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I am planning to make an alpha legion army during the Horus Heresy. So my question is: did they keep the green and purplish scheme until after the supposed death of Alpharius at the hands of the ultramarines, or did they switch to the blue with neon green highlighting and the hydra symbol when they decided to ally with Horus? Also, at what point during or after the heresy did the armor of chaos marines begin to become tainted, like the models in the dark vengeance boxed set, and because alpha legion is less associated with the chaos gods than most renegade legions, and not based in the warp, did their armor ever become tainted?

Also if there is no definitive answer on this, what is your opinion?

The Alpha Legion actually never really changed their colors, being the only Traitor Legion not to. The difference between the colors then and now is just the wear of 10,000 years of war and all that good stuff.

Who knows what will end up happening now, but in the past, the Legion was shown to have changed their colors:



Of course, it is subtle, but it is there!

This was when their cry of "For the Emperor!" was more of a tolling thing, and less of the "Maybe they are?" thing it is now.

 xSPYXEx wrote:
The Alpha Legion actually never really changed their colors, being the only Traitor Legion not to. The difference between the colors then and now is just the wear of 10,000 years of war and all that good stuff.

I actually believe the Night Lords are one of the only ones not to change their scheme actually and i guess you could include the Iron Warriors also.

As for the symbol and changing of their scheme i believe it would most likely be done after Alpharius was killed or shortly after fleeing the failed Siege of Terra.I do also think that the changes to their power armour would just happen after long exposures to the warp or the worshiping of chaos gods. The power armour's machine spirit i'm pretty sure needs to be turned to chaos first before it starts to morph or change or even accept them.

 Alpharius wrote:
Who knows what will end up happening now, but in the past, the Legion was shown to have changed their colors:



Of course, it is subtle, but it is there!

This was when their cry of "For the Emperor!" was more of a tolling thing, and less of the "Maybe they are?" thing it is now.

It's not much different though.

 GambleDwarf wrote:
I actually believe the Night Lords are one of the only ones not to change their scheme actually and i guess you could include the Iron Warriors also.

Like the Alpha Legion, both of these changed their heraldry if not their overall colors.

No the Nightlords didn't. The Skull with bat-wings was always their Legion symbol and they had lightnings painted on their armor even pre heresy.

It didn't always have a Chaos Star behind it, did it?

As if they would paint those on the shoulder pads. Look on the picture above, the Alpha Legion Hydra has a star behind it too but it's not really relevant for their actual paint scheme.

Good point. I suppose NL heraldry would not have to incorporate the Chaos Star.

 Shadox wrote:
No the Nightlords didn't. The Skull with bat-wings was always their Legion symbol and they had lightnings painted on their armor even pre heresy.

Actually, if I remember correctly, the Night Lords didn't paint their armor with lightning. There actually IS lightning on their armor. I think something happened after the Horus Heresy that caused the lightning to come to life on their armor, either just writhing around on the surface or actually arcing across the trim, like is shown in the Chaos Codex.

As for the Alpha Legion, I know there is a change in the colors, but it's not as contrasting as the World Eaters going from white to red. I think the color was also more caused by their constant regrowth, as they've been "officially purged" multiple times. That means they probably lost a majority of their number and were forced into hiding, but since they're sneaky little bastards they've planted numerous Alpha Legion cults across the Imperium. I'm assuming that whenever they try to regain their ranks, they have to steal and repaint existing armor, probably using the senior Legionnaire's armor as a template. Then, things like slight changes in the atmosphere causing color changes, a personal preference for a color, or other environmental factors could cause the new armor to be painted slightly different. Maybe a bit more blue on the edges, maybe a little more green on the toes, or a few extra scales.
Extrapolate those small changes over ten thousand years, and you can see how the colors would change like they have.

Okay so their colour scheme was probably the same during the whole heresy as it seems there was no conscious shift, but when did the hydra motif get added to their heraldry?

I think about the time they joined Horus.

The Iron Warrior didn't change either they were metal they stayed metal

Alpha Legion - old background, they clearly did change their colors post-Heresy.

New background? TBD.

with their new background i dont see that Alpha Legion even need to dress in Chaos style armour.

1)they didnt run off into the eye
2. they didnt really want to turn bad

maybe they could be part hersey armour part salvaged imperial armour and something just butchered together.

Its only the HH BL books that have actually made Alpha Legion start to appeal to me

I never had 'Chaosy' looking AL, even before the HH books gave them one hell of a retcon (maybe).

And for many of the same reasons you gave above - didn't go into the Eye, excelled in subterfuge and infiltration - passing themselves off as 'regular' Space Marines seemed like a good thing to do!