I am Alpharius

I am Alpharius.

I'm not really.  Or am I double bluffing?  He's everywhere!

Well, I managed to get a good look at the special rules for the Alpha legion recently (I'm sure you can too if you scry the web hard enough) from the third book of the Horus Heresy Forge World series: "Extermination".

The rules for the Alpha Legion are just wonderful to behold to say the least.  And having read them, I think I have finally made my mind up about which 30k legion to collect and paint … I was thinking Death Guard (already got a big existing 40k collection), Raven Guard (something new entirely) or Sons of Horus (got some 40k Black Legion and old minis painted in their livery). But when I saw the Alpha Legion there, it was a winner.

Let me explain my reasons.

Firstly, there's the fact that the Alpha Legion has (mysteriously!) got hold of Corvus mark armour contained within the book. Why is this important? Because it makes collecting an Alpha Legion army much cheaper (think: plastic regular space marines versus forge world parts!).

Secondly, the Alpha Legion may take (using their unique rite of war: the Coils of the Hydra and the special rule "The Rewards of Treason") a unit from any other legion. This means that I *can* include a unit of grave warden Death Guard if I so choose. This is absolutely brilliant and means that I don't really lose anything by going with Alpha Legion. I can add to my Death Guard along the way as well(!)

But the thing that simply blew me away was all the fancy rules that the Alpha Legion is able to field. The fluidity of command means they may choose what special rule they like (tank hunters, infiltrate, etc) for each unit with the Alpha Legion Astartes rule that they like. This is awesome! They also have some nifty specialist units (Lernaean terminators, Headhunter squads) and some really interesting characters available (Dynat, Exodus, and Alpharius himself … or is it Omegon? Could be!) and a Saboteur Consul -- they're going to be awesome for just coming on the board and whacking an enemy tank with a penetrating hit … just because its the Alpha Legion. And the sudden appearance of Alpharius himself anywhere is just priceless. Preferred Enemy: everything is too cool to ignore for me as well (coupled with the replacement of reserves: Alpharius is going to annoy a lot of other players, I'm certain!).

I can't wait to see the model for some of these characters -- particularly Alpharius. Well, I think I'll hold off any purchases for a while to see what models come out of Forge World in the coming months. But in the mean time, I think I ought to consider what units might go in to a 1500 to 2000 points army for the Alpha Legion. Your thoughts are welcome as always.

Hydra Dominatus brothers.