Editing Alpharius (section)

===Great Crusade===

Alpharius, unusual for the Primarchs, developed a different 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 [[Matt Ward|spiritual liege]], and Guilliman openly called Alpharius' tactics cowardly. Unlike most similar arguments (such as between [[Lion El'Jonson|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 [[Derp|had a 100-year head-start on the Alpha Legion]], which is partly false since the XXth ''"Ghost Legion"'' had existed since the early years of the Great Crusade and done the [[Emperor]]'s wetwork in secret, though Guilliman probably wouldn't have known that. This might sting even more if the twins were separated as one of the origin stories suggest, and one of them was actually were in command of the ''Ghost Legion'' decades before Guilliman's discovery, meaning that Alpharius/Omegon could have actually had the headstart.

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 [[Fur heresy|Dark Heresy player that had just]] [[Chakats Meet the Hammer of the Emperor|derailed his GM's campaign]].

What he got was not what he expected. Instead of praising him Guilliman rebuked him pretty harshly, claiming that Alpharius' method had been "A waste of time, effort, and the Emperor's bolt-shells". The reason was that, while Guilliman certainly could appreciate the masterful organization and lack of casualties, he was an empire builder and looked beyond immediate conquest and compliance. Guilliman knew that leaving planets "conquered" but in ruins made for difficulty in rebuilding afterwards, and that it costed more effort and pain in the long run than a more strictly clinical alpha strike and that direct approaches (like he had his own Ultramarines do whenever possible) left planets in a better state to use and integrate in the Imperium once the ass-kicking was done. 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' stratagems had indeed spared Space Marine lives, but in doing so had totaled the rebels' infrastructure which seriously hurt the civilian population and would cost the Imperium much larger amounts of resources to set the planet back on its feet than if he'd gone in openly and just punched the fuckers in the face. However, this criticism misses the fact that a direct conquest leaves much more resentment and possibilities for rebel elements to cause mayhem on an already conquered world (something the XXth were well familiar with by that point, having covertly put down many such anti-Imperial rebellions in what should be stable Imperial territory), while a population that was thoroughly psychologically broken and jumping at shadows would be much more wary about their own seditious elements, fearing that it might be another ploy by their shadowy conquerors to test their loyalty and resolve (which sometimes it totally was), which would paradoxically result in a more stable state of affairs as the conquered population essentially starts to police itself to a degree. Guilliman, of course, was not completely blind to it, having founded his own secret police, Vigil Opertii, to ensure the stability of Ultramar, which ultimately makes him a bit of a hypocrite towards Alpharius, who strove to minimize the need for exactly those kinds of organizations to avoid spreading the efforts of his Legion too thin. Ultimately that was all for naught as when Malcador lost control over the Alpha Legion, he created the Inquisition instead, which debatably is much worse at these kinds of duties. All that being said however, Guilliman did manage to accrue the greatest number of total compliances of any Legion during the Great Crusade, so clearly he was doing ''something'' right.

Alpharius was likewise admonished by [[Rogal Dorn]] who, while acknowledging the sheer magnitude of what Alpharius had accomplished, dismissed his methods as [[-4 Str|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 Alpharius wherever possible, but for unreported reasons. Rotten cherry on top of an already spoiled cake, even fucking ''[[Konrad Curze]]'' openly mocked Alpharius and his Legion for "hiding his sins in a shroud of lies".

Suffice to say, Alpharius was [[rage|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 while he was at it. Though it was noted ''(with a hint of surprise)'' that Alpharius successfully campaigned briefly with the [[Lion El'Jonson|Lion]] and [[Ferrus Manus]] without incident. It's unfortunate that he/they never got the chance to fight side-by-side with [[Corax]] or even better, [[Vulkan]]. Not only is Vulkan THE bro-ing-est Primarch, who not even Mortarion or Curze could hate, Vulkan was one of the Primarchs 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 he and Alpharius would've gotten on like a house on fire.

But yeah, sadly enough, Alpharius got chewed up by the stuck-ups and fed up with his available brothers being [[butthurt]], he took off, believing fervently (and pretty accurately) that Guilliman hated him.

'''Important note''' ''Some or potentially all of this may well be Old Fluff. We've learned a lot about Alpharius in recent years as well as getting a more personal picture of the others and this story really does not fit with either of them. We know now that Alpharius was working for the Cabal and thus didn't join Horus because he was pissed or anything, in fact he was working AGAINST Horus so this squabbly stuff doesn't really fit. Perhaps Alpharius wanted to appear bitter and resentful and a natural choice for Horus to recruit but that's clearly not the whole truth. On top of that the spat with Guilliman doesn't sound like the Guilliman we've seen in the books. His own writings specifically say that whatever wins the battle is the right strategy and as a master of logistics, it seems weird for Guilliman to bitch about Alpharius winning by using the least resources possible. Maybe he thought Alpharius took too long or left the planet ripe for another rebellion but that's not the same as calling him a coward. On top of that given that a legion like the World Eaters or Iron Warriors would probably have butchered every single person on the planet in a rave-orgy of blood and death, calling a more restrained approach 'cowardly' just doesn't fit. It maybe sounds like Dorn to be pissed off for not developing and fortifying the worlds Alpharius conquered but only the Imperial Fists, Word Bearers and Ultramarines really did that; the other legions leaving it to the Imperials following behind them to re-build stuff. Whether Alpharius was playing up the rift to ensure Horus came calling or if this is just totally out of date is unknown but it's safe to say that this stuff isn't the whole truth. [[Just as planned]]...''