Question about Alpharius from Praetorian of Dorn

[Krelious]

I just finished Praetorian of Dorn and I just dont understand why Alpharius

Spoiler

allowed himself to be killed

. Is it related to the whole Alpha and Omega thing that was being chanted and some weird plan/ritual. It just seems odd because even in the epilogue Omegon is confused and distraught losing his twin. IDK I feel like maybe this is just one of those mystery box type things where it will be explained later but they have no plans with it now kinda deal. 

[Scribe]

From what I remember he was so full of himself so convinced in his own cleverness that he assumed Dorn would agree.

 

Dorn cut him down instead.

 

It's been a very long time, that could be head canon.

[The Praetorian of Inwit]

Scribe is right. 

 

We can only hope GW doesn't decide to retcon it.

[Fedor]

He doesn't. The fight just doesn't go to plan, as is foreshadowed by the earlier Dorn vs Ork warlord part. French writes it somewhat ambiguously, using the flawed viewpoint of Archamus (or whatever his name was) and his intervention to muddy the waters as to what extent the outcome was decided by it, but it's never suggested that Alpharius let himself be killed, not as far as I can remember.

 

Of course, the plan itself was thoroughly murky regarding Alpharius' intentions. Personally I did read the encounter as him trying to heavily injure and subdue Dorn, if not outright kill him.

Edited 13 hours ago by Fedor

[Karhedron]

It gets confirmed later in Siege of Terra. The Alpha Legion had 30,000 troops in stasis hidden beneath the Imperial Palace. The implication is that the plan was for the AL to play both sides until a crucial point where they could unleash their reserves and win the day in favour of which side they chose to support. Dorn killing Alpharius instead of listening scuppered the plan and effectively forced the AL into a role they had only been playing up to that point.