Alpharius

Artistic rendering. Omitted from the picture is his magnificent, 18-inch long penis. What the hell Alpharius? We snuck in here to write that?! Shut up, Omegon. You're ruining it.

No such Primarch exists, please redirect yourself to the main page.

No, Seriously

Alpharius is the mysterious Primarch of the Alpha Legion. We don't have much information on him other than that Omegon, his bro, looks exactly like Alpharius, but we also don't know which one is which. He was supposedly killed by Roboute Guilliman of the Ultramarines, but we may never exactly know if he killed Alpharius or Omegon (or even just a decoy), since the two look exactly the same. For all we know the entire Alpha legion is Alpharius and Omegon. And since the entire Alpha Legion looks the same and they could all be Alpharius or Omegon, Roboute Guilliman could have very well killed any random Alpha Legion member. Hell, they're so secretive they may have betrayed the Imperium to help the Imperium, which helped Chaos beat down the Imperium, which actually helps the Imperium kick Failbaddon's ass. He could be the one that's making Abaddon fail so much.

But what the fuck, we don't know. That's why we put this guy under both categories. Shit's complicated.

tl;dr Alpharius is like Anonymous. There's over 3 billion of him and everyone is Alpharius. It's even worse than Spartacus.

Without the memes this time

All right, FINE, ruin the fucking joke. Asshole.

Remembrancer sketch of Alpharius... Or is it?

Anyway, Alpharius was the last Primarch found by the Emperor - long after the Emperor had won his drinking contest with Leman Russ cheated to beat Leman Russ in a brawl, brofisted Vulkan, and caused Konrad Curze to nearly claw his eyes out in a semi-religious fit, had established most of the Space Marine legions, and was in the process of reclaiming the galaxy for humanity. Whilst most of the Primarchs wound up on worlds in Imperial space, Alpharius wound up picked up by derelicts from some unknown world, and grew into a Space Pirate - long before Huron Blackheart made it cool.

Fuck yeah. Alpharius in front, Omegon in back. Or may be not.

One day, on a patrol in a no-name system, Horus' strike group came under attack by pirate forces - mostly small (and ancient by modern standards) fighter craft. The attack was carefully-staged, and the pirates managed to cripple one of the advance ships the fleet had, which forced Horus to move his own ship in to do something about it. When Horus managed to board the advance ship with his retinue, he was shocked to learn that a small team of pirates had somehow gotten on-board and were fighting their way to the bridge. Fighting their way past the chapter serfs, a squad of five burst into the bridge, whereupon Horus opened fire with his Combi-bolter. Four were taken down by Horus' suppressing fire, but the fifth one, who towered over even the Space Marines in Horus' retinue, dodged Horus' barrage, and continued to advance regardless of the oncoming fire. It was only when Alpharius got to close range that he stopped his Eversor-esque charge, as both he and Horus immediately recognized the physical similarity between the two. Horus smiled, for he had found the last of his missing brothers. Just as planned. Or it would be. But unfortunately this story is a lie.

In any case, Horus did not immediately send Alpharius back to Terra - instead, he kept Alpharius around for months, showing him how to get shit done. Alpharius quickly formed a pretty strong bond with Horus, since he seemed like a pretty coolguy who killed aliens and doesn't afraid of anything, and Alpharius and his men quickly adopted the Imperial creed. Horus was greatly impressed with Alpharius' skill, though Alpharius trolled Horus mercilessly by refusing to tell Horus what world he was from, and instead denied that any of the worlds Horus captured and brought into Imperial compliance were his point of origin. The Emperor was pleased when Alpharius was finally found, but by this point there wasn't much time for celebrations - the Great Crusade was in full swing. Alpharius was given command of the newly-formed 20th Space Marine legion, dubbed the Alpha Legion, and proceeded to get to work.

But Wait!

The above account is considered the most well-known by fa/tg/uys and the gaming community in general, but "recorded facts" tell varying different stories. The Horus Heresy series of books suggests that the above origin story is a lie and gives three more discovery tales about Alpharius, then goes on to assert that they are all lies too but that they contain grains of truth that could lead to an even greater secret.

These include:

• Growing up on a dead world with absolutely no-one to raise and educate him, only escaping by commandeering a Xenos vessel that had landed to plunder the planet's ruins, he then left to discover who made him.
• Landing on a human world and living amongst them for ten years, but the planet is then attacked by the Slaugth who kept him as a curiosity and killed the remainder of the population. Alpharius would be saved by the Emperor directly but kept him hidden from public knowledge for many years while his son was rehabilitated.
• Alpharius was not fully completed at the time of the scattering of the primarchs, thus was spared OR some part of him remained behind (potentially Omegon?). Either way he remained at the Emperor's side at the beginning of the Great Crusade and acted as His hidden agent until the time was right to reveal him.

What this suggests, if all four stories are true and taken into context is that the twins were separated at the scattering, one grew up in secrecy with the Emperor and accounts for much of the actions of the XXth legion LONG before the Primarch's "official" discovery, whilst the other twin landed on a separate planet (the human world becoming the dead world when the xenos arrived) and was then raised by Xenos, but escaped (or was rescued) and attempted to search for his creator, finding Horus.

Before that, a marine that drank Omegon's blood gained memories of Omegon "scheming their way to supremacy" on the twin Primarchs' distant homeworld, for whatever that is worth.

Great Crusade

Alpharius, unusual for the Primarchs, developed a very unusual approach to his missions, focusing primarily on flexibility and personal initiative and making extensive use of subterfuge and non-Astartes specialist operatives. This was reflected with the Alpha Legion's symbol - a Hydra, which could strike from multiple directions at once, and which could keep going even with the loss of a head. This multiple-fronts, seemingly-unstructured approach towards warfare, naturally, pissed off Roboute Guilliman, who Alpharius refused to recognize as his spiritual liege, and Guilliman openly called Alpharius' tactics cowardly. Unlike most similar arguments (such as between the Lion and Leman Russ), this one turned violent in record time when Guilliman pointed to the Ultramarines' own record, something Alpharius could never hope to achieve, since Guilliman had a 200-year head-start on the Alpha Legion.

Determined to prove he was an infinitely better commander than Guilliman could hope to be, Alpharius took his forces and went on their very first assignment - a world that had thrown off Imperial rule, and was openly stating its intention to fight off Imperial forces. Rather than land immediately and bring the world to heel through force, Alpharius delayed, and the world fortified heavily. By this point, some two million PDF troopers stood ready to repulse the Space Marine invasion. It was only now that Alpharius struck - by taking advantage of and equipping Imperial-loyal citizens on the planet, Alpharius' forces managed to cause several diversionary attacks that drew the PDF away from their held locations, before a series of bombings cut them off, and the Alpha Legion cut the power to the city's central hive. Within a week, Alpharius had subjugated the world - having lost less than 3 dozen Space Marines in the process. Beaming with pride at his accomplishments, Alpharius returned to a meeting with his brothers with all the smug satisfaction of a Dark Heresy player that had just derailed his GM's campaign.

What he got was not what he expected. Guilliman bitched him out to no end, claiming that Alpharius' method had been "A waste of time, effort, and the Emperor's bolt-shells". Which, if anything, shows how very little Guilliman knows about waging a war, as open battles consume vastly more amounts of resources than clandestine operations, as supply lines and the like consume a large amount of resources to maintain. However, Guilliman was an empire builder, and saw that leaving planets "conquered" but in ruins made for difficulty in rebuilding afterwards, while the Ultramarines' more strict and direct approaches left planets in a better state to use. Alpharius had totalled the rebels' infrastructure which seriously hurt the civilian population and would've cost the Imperium huge amounts of resources to set back on its feet. Ultrasmurf style was meant to inspire respect and make it easier to build/rebuild support for the Emprah, instead of leaving a traumatised, resentful population.

Alpharius was likewise admonished by Rogal Dorn, while acknowledging the sheer magnitude of what Alpharius had accomplished, dismissed his methods as unmanly and that his legion were "not fit to bear the Emperor's mark" because of the harm it did to the civilians on the planet. He didn't get on well with Mortarion or Russ either, coming close to conflict due to his lack of adherence to battlefield commands (though it seems the lord of the Death Guard rubs everyone up the wrong way). Magnus and his Thousand Sons went out of their way to avoid the Alpharius wherever possible but for unreported reasons. While even fucking Konrad Curze openly condemned him and his legion as "hiding his sins in a shroud of lies" (yeah, because he never hid anything, the bloody prison rapist that he is. Actually he didn't- he broadcast that shit all over the place).

Suffice to say, Alpharius was fucking pissed. Many argue he was simply unlucky - had he been on the other side of the galaxy at the time, he would have likely hooked up with other brothers who may have been not only impressed with Alpharius' stunning accomplishment, but likely would have noted it for their own tactical use later and taught him to think about preserving non-combatant lives. Though it was noted (with a hint of surprise) that Alpharius successfully campaigned briefly with the Lion and Ferrus Manus without incident. It's unfortunate that he/they never got the chance to fight side-by-side with Vulkan. Not only is Vulkan THE bro-ing-est Primarch, who not even Mortarion or Curze could hate, Vulkan was one of the Primarch's who firmly instilled the creed of 'Mortals are people too. They don't have our strength, speed or wisdom. They do the best they can with what they have. Look after them,' meaning him and Alpharius would've gotten on like a house on fire.

Fed up with his available brothers being butthurt faggots, Alpharius took off, believing fervently (and pretty accurately) that Guilliman hated him.

Horus Heresy

When Horus turned to Chaos during the Horus heresy, Alpharius really had only met one brother who had not treated him like shit, and that was Horus - so it comes as no surprise that Alpharius followed Horus' descent into Chaos... Actually this is another lie. The real reason Alpharius joined the Warmaster was because a Cabal of Xenos showed him that if Horus won, then Chaos would be defeated. Hence the Alpha legion are all a bunch of closet loyalists Malal worshipers, seriously they are chaos worshipers trying to kill chaos. (So... double traitors? but unlike double heresy it's like a double negative?) Could just be that Alpharius preferred the future that ensured humanity's continued existence rather than the one that had humanity go extinct at the hands of a victorious Horus; pro-humanity.

After being involved in the Istvaan V massacres, Alpharius proceeded to conduct one of the best-known and widely-regarded bits of trolling in 40K history: He led Guilliman on a merry chase halfway across the galaxy on a fool's errand, leading him far away from Terra as Horus' troops prepared to lay siege to it. Whilst Guilliman did, eventually, kill Alpharius (or so Guilliman claims; even the Ultramarines have doubts on this), the Alpha Legion, to Guilliman's horror, didn't break up like he thought - instead, Alpharius had taught them to be self-reliant, and the band remained coherent, evading Guilliman's forces whilst ever harassing them when they let their guard down. In short order, the Alpha Legion had gathered up their forces and fled the planet, leaving Guilliman empty-handed on his return to Terra, which was still under siege.

BUT THERE WAS MORE

As it turns out, Alpharius' greatest secret was not his homeworld - it was that he had an identical twin, named Omegon. It is not believed that the Emperor intended this, nor was he even aware of it. Alpharius and Omegon are, in fact, both the Primarch of the Alpha Legion, although 'Alpharius' is the public face and appears as the more senior of the two. Both look alike, however, and the two switch their roles often. Alpha Legion marines have described this well-kept secret as the pair sharing one soul between two bodies, and the other Primarchs, unaware of the Alpha Legion Primarch's true nature, simply believed they WERE one person, named, appropriately enough, Alpharius Omegon. The only true way to tell the difference between the two was their armor (and their eyes, THE EYES!) - Omegon, being a stealth specialist, usually wore black-toned armor intended for night operations, whereas Alpharius preferred the teal-colored pattern of the standard Alpha Legionnaires. In addition to this, it's rumoured that Alpharius, or Omegon, or both of them, or someone, maybe... My head hurts!

Okay! Back on track. It's rumoured that someone had several of the Alpha Legion Marines surgically altered to look exactly like them so they could stand in as extra body doubles if/when it was needed. This was easier for the Alphas than it would've been for any other Legion, because some alpha legionnaires were unusually freakishly tall, and their primarchs looked normal, rather than being giants with one eye, wings, and/or metal hands. It also helped that digesting a small portion of their primarch's blood made those body-doubles powerful enough to be mistaken as true Primarchs not only by appearance but also by their combat prowess for quite a long time (up to a several hours), although it isn't known it this were a common ability amongst Alpha Legionnaires, or was it artificially engineered only for the body-doubles.

It's unknown if Guilliman killed Alpharius, Omegon, or simply some dipshit Alpha Legion Marine who decided to pull a Spartacus and pose as them. Or both. OR NEITHER. So you can see where the memes come from. Who the hell did Guilliman kill?

Yet another theory is that neither Alpharius nor Omegon was killed. It was Guilliman who was defeated and replaced by either Alpharius or Omegon so they could destroy the Ultramarines from the inside out. It was a plan as delicious as just as planned can potentially be... until Fulgrim stabbed him in the windpipe and made him bleed to near-death. Oh well.

Maybe the whole war on Eskrador was a big chunk of disinformation trolling made by Alpha Legion agents to fake their primarch's death. Or they want the Inquisition to think so. After all the only source of information about said war was Inqisitor Kravin's report - who mysteriously disappeared shortly after and may or may not be an Alpha Legion agent undercover. That being said: The Ultramarines have no records about the Eskrador war, but again those records may or may not be lost or may or may not be destroyed due to some Alpha Legion black ops... or just lost due to shity imperial record keeping, as it would not be the first time that's happens.

And to keep up the mystery, when Gregor Eisenhorn needed someone to keep Alizabeth Bequin's clone Alizabeth 'Beta' Bequin safe he got someone whose only response was "I am Alpharius" and can make an Emperor's Children Space Marine run away just by showing his face.

... Goddamnit this is confusing.

It gets worse. A short story printed in The Primarchs Horus Heresy book shows that by drinking the Primarch's blood an Alpha Legion Marine took on the genetic coding of the primarchs, fooling even the apothecary on the mission. Also at the end Alpharius and Omegon are speaking about the necessities of war as the mission before was a one way trip including the death of a rogue psyker who became close to Omegon. Omegon seemed to think the sacrifice was not necessary whilst Alpharius believed it was, hinting that the brothers were not in agreement on all things. As their plan in Legion relied on killing off humanity to kill off chaos, Omegon is probably looking for another option. This may or may not mean the Alpha Legion has some connection to The Purge, but as with all other things on this page nobody fucking knows.

It is notable that in Deliverance Lost, the Alpha Legion betrayed even the Cabal. And the third Forge World Horus Heresy book includes a large story which ended with Alpharius (or was it?) screwing over Horus by not garrisoning an area after the Alpha Legion conquered it. At this point, combined with how even Alpharius and Omegon don't seem to agree, it's questionable if the Alpha Legion is even unified in its purpose.

Tabletop

	WS	BS	S	T	W	I	A	Ld	Sv
Alpharius:	7	7	6	6	6	6	5	10	2+/4++ or is it??

While not a monster of close combat like other primarchs, Alpharius gives candy to his army while fucking whith the opponent's like no one but him can (That being said, even the worst of combat primarchs will whomp just about anything else). Sire of the Alpha Legion grants all Alpha Legion units Preferred Enemy (Everything) and gives Alpharius Preferred Enemy (Everything), Counter attack, Move through Cover, Scout, and Crusader- but not right away. You see, after both sides deploy he can opt out of deploying normally or via deep striking and choose to hide in any Alpha Legion Infantry unit wich is part of the Primary Detachment, disguised as a rank-and-file model, but can reveal himself starting at turn 2 (and does so automatically at turn 5) replacing a model and gaining all of the above buffs. If the unit he's hiding in is "falling back" when he reveals himself, it auto-rallies, and if it's destroyed while he's still hiding (or if it is in a Transport and there is no space for him), he just goes into reserves (you must write which unit is hiding Alpharius...but if you're a true Alpha legionnaire you'd have 6 different notes, none of them with your actual handwriting style). Be careful though: remember that he is Bulky and that he can only be revelead at the beginning of your own turn, so if he is hinding in a transport at full capacity he could be impossible to place (for example in a ten man Breacher squad inside a Rhino) unless you already disembarked the Squad on the previous turn, so plan accordingly. He can also Seize the Initiative on a 4+, give units arriving via Outflank a +D3 movement bonus and, best of all, if an enemy unit is successfully brought in from reserves and your army has an identical version of that same type also in reserve, roll a D6: on a 4+, the opponent brings in your unit instead. Combine him with his Legion RoW to almost guarantee going first and almost completely negate your enemy's reserves. On defense,The Pythian Scales gives him 2+ armour save and 4+ invulnerable save and also ignores the effects of Poison and Fleshbane. Not bad. His weapon, The Pale Spear doesn't boost his Strength, but it does have AP1, Armourbane, and Instant Death along with Two-Handed. He also has the following equipment: Venom Spheres, Master-Crafted Plasma Blaster, Cognis Signum, Nuncio Vox and Camelioline, making him quite the force multiplier and perfectly capable to adapt to a variety of circumstances, like he should be.

Alpharius VS other Primarchs:

Primarch fighting, while fun to see, isn't a very competitive thing to do as it'll usually tie up both Primarchs for the entire game without either of them dying. With that in mind this section is about how Alpharius fares against other Primarchs Mathhammer wise. Please note that all the various abilities are taken into accounts when possible and the match-ups assume the Primarchs are the only ones involved in the fighting, so various abilities like Angron's "The Butcher's Nails" and Rampage do not provide any bonuses. In essence, the fights are supposed to happen in a "Vacuum" for simplicity, but notes are added to make things clearer in particular instances. Also all of the Primarch use their most powerful weapons (because why have a contest if you don't do your best?).

• Alpharius VS Horus
  • Horus hits 4 times (Talon), wounds 3.556 times, 1.778 after saves and IWND will take that down to 1.444 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius hits 2.92 times and wounds 1.701 times, 0.567 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.234 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius lose. Badly.

• Alpharius VS Angron
  • Angron Round 1: hits 5.333 times, wounds 4.444 times, 2.222 after saves, and IWND take it down to 1.889.
  • Angron Round 2 and thereafter: hits 4 times, wounds 3.333 times, 1.667 times after saves and IWND will take that down to 1.333 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius hits 2.92 times and wounds 1.701 times, 0.851 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.518 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius lose really badly.

• Alpharius vs Mortarion
  • Mortarion hits 2.5 times, wounds 1.667 times, 0.833 wounds after saves and 0.5 wounds after IWND.
  • Alpharius hits 2.92 times and wounds 1.136 times, 0.568 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.0124 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius lose badly

• Alpharius vs Fulgrim
  • Fulgrim hits 5.333 times, wounds 3.556, 1.778 wounds after saves and 1.444 wounds after IWND.
  • Alpharius hits 2.92 times and wounds 1.701 times, 0.567 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.234 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius lose badly.

• Alpharius vs Ferrus Manus
  • Ferrus hits 2.5 times, wounds 2.083 times, 1.042 times after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.709 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius hits 2.92 times and wounds 1.136 times, 0.379 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.045 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius lose. Again, badly.

• Alpharius VS Vulkan
  • Vulkan hits 2 times, wounds 1.667 times, 0.833 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.5 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius hits 2.92 times and wounds 1.136 times, 0.379 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 0 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius lose and can't even wound Vulkan at all.

• Alpharius VS Lorgar
  • Lorgar hits 2.5 times, wounds 2.083 times, 1.041 times after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.708 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius round 1: hits 3.333 times, wounds 1.9444 times, 0.972 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.639 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius round 2: hits 3.889 times, wounds 2.268 times, 1.134 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.801 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Now this was a fight! Alpharius finally win against the weakest of the Primarchs! Let's not say to him he wasn't using his Psychic Powers...

• Alpharius VS Perturabo
  • Perturabo hits 2.667 times, wounds 2.222 times, 1.111 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.778 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius hits 2.92 times and wounds 1.701 times, 0.567 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.234 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius lose.

• Alpharius vs Konrad Curze
  • Curze hits 4 times, wounds 3 times, 1.5 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 1.167 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius hits 2.92 times and wounds 1.701 times, 0.851 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.517 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius lose.

• Alpharius VS Rogal Dorn
  • Dorn hits 2.667 times, wounds 2 times, 1 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.667 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius hits 2.92 times and wounds 1.701 times, 0.851 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.517 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius still lose, but not by much this time.

• Alpharius VS Corvus Corax
  • Corvus hits 4 times (Scourge)/3 times (Shadow-walk), wounds 3 times (Scourge)/2.25 times (Shadow-walk), 1.5 wounds (Scourge)/1.125 wounds (Shadow-walk) after saves and IWND will take that down to 1.167/0.792 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Alpharius hits 2.92/1.944 times and wounds 1.701/1.134 times, 1.134/0.756 wounds after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.801/0.423 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Even without counting Hit and Run bonuses, Alpharius still lose.

• Alpharius VS Roboute Guilliman
  • Guilliman Round 1: hits 2.5 times, wounds 2.222 times, 1.111 times after saves and IWND will take that down to 0.778 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Guilliman Round 2 and thereafter: hits 3.333 times, wounds 2.963 times, 1.482 times after saves and IWND will take that down to 1.148 wounds at the start of the next turn.
    • Alpharius hits 2.92 times and wounds 1.701 times (Remember he got Preferred Enemy), 0.851 wounds after saves and 0.425 after Armor of Reason. And IWND will take that down to 0.092 wounds at the start of the next turn.
  • Guilliman wins really easily, as the damage Alpharius does is almost irrelevant, thus making the claim that he personally killed the lord of the Alpha Legion actually believable...But then again, every Primarch could have actually killed him!

• TLDR version: Alpharius is not a combat character and function more as a strategical/force multiplier one. And that's actually really good because after factoring in that Lorgar can become one of the strongest Primarch thanks to his Psychic Powers Alpharius is bottom of the pile, but then again his other rules make him a unlikely to be fighting unless it's on his terms, instead preffering to appear from the shadows and eat a terminator squad before you can drop Angron on him. Guess he was the last son for a reason kinda busy stealing your reserves, buffing his army and sneaking into the perfect position to win the war in a single strike to focus as much on fighting face to face.

The Primarchs of the Space Marine Legions
Loyalist Corvus Corax - Ferrus Manus - Jaghatai Khan Leman Russ - Lion El'Jonson - Roboute Guilliman Rogal Dorn - Sanguinius - Vulkan
Traitor Alpharius/Omegon - Angron - Fulgrim Horus - Konrad Curze/Night Haunter - Lorgar Magnus the Red - Mortarion - Perturabo