coordinate construction of Chaos Shrines and the slaughter of Armegeddon's defenders in such a way that the Wolves et al wouldn't have had all that extra time to dig in and scream for reinforcements. Alas for Chaos, they chose to corrupt the guy whose gene seed grants the ability to axe murder instead of an ability to organize the movement of large numbers of men and material.

 

EDIT:

For some reason the idea of Rob and Alpharius being LOGISTICAL rivals in the way that Dorn and Perturabo are siege/fortification rivals makes me want to giggle like a wee school girl. Perhaps I should grab a cold beverage and lie down until the feeling passes.

[b1soul]

I´ve reached the point in Fear to Tread where BA and AL are fighting orks, and the AL are superiour as usual. If they´re so great, why didn´t the Emp make all his Legions like them. This is getting silly... Anyone has examples from the HH books where the AL doesn't kick every ones *** without even being noticed doing it?

Yes, I agree it's starting to get silly and rather annoying

 

AL are always these untouchable stealth-masters who make other legions look mentally retarded

AL run circles around their dimwitted cousins and generally outperform them in all ways

 

I would venture to say AL are being w@nked even harder than SW at the moment...and that's saying something

[Vesper]

I´ve reached the point in Fear to Tread where BA and AL are fighting orks, and the AL are superiour as usual. If they´re so great, why didn´t the Emp make all his Legions like them. This is getting silly... Anyone has examples from the HH books where the AL doesn't kick every ones *** without even being noticed doing it?

 

Well, I guess Ultramarines, Space Wolves, Grey Knights and Blood Angels are totally retarded if the Alpha Legion is silly. Because in like every piece of fluff "they are the best of the bestest that beat everyone so cooly-bombasticly and in the end, they win infinity +1".

 

The fact that the Alpha Legion style is perfect to operate in and against the imperium (a pretty moronic colossus) and the chapters (that are far too predictable) is pretty logical. Yet, sometimes, the AL loses, unlike the very one dimensional Space Wolves.

[Kol Saresk]

One thing just hit me, you never got far into the novel then did you OP? I mean, you see Alpha Legion very close to the very beginning of the book. And yo be honest, you don't even see what they do. All we see is that the Orks are running straight into the picket line made up of the Blood Angels and that the Orks aren't only fighting the Blood Angels, they are fighting each other. Oh and a small planet blows up but for all we know the Orks went kamikaze on that one.

[Daemon2027]

I'm not sure if anyone else said this, kind of skim read it, but as shown in Deliverance Lost, the Alpha Legion had already trained in methods to fight other marines. This would give them an edge early in the heresy. The other thing which was pointed out is that they fight on their terms, they force other forces into a situation they like. Hopefully we will see an author take them out of this comfort zone and we can see how the legion react. I think if the whole legion deployed on a battlefield opposite another legion in a strieght fight they would struggle. That's why the have to even the playing field using 'covert' tactics.

 

I also see them as having a few big weakness, a sort of youthful arrogance, that will see the (possible) end of Alpharius at the hands of Guilimen. This leads them to play out simple missions into a massively convoluted ploys that tie there resources up. I can't remember the name of the world where Alpherius and Guilimen fall out, but it's r there they could have achieved the mission with a simple assult, there confidence in their ability led them to infiltrate the enemy. In that situation it worked but against another force they may left themselves and their allies exposed.

 

I see the AL heading for trouble. There is a clear division in their ranks, which will lead to fractures. Thier very nature has created a paranoia which will fuel this. While the AL may seem unbeatable now, by the end of the Heresy I don't think they will be in he same position.

 

Also they arent great spies, the undercover marines in the Raven Guard kept almost giving themselves away in increasingly stupid fashions.

 

Just my thoughts anyhow..

[NemFX]

Okay. I already did a short sound off earlier in this thread, but here's some stuff for you all.

 

In Legion, the two major tactics that the Alpha Legion showed were:

 

* Using TWO spaceships (i think battle barges?) instead of one. (oh snap, didn't see that coming..)

* Using misdirection in frankly silly ammounts. Everyone pretended to be someone else.

 

They also used minor tactics, like having the partially blacked out armour that was invisible to the sensor nets the Imperial Army had access to.

 

Granted, you never hear about those sensor nets again, but THAT would be something useful in the bigger scheme.

 

In the book The Primarchs, they use two different tactics:

 

* the Effrit stealth squad makes use of xeno tech to deceive a techpriest. The crystal things (they arent explained much) project an image of a normal sized human, probably customizable. The legionnaires trade the crystals alot for whatever reason. Eventually they do it enough to be intimidating, because the priest eventually realizes its the same people he sees. Probably unnecessary, but whatever. It'd make for a good movie scene.

* The asteroid base infiltration mission. They trick the (undertall round men, who have a predilection for mining and beards, named after a gym excersize) 's robot mining devices into attacking their own base.

 

They also rehash the misdirection in that Omegon, who was leading the mission? Yeah. No. Wasn't him.

 

The end of that story had Omegon being sneaky in his room with a hidden suit of armour.

 

(so yeah, that pretty much helps to confirm my belief that they are gearing up for civil war)

 

(or. wouldnt it be a total acid trip if it turns out that omegon gets cosmetic surgery to look like roboute guilliman, and is actually the one in the stasis field?)

 

(oh snap.)

[Kol Saresk]

Okay. I already did a short sound off earlier in this thread, but here's some stuff for you all.

 

In Legion, the two major tactics that the Alpha Legion showed were:

 

* Using TWO spaceships (i think battle barges?) instead of one. (oh snap, didn't see that coming..)

* Using misdirection in frankly silly ammounts. Everyone pretended to be someone else.

 

They also used minor tactics, like having the partially blacked out armour that was invisible to the sensor nets the Imperial Army had access to.

 

Granted, you never hear about those sensor nets again, but THAT would be something useful in the bigger scheme.

 

In the book The Primarchs, they use two different tactics:

 

* the Effrit stealth squad makes use of xeno tech to deceive a techpriest. The crystal things (they arent explained much) project an image of a normal sized human, probably customizable. The legionnaires trade the crystals alot for whatever reason. Eventually they do it enough to be intimidating, because the priest eventually realizes its the same people he sees. Probably unnecessary, but whatever. It'd make for a good movie scene.

* The asteroid base infiltration mission. They trick the (undertall round men, who have a predilection for mining and beards, named after a gym excersize) 's robot mining devices into attacking their own base.

 

They also rehash the misdirection in that Omegon, who was leading the mission? Yeah. No. Wasn't him.

 

The end of that story had Omegon being sneaky in his room with a hidden suit of armour.

 

(so yeah, that pretty much helps to confirm my belief that they are gearing up for civil war)

 

(or. wouldnt it be a total acid trip if it turns out that omegon gets cosmetic surgery to look like roboute guilliman, and is actually the one in the stasis field?)

 

(oh snap.)

Is this an example of the Mary Sue everyone is complaining about or is it the reason why no one should really be complaining? Just asking.

[Alkana]

Is this an example of the Mary Sue everyone is complaining about or is it the reason why no one should really be complaining? Just asking.

 

Yes. People are mad that the AL is fighting exactly the way they always have.

 

Edit: To clarify, people are upset that in the grim darkness of the future, not everyone resorts to "charge it while shooting, then switch to swords" whenever they're faced with adversity. I said this earlier. The AL aren't Mary Sues or anything like that, they just plan everything as much as possible so that when they go into battle, they're 99% sure they're going to win.

[Rain]

The point this topic is trying to make is non-existent. As has been pointed out, the Alpha Legion lost when Voldorius was killed, and when Arkos's entire warband was wiped out at Vraks and he was taken prisoner. That said, I think that they should be portrayed as successful against other astartes as they are the only legion that uses something akin to modern tactics. They don't line up and charge and wave swords around and all that, they infiltrate, the gather intelligence, and they carry out missions. Thus, they are to my knowledge the only legion to have defeated the Ultramarines in canon, though of course that didn't really happen because the Ultras haven't ever lost a battle and the Beatles didn't do drugs.