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I knew of the previous fluff and still loved it, myself.

My alternative theory of the Alpha Legion is that they are traitors: traitors fully committed to the cause of Chaos.

I know, all I have is mountains of evidence showing that is exactly what they are, but here on Dakka and the Internet, such a theory is labeled as pure crockpottery.

 DarknessEternal wrote:
My alternative theory of the Alpha Legion is that they are traitors: traitors fully committed to the cause of Chaos.

I suspect that's what they are now, but I don't believe that's what they always were, or at least were at the start of the Heresy.

A good traitor is one that makes you wonder if he really is one or simply misunderstood.

So, as an Emperor fearing citizen it should be your duty to simply burn them at the stake or attach bricks around their feet and throw them in a lake. If they don't burn or somehow float then you know they are a heretic and should be shot. If they do burn or drown, then, well, it doesn't matter as the problem is now one for the Emperor to take care of.

If you want my opinion on this issue, read the story in my signature.

clively wrote:
Neither.

Alpha legion couldn't of cared less about Chaos. It was just an excuse to throw off the shackles of the Imperium and do their own thing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

ZSO, SAHAAL wrote:

Is: "Other, the modern Alpha Legion fluff is awful" an answer?

yea but we are stuck with it no matter if we like it or not, I agree Legion was god awefull, Deliverance lost was damage control. They've done some Legions great in the HH novels like the World Eaters, Word Bearers, Night Lords, and Sons of Horus, but some horribly like the Alpha Legion and the Emperors Children.

I 100% completely agree with you. AL nd EC have been short changed on the quality of their plot lines.

Have you even read Descent of Angels? It's like fan fiction written about shipping Luther and Lion El Jonson. Awful, awful, stuff.

Legion is one of the best hh novels. If not the best. The alpha legion during the horus heresy are fascinating. I'd love another full length book about them. I'd even like to start an army of them but I don't think I could do them justice.

i loved legion having read it 4 times now
I love the fact that abnett not only introduces the alpha legion but comes up with the cabal and on top of that brings in 2 of the coolest ig legions in the lucifer blacks and the gene enhanced guys and also brings in gramaticus one of the coolest characters in the hh.

 Just Dave wrote:
I can't stress enough how many people I've seen refer to Legion as one of their favourite BL novels...

Yep, this is a constant refrain -- with good reason!

Also ... the Alpha Legion are CSM. I don't just mean you'll find them in the CSM dex. I mean, they are in the thrall of Tzeentch. The fact that some of them may not fully recognize this is pretty classic for Tzeentchians.

Legion is my favorite HH novel because I just get that feeling when someone says "I am Alpharius." (I just about had to get tissues or a sock while reading Pariah). I also loved it mostly up until the cabal thing, which was a bit weird. I feel like that was more to just make the fall to chaos be much shorter, and there was something else going on that we don't know about/weren't shown. And that last sentence in the book. Euurgh.

Personally, what I think they're doing is trying to kill the Emperor before he bleeds out. The way the Emperor was born, last I checked, was a mass suicide by ancient shamans which released a huge burst of energy into the warp that stunned the Chaos Gods and merged together to form the New Man.
Now the Emperor is a dying corpse on life support being fed the life energy of thousands of psykers. But he's still dying. His mind and psychic powers are bleeding out into the warp, but he still has a lot left as shown by the astronomicon.

Here's my theory. If the Emperor continues like this (with Abaddon distracting and harrassing the Imperium constantly) his life energy will slowly bleed into the warp and be reabsorbed by the Chaos Gods. What the Alpha Legion is trying to do is kill the Emperor so that the remaining bulk of his energy explodes into the warp with such force that it overloads the Chaos Gods and causes a New Man v2 to be born. The Alpha Legion will finally be destroyed upon his reincarnation, with Alpharius/Omegon allowing themselves to be executed by the Custodes and his final words being a whispered "For the Emperor."

If it is cool that the Alpha Legion are secretly loyal then it must be even cooler that the they are secretly loyal but even more secretly traitors. And it must be even cooler yet that they are secretly loyal but even more secretly traitors but, and stay with me here, their greatest secret of all is that they are loyal but also traitors who are loyally traitorous and traitorously loyal.

So my own conclusion is that it is not in fact cool that the Alpha Legion are secretly loyal. What I think is cool is that the Alpha Legion itself no longer has any real sense of whether they are loyal or traitors and that they simultaneously worship and despise Chaos. I don't mean some of them worship Chaos while some of them despise it nor do I mean that they do both separately. I mean, their mindset is so convoluted (a.k.a., Chaotic) at this point that worshiping Chaos and despising it are one and the same just like being loyal and being traitors is the same thing for them.