4 Corners of 30k - Week 3

The Horus Heresy: Betrayal

The book was a whole lot of awesome! It's focus was around the Istvaan III massacre time frame.

The book provided fluff, images and additional rules for Death Guard, Sons of Horus, World Eaters and Emperor's Children in the 31st millennium. To see actual rules printed for Primarchs gave me the chills!!!

This brings me to the 4 Corners of 30k Project, itself. The name for week 3 is: a new direction. (If this was Week 4 I would call it: a new hope!) To put a little background on this; a few weeks ago I was asked to join this project because I passed a few criteria: I play 40k, I blog and I am located in a "corner" of the US. Before being asked to join the project, the only exposure I had to the 30k universe was through the Horus Heresy, Black Library series of books. The 15 books of the series that I read were incredible and gave me a solid understanding of the 40k history but they did not help me with 30k list building! So when I was asked to participate, I naturally went with my favorite characters; the Legio Custodes. After reading the Betrayal rule book however, I realized that I did not want to stray too far from the forces in the book and there wasn't a clean way to have Custodes in a list; even with "plays as" rules. As I read, I did know that I wanted to do something different than the options I had. 

Enter: Alpha Legion

I read Legion by Dan Abnett many moons ago and loved it! The idea of 2 Primarchs is just cool in itself but the Legion and it's tactics rock! The whole Legion has a Navy Seal mixed with James Bond feel to it. 

Before the Hydra was their main symbol, Alpha Legion used this:

I pulled their combat doctrine from the Warhammer 40k wiki: The Alpha Legion's Primarch Alpharius' axiom was to attack one's enemy in as many diverse ways as possible, at the same time. In practice, this doctrine manifests in a variety of ways depending on the size of the operation and locale of the battle zone. Obfuscation and skullduggery are the Legion's mantra. The Alpha Legion has been known to employ devious tactics such as flanking maneuvers, tunneling to bypass enemy defenses, diversionary tactics, disguising troops and vehicles in enemy colours, air drops and teleportation behind enemy lines, infiltration, disabling enemy transport vehicles and routes, sabotage of essential supplies, ammo, food, and fuel depots, as well as atmospheric and ecological tampering, triggering seismic and tectonic activity, coercion, bribery of enemy troops and officers and Imperial officials, disguising and impersonating Imperial officers, enlisting enemy forces, distributing propaganda to incite civil unrest and outright rebellion, organizing anti-Imperial activity and supplying heretical groups and cultists, and allying themselves with corsairs, aliens and other Traitor Legions. Many of these unscrupulous tactics are employed by the Legion after careful coordination, often resulting in an elaborate and enigmatic strategy that leaves their enemies confounded and confused. Through the use of these completely unorthodox tactics the Alpha Legion is able to deploy smaller and more highly mobile forces than is normally necessitated, for the Legion employs actual combat as only one part of their overall strategy.

What this docterine tells me is: scouts, recon marines, deep striking terminators and droppods/dreadclaws FTW!

In closing; Most blog posts you read out there have a pre-planned feel. In fact, you will see that in the main 4 Corners of 30k blog when it is up. With this post series, I really wanted to go through the discovery phase and the decision building with my readers. Hope you like it!

Next week: Army list and FW order!

Alpha Legion!

Swonkob Bo - OUT

[Images acquired from http://warhammer40k.wikia.com and http://forgeworld.com; images were used for reference purpose only, not for monetary gain]