The Serpents of Progress

Traits
Targeting Augury

Impetuous

Reactive Tactics

Direct Fire

Enhanced Physiology

Finely Balanced

History
While the Astartes leading The Serpents of Progress proclaims himself as the Primarch of the Alpha Legion, Alpharius, he has much more (relatively speaking) humble beginnings. Born on Inwit, [NAME REDACTED] grew up as the son of a noble family known for an illustrious history of sons serving in the Imperial Fists chapter. He was chosen by the chapter to start training to become an Astartes. The night before he was to make his journey to the training monasteries, a headhunter team of the Shrouded Hand warband snuck into his family's mansion and kidnapped the boy.

The Shrouded Hand were under orders from their Lord to kidnap [NAME REDACTED] as his skills could be put to great use for the warband. Undergoing the Alpha Legion's intense and mysterious recruitment process, [NAME REDACTED] eventually became a full-fledged member of the warband. The process of becoming an Astartes already involves a great deal of hypnotherapy to quickly learn all there is to know about the galaxy and how to work within their chapter/warband, [NAME REDACTED] was subjected to a litany of grueling sessions that changed his personality, implanted fake memories that replaced his old ones, and gave him the false knowledge that he had been an original member of the Alpha Legion since the late years of the Great Crusade. The final bit of memory manipulation involved causing [NAME REDACTED] to believe that his name was without a doubt, Alpharius.

After serving the Shrouded Hand for [NUMBER REDACTED] years, Alpharius became the Lord of the warband, complete with a masterwork suit of Lernaean Terminator armor. He lead the warband for [NUMBER REDACTED] more years until a certain code word triggered something in his mind. Upon exploring an Eldar Crone World and recovering a lost relic of the legion, Alpharius read a relief that contained a single phrase, "Reperio nos." A hypnotherapy session during his recruitment process implanted a trigger into his psyche that, when activated by the key phrase, taught him about the existence of a shadowy, long-dead organization known simply as The Cabal. It existed during the time of the Great Crusade and consisted of members from most intelligent races in the galaxy, including humans and eldar. The group existed solely to defeat the Ruinous Powers. The Cabal contacted the twin Primarchs and told them of a prophecy involving two possible futures, with only one leading to the destruction of Chaos. This path unfortunately led to joining Warmaster Horus in his rebellion against the Imperium. While this would be a pyrrhic victory, the prophecy said that Horus would eventually break from the dark god's grips and destroy all of chaotic followers, and with the whole of humanity as well.

Alpharius also learned more about The Imperial Truth, the atheistic philosophy the Emperor forced upon the Imperium during its infancy before The Imperial Cult became the de facto religion. With this new-found knowledge, he sprang into action to continue on his twin primarchs' legacy. He would reshape his warband to become The Serpents of Progress, a warband focused on spreading the lost, Imperial Truth to humanity, freeing the Imperium's citizens from the grips of its corrupt and fascist rulers, the restoration of The Cabal, and the utter destruction of the Ruinous Powers.

Alpharius has since then used his legion's signature tactics and guile to create his fledgling empire, manipulating his enemies into destroying one another, using assassination tactics, quelling or starting uprisings, and infiltrating many a chapter and warband to keep tabs on the other Astartes.

At this time, Alpharius has set his sights on the world of Belus IV, a perfect world to set up a headquarters in a new sector to further his work. Two other Traitor Astartes warbands made contact with him upon entering the region, with aims to crush The Serpents or assimilate them into their own warband. Using supreme tactics, trickery, and a little luck, Alpharius was able to efficiently strike down these two forces into submission, tricking them into thinking that his warband aims to conquer the planet for chaos and not to further The Cabal's and The Emperor's dream of destroying chaos itself.

Army Composition
Being secretly loyal to The Emperor's original vision for humanity, The Serpents of Progress abhor daemons and The Ruinous Powers. As such, they do their best to avoid using daemonic entities in their warband and only do so under the gravest of circumstances. A very small portion of their brothers have come down with cases of possession or warp-borne mutations, and they are dealt with quickly and efficiently to ensure that their taint doesn't spread to the rest of the forces. The warband still keeps a few of such unlucky individuals under extreme protection and utilizes them only when they are under extreme circumstances. A few hellbrutes and obliterators are kept under cryosleep and are closely guarded by psycho-indoctrinated, ex-Officio Assassinorum agents and sentry turrets to make sure that if they were to escape, they would be taken care of with extreme prejudice. The sectors that these assets are stored in are also surrounded with a fail safe that's set to self-destruct and implode if any manage to bypass the initial defenses.

The rest of the warband consists of ancient, pre-Heresy soldiers and wargear. Contemptor-class dreadnoughts and Cataphractii terminator power armor are common within the warband and Alpharius himself wears a replica of the Lernaean armor he wore during the Heresy.

Mortal recruits are generally taken from Imperial worlds that have been shown the Imperial Truth and instructed to fight with similar tactics to that of the Astra Militarum. Unlike many other Astartes armies, loyalist and renegade/traitor alike, The Serpents of Progress treat these soldiers with much respect. An Astartes can stand up to all the horrors the Milky Way Galaxy has to offer with not so much as a flinch, but for a normal human to do the same commands a great deal of admiration. These soldiers routinely train in live fire exercises with the Astartes of the warband (though not under the same grueling conditions) and are encouraged to socialize amongst each other and engage in philosophical debates about humanity's destiny. The strongest and most honorable among the mortal soldiers give up their first-born sons to enter into the recruitment processes of the warband to replenish the ranks.

The warband prefers to focus on long-range engagements, using butcher- and las-cannons to soften enemy armor, before releasing an enfilade of heavy bolter fire upon personnel targets.

Battle with the Blade of the Whills
Ave Progressus! After hours of recon gathering, Alpharius collected a strike team of his loyal soldiers, mortal and astartes alike, to seize control of a mine that a group of Grey Knights had fortified. The blindly fervent lackeys of the Imperial Cult stood steadfast at first against an onslaught of fire, but fell quickly once our bolter rounds found purchase in the weak spots of their armor. Backed up by an Armiger-class Helverin and a veritable storm of assorted heavy weapons fire from a team of Centurions, The Serpents charged forth to wipe the remaining daemon-hunters from the area and emerge victorious. The Serpents constricted around the final Grey Knights and squeezed the life out of them, causing them to rout. With another sector under their belt, Alpharius and his soldiers teleported back to their HQ to plan their next surgical strike.

Player Resources
Army Characteristic: Vast Empire
 * Alphon 1 - Throne Sector - Starting
 * Alphon 2 - Shrine Sector - Starting
 * Alphon 3 - Agri Sector - Starting
 * Alphon 4 - Forge Sector - Starting
 * Alphon 5 - Hive Sector - Vast Empire
 * Alphon 6 - Agri Sector - Vast Empire
 * Alphon 7 - Forge Sector - Vast Empire
 * Alphon 8 - Mining Sector - Won from "Battle with the Blade of the Whills" +1 Conquest pt
 * Alphon 9 - Mining Sector - Won from "Battle with the Deathwatch" +1 Conquest pt
 * Alphon 10 - Outpost Sector - Won from "Second Battle with the BLade of the Whills" +1 Conquest pt