Being inspired by some other people's alternative Heresy projects and having encountered the Tarot Primarch Theory, I'm throwing my hat into the ring as well.
The plan is to cover twenty legions in the style of the Forgeworld Black Books
In order to replicate the sectioned off text we get in the FW books in the forum posts, I'll be using the spoiler function.
, and then go on to look at important events in the Great Crusade and what takes the place of the Horus Heresy (as a filler I'll be referring to it as 'the Betrayal'). As the legions are being developed one by one, at this stage they might be considered to be at 'alpha phase' and all feedback is welcome. I'll be adding a section to each post with any relevant notes on planned revision.
As this is something I've been working on over on alternativehistory.com, there will be a faster posting rate to start with until this one is caught up, and shout out to anyone who knows me from there.
Primogenitor: Aethios Hierax, Basileus of Bithynia, the Conqueror
Cognomen: The Immortal Sons (often shortened to the Immortals), the First (common unofficial), the Thunderbolts (limited prior).
Observed Strategic Tendencies: Close formation combat, line-breaker and counter-attack manoeuvrers, spearhead assaults.
Noteworthy Domains: The world of Bithynia, primary tithe rights to Terra.
The First was meant to be more than simply a working prototype for the Legions that came after, or test-bed for the concept behind the Legiones Astartes Project. It was to be an exemplar of the Emperor's plans and ambitions. In this they stood apart, even within the storied ranks of the Tetraic Formation, lionised by remembrancers and favoured by the War Council for their performance in the Great Crusade. Yet as the dramaurge Shakespear asks us, "Can one desire too much of a good thing?"
Origen: Heirs to the Blade
Few records of the Ist Legion's earliest history exist in any but the most oblique terms, or sealed under the highest authority, such was the secrecy surrounding the Astartes Project at this time, and the concern of what might be attempted by the Emperor's foes should they learn of it. But, from the fragments available, it is possible to sketch an outline of events as they transpired and deduce further details from them.
Based within the Emperor's initial Strife-Era territory in the Himalazian Plateau, the secretive first intake of recruits came from both the most loyal core territories, and those who had most avidly welcomed His armies as liberators from the terrors of Old Night. The Achaemenid Empire would provide many of this initial wave, alongside the Nordafrik Enclaves, Techno-Union Clans and Ganga hive-chain. Given the importance assigned the project, it is unsurprising to learn that the Emperor devoted so much personal attention to the transformation of this first cycle of neophytes, a point of pride within the Legion going forward, and shared only decades later with the creation of the XXth Legion. It is perhaps from this intervention too, that they manifested such dedication and belief in the cause set before them.
The resulting proto-Legion was built to a full thousand strong before it was first deployed in battle, a rarity among the Legions the followed, fighting alongside the Thunder Warriors they would eventually replace, and the genic troopers that are known to have inspired their creation. In retrospect, while we who came after saw only the undeniable supremacy of the Legiones Astartes on the battlefield, it has to be remembered how much was an unknown at that time. How a failure to succeed at this stage, by these legionnaires, could have forced so different a path on the Emperor's ambitions.
It is no secret in the present day that the Legiones Astartes were created as a refinement and advancement on the Thunder Warrior regiments that formed the Emperor's elite during the early Unification Wars on Terra. Though capable enough for the task at hand in those early days, the growing instability seen in the oldest members showed it clearly that they would have proved unsuitable for greater mission of unifying all Humanity across the galaxy.
Some have suggested that the death of the Thunder Warriors came from a desire to pass in a final blaze of glory rather than wither away, or perhaps to prove themselves in the face of being slowly superseded by the Emperor's newest transhuman soldiers. In either case, they would go one to be remembered both for the victory that cost the last of them their lives, and in setting the standard against which their successors would measure themselves against.
Reliable, and open, records begin with commendations and battle honours for defeats inflicted against the armies of the Rus and Norvik Sinks in rapid sequence, opening up the Cephic Hives whose own sally against the Emperor's forces was shattered by the First in open battle. The emergence of a new and more deadly breed of transhuman soldier spearheading the emperor's armies would have been as a lightning bolt from a clear sky, and as sudden as it was catastrophic for those meeting it. In these and subsequent battles that followed in the wars against the Yndonesic Bloc, the Legion continued to prove itself equal to the challenges it faced and highlighted the worth of the Legiones Astartes Project in unifying Terra. Despite the emergence of new Legions, the Vth, VIIth and XIIIth Legions being founded in quick succession during the same period, the First continued at this stage to draw the lion's share of resources and recruits, a necessity given the extensive and very visible deployments they undertook. Where resistance proved most stubborn, the First were sent as a living statement to all who observed, a clear message by the Emperor to both his enemies and allies. Behold His will, and know His power.
Even compared to the iconic Thunder Warriors that had, until now, formed the Emperor's elite on the field of battle, these early astartes were marked as deadly in the eyes of His enemies. As was noted by one chronicler, their name now lost to time, 'the Thunder Warriors are stronger, fiercer and more enduring, yet inferior in every other way'. The Emperor's original gene-forged warriors were blunt instruments, the newest honed blades, and this was the difference seen and feared.
We can observe, looking back on the events of those tumultuous years, the essence of Legion shining through. Limited in number compared to the scale that they would later reach, the First relied on strong unit cohesion and the ability to act a one to magnify their collective strengths. Alone and in the beginning unique, a powerful bond between legionnaires past any influence of their psychoinduction emerged, an adamantine brotherhood with absolute confidence in their fellows that saw them undaunted in the face of any opponent. So it was they formed the unbreakable speartip of assaults and the unyielding shield against whom their foes spent themselves without purchase. In character, individual legionnaires displayed a terrific conviction, and a bellicose resistance to any obstacle or hindrance to their goals, whatever they might be. This aggressive temperament was not the wildfire passion of the XVth however, but a focused and disciplined flame, stoked hot and set to purpose.
Battlefield of Stars
Following the Wars of Unification, the First, now referred to in many records as the Thunderbolts, remained at the forefront, leading the xenocidal wars taking place in the Solar Domain, though more often as beachhead formations leading the advance of mixed force deployments rather than as massed formations in their own right. With the calming of the warp storms isolating Terra, and the expanding reach of the Expeditionary Fleets, the Legion built quickly on their already impressive reputation and roll of honour, with swift and clean compliances in the near-Terra sphere. Here the First did not simply defeat armies, it broke nations and left them easy pickings for the Iterators and adepts that followed in their wake. It was a strategy honed to horrific effect by Preator Arataz, that the Legion would aim to maximise the transhuman shock inflicted on their opponents at the moment of initial contact, its impact calculated to weaken and fracture further resistance.
Seen by many as the Emperor's hand of wrath striking down upon those who denied Him, the Ist Legion also came to be called on when the War Council sought to punish rebellious worlds or other Imperial units deemed to have failed in some spectacular fashion. These were hammer-strikes from on high, less battle than they were cull, that began and ended before the subject of their ire could fully process what was happening to them.
What the First would have come to under their own initiative is a question less easy to answer than it might first seem. Embracing, with open and knowing arms, the purpose behind their creation, they were held as paragons of Humanity's fighting spirit and refusal to bow before the hunger and depravity of those who threatened the dominance of Terra's children. Yet, this would be shown to be only one of their aspects when the first of the Emperor's lost sons was rediscovered.
A Conquering Son
For all the orbital infrastructure surrounding Bithynia, the freighters and warships traversing the void, and the psyker-oracles employed by its leadership, the capsule carrying the infant Primarch was only detected as it lit up like a new star, streaking across the sky with the heat of atmospheric reentry. By the time it had crashed into the savannah to the north of Pergamon, a convoy of vehicles were racing towards the site, the arcology-state's aristocracy having watched the sight from their garden-estates, then been roused to action by oracles near hysterical from the echoes of fate sent rippling through the aether.
Bithynia (civilised/hive world)
Location: Segmentum Solar, eastern quadrant
Size (Terra relative): 1.1
Average temperature: 25*C
Moons: None
Population: 57.3 billion
Notes: Seat of power for the Bithynian Dominion
Bithynia was the youngest of a new wave of colony worlds near the heart of Human territory near the dawn of the Age of Strife, overlooked in the centuries prior in favour of those with richer resources and more hospitable climes. Though resting on a broadly stable warp route, and as such the site of long used waystation for voidcraft, only now was it considered worthwhile to truly colonise, and even them only as a hub for other systems. Resource thin and arid, it required massive water management projects to make it more habitable, and manufacturing arcologies were founded for it to recoup the costs through supplying the needs and wants of richer worlds.
When warp storms and wars in the stars beyond left the region isolated and unsupported, older worlds turned on the younger to support their quality of life, leaving halos of sacked remnants surrounding them. By luck, Bithynia's youth saw it ignored at first, a target unworthy of the effort, and was instead given time to prepare defences against its neighbours' rapacious hunger.
Construction walkers and geoforming engines were converted to weapon platforms and tanks. Half-built or damaged vessels resting in the orbital docks were stripped to keep the best functional and turned into fire ships concealed in obscure orbits. When ravaging fleets arrived they were met by suicidal attack runs, later also being forced to run a gauntlet of wrecks formed from those that came before and were themselves rigged with powerful explosives. Those that reached the surface were then faced by ground defenders with no less adamant resolve. In the aftermath, enemy ships would be scavenged for anything of use, and captured soldiers stripped of their gear and sent to forced labour agri-camps.
Through the fanatical dedication and sacrifices of those manning these jury-rigged war machines and fire-ships, invaders would be driven back at each turn, though the cost would grow heavier each time in pace with the hunger of other worlds. Across years of conflict the war-walkers and tank-engines would be lost, one by one, but ultimately succeed in breaking the power of those who set themselves against the colony.
With the time bought by these desperate actions, Bithynia's leaders were able to raise and train their own army, equipped from repurposed factories and dispatched on converted warship-transports to carry back their reply to those that had assaulted their world. Left weakened by their widespread wars and moving towards grudging peace with each other, they were unprepared for the retaliation launched against them, tercios of Bithynian Hoplites securing resources and plunder from each defeated world, fuelling the next advance. When they reached those worlds that had been themselves ravaged, they traded the best and brightest they had to offer in return for succour and support.
This early flood of wealth, in all its forms, would inform and fuel the planet's development, and the new shape its society and culture would take on over the centuries to come.
By the time of Aethios' arrival, Bithynia was a world of clean and prosperous arcology-ziggurats, their white, limestone clad, walls decorated with bright lapis, turquoise and amethyst glazed tiles, each tier surmounted by the rich terrace-estates of the High Houses. Beyond the cities lay plantation-farms lining the banks of rivers shaped in the planet's youth, the flat expanses of spaceports, and the training fields of hoplite tercios. High above, orbital yards maintained the world's fleet and acted as the gatehouse between it and the stars, lifters ferrying down raw materials and exotic luxuries, then returning with the output of vast manufactora and specialist workshops.
Well equipped, trained and motivated armies ensured dominance over local space alongside a fleet of star-galleons: a dozen worlds half-ruled from garrison-colonies settled by the veterans that had humbled them, a score of tributary systems, and trade links to unknown worlds beyond.
Service among the tercios and in the fleet, offered many things to many people. For the Low Houses, there was prestige and honour to be had, alongside wealth from the spoils of campaigning. Veterans completing their service could look forward to land in one of the colonies or a cash bounty. For the scions of the High Houses, it was all but a prerequisite if they wanted to stand for public office, and a successful military career offered capital in the internal politicking and rivalries that existed between them.
Underpinned the relationship between High and Low was a patronage system, based on a complex reciprocal arrangement of service-for-support where the successes of the High Houses would see those bound to them prosper. There was however no compelling factor beyond the ability of a House, or even individual noble, to inspire loyalty then successfully deliver on the expectations of their followers. This practice also offered to set both groups apart from the bondsmen underclass, descendants of prisoners taken from defeated armies, who were barred from many aspects of public life.
Coming upon the crater its landing had left, the party found the pod already open and a child tottering amid the spring wildflowers surrounding it. While the capsule would be studied and examined for its secrets by the hive's technologists, that much all present agreeing on, of the boy's future there was considerable, and intense, debate. The oracles were united in declaring the importance of the child to the future of Pergamon, and of Bithynia as a whole. But more than that they could not divine, some impenetrable and rowing uncertainty clouding his thread of fate the further they scryed, leaving the Patriarchs and Matriarchs of the High Houses to argue among themselves over the boy's future.
By virtue of his own reputation and the standing of his House, backed by canny diplomacy and negotiation, custody would go at last to Prusias of House Bas, a respected statesman of advancing years who led one of Pergamon's Founding Houses. His wife, Apama, named the boy Aethios, and was able to secure the rights for formal adoption through her family's ties to other cities, whose oracles had also felt the child's arrival and whose High Houses expressed more than slight curiosity and interest in him.
Like all his siblings the infant Primarch grew swift and strong, far beyond any limits that might be expected on either mind or body, reaching adulthood in only a decade and excelling at every test and step along the way. Powerfully built in the athlete's ideal, his skin gleaming a smokey black under cedar and sandalwood oils, the force of his presence went beyond the mere physical, his golden-eyed gaze demanding submission and challenging any to test his resolve. Strong willed, focused and goal-orientated in all things, it was while learning the arts of leadership and strategy, in preparation for taking military command, that his truest talent was found. An intuitive grasp of warfare seemed written through his being, be it commanding troops, planning strategy, tactics or the consolidation following victory. His adoptive parents bent every effort to acquiring him the finest tutors and decorated veterans to refine his native ability, sparing nothing in memory of the oracles' words.
While the Primarch and his adoptive family were never gregarious or openly sanguine in their affection, leading some who came after to think Prusias saw Aethios firstly as a means of advancing his own House. This, however, was a mistaken view. The realities of inter-House politics, the expectations placed on both sides, and the cultural practices of the Bithynian nobility fostered a more private and semi-formal manner, but one that ran no less deep for it. When his adoptive parents died, some years after the coming of the Emperor, the Conqueror returned from campaign to oversee their funeral, leading the procession in grey robes and with his face masked with the ash of mourning. Now head of House Bas, he remained in touch with his mortal kin, carrying out the duties that now fell to him with no less commitment than that shown to the command of his Legion.
It was the tributary world of Galatai, contrary at the best of times, of late short and reluctant with its tithe, where Aethios would meet the challenge of proving his ability in the fires of actual combat. The planet's Prince, having ejected the merchants after stripping their wealth, and refusing any attempt at peaceful resolution, would be brought to heel instead by the force of an army dispatched against him. In short order after arrival, Aethios led his infantry tercios to victory over the Prince in open battle, skirmish and siege. His stratagems overcoming the defenders at every turn and throwing them back time and again. Each settlement encountered was offered the choice of surrender or sack, and few had the spirit to test his will after the example of the first, preferring to buy peace with the wealth they heaped on him and his troops. His noble peers, young and eager spirits to the last, toasted him for leading them to glory, the soldiery chanting his name for the spoils they gained. The Prince himself would at last be captured in the final siege and battle, his seat taken and despoiled by the Bithynian troops, the man then slain before the survivors and a new Prince raised from those who surrendered elsewhere.
Further, Aethios declared a new colony would be founded to ensure Galatai's obedience once he had departed. Such was the submission inflicted that the new Prince could do naught but accede, and offered them the remains of the old capital on which to build. On returning to Bithynia, his family arranged triumphal celebrations for him in the plazas and concourses of the hive, and the Parliament's members stood as he passed them in procession, displaying the tribute and noble hostages taken. The nickname Hierax, the Hawk in their tongue, would be gained from this campaign in light of his swift and crushing victories, and the bounty torn from the enemy's grasp.
From here his military career continued its rapid ascent, further campaigns cementing his reputation and the support of all who profited from them. Having achieved more in a decade than others would in a lifetime, his attention turned to the battlefield of politics and the manoeuvres of the High Houses. By this point he had brought two more worlds to their knees and set colonies upon them, secured tribute from a half dozen more, and routed both pirate and invader, both Human and xenos. From his own coffers he paid for public works to enhance Pergamon above all others, sponsored artists and led festivals. With this trail of victories and the support of a host of tercio veterans and their families he achieved appointments first in the Parliament of Pergamon, then that of Bithynia as a whole.
In this arena, Aethios showed a keen understanding of motive and desire, and as in war he balanced magnanimity to those that yielded with ruin to those that refused. To his supporters he delivered fine rewards, and those that failed to support him were turned to the cause in time or left isolated and without support. Prusias stepped back from official affairs of state as his son rose, turning towards less public machinations. Between them they assured the ascent of House bas, securing advantageous marriages and positions of importance for its sons and daughters. So successfully did he rise, and with such widespread support, that he achieved the rank of Basileus, one of only a handful in the history of the world to hold such exalted power.
It was shortly after that appointment that the Imperium would reach the borders of Bithynia's sphere of influence, learning of it through the tales of merchants from newly compliant border worlds who traded with them. Aethios heard of the Imperium in turn also, and by the same means, working with his generals and logisticians to determining the most likely point of contact and calculate how they might counter this potential threat. So it was that when the Principia Imperialis, the Emperor's own Expeditionary Fleet arrived in the outermost tributary system it was met in kind, and bid to halt its advance by Aethios himself, having gathered the greater part of the Bithynian Navy as a show of force against this encroaching power.
There was debate and negotiation, even in the face of the Emperor's own presence, for Aethios was not inclined by nature or upbringing to bend easily or kneel to another without good cause. There was no lack of respect on either side however, the wisdom in his gen-sire's planning, and both the victories He had achieved and the means employed were well spoken of by the Primarch to his advisors even before agreement was reached. The Emperor likewise praised His son's successes and accomplishments, His offer a means to continue them on a grander scale and to build further on the foundations laid so far. His son's world would not be as a tributary beneath Terra's yoke, but held alongside the Throneworld in the manner of the hive cities who together forged Bithynia's strength. So did Aethios and his homeworld come to join the Imperium, pre-eminent in its sector and ambition.
Warhawks and Raptors
Aethios offered all due filial allegiance to the Emperor, but it was clear that the First Primarch would bow no more than that, and to no other at all. The Fabricator General of Mars was met as one equal to another, and bargained with accordingly. Malcador the Sigillite was granted all honour as the Emperor's Hand in matters of state, and the council he offered was recognised for its value above any other in this regard, but it would only be as council, and weighed accordingly. On Terra, the Emperor and His son proved of similar mind, if, so it is rumoured, too much alike in some aspects. Yet, it was recorded by others that both relished the challenge brought by the other, that it was in the very fact, so Aethios would write, that they both stood before one who could not be brushed aside that their bond was forged.
Unification of Primarch and Legion was swift, command being granted without preamble and sealed with the emerald bladed kopis Vanquisher, a pre-Strife relic discovered by conservators from the Achaemenid Empire. Standing before their gathered number on the ground where he first arrived on Bithynia, Aethios addressed his sons, of how he had reviewed the conduct and campaigns. "It is acceptable... but that is all. However, I am your father and you are my immortal sons. So I shall teach you these things you do not know, that we may stand before each other with only pride in our hearts."
Unlike a number of occasions when a Legion and its Primarch came together, Aethios was less concerned with changes in the martial practices of his sons, though in this his hand can still be seen, than in all other parts of them. It was the culture of his homeworld and people that he sought to instil firstly, with a focus on the pre-eminent military-philosophical text Principles of War. For the newly renamed legion, words were now found to skilfully articulate and expanded on the concepts they had lived and fought by, one of these precepts, 'strength through the man next to you', becoming their foremost and central tenet. Tailored for the nuances of an Astartes Legion, and blended with the traditions and practices already in place, Bithynian culture was adopted in a manner both quick and smooth even before the first training cycles of aspirants from the Primarch's homeworld had been completed.
Returning to the Crusade, expanded with a fresh influx of Bithynian recruits and supported by massed infantry tercios joining the host of the Imperial Army, the First Primarch cut a swathe through the outer Segmentum Solar, following a path close and parallel to the Emperor's own. The two Expeditionary Fleets would cooperate in a number of campaigns leading up to the full compliance of the Segmentum, of which the Battle of Gorro would be the most remembered. From here Aethios' fleet struck out on an independent path, he and the Emperor as the two highest ranking commanders of the Great Crusade following the dominant warp currents running north and south around the galactic core.
The new dimensions emerging in the character of the Legion can be seen in the compliances achieved in this period, as the arguably more refined martial culture Aethios brought into it began to bear fruit. The Three Methods of Victory - reason, threat, force - brought a new appreciation of diplomacy to a host who were known for one of the most wilfully warlike approaches of all the Legions, and a new range of subtler means to leverage power over others. The balance of civilisations brought to their knees by the sword now shifted towards a more even level with those who knelt willingly, or at least without war upon their territories. The full tally of compliances soon grew at a rate unequalled by any save the Emperor Himself, and only the discovery of Aethios' lost brothers brought about similar achievements elsewhere.
Several of the Primarchs would begin writing their own place in the annals of the Great Crusade alongside Aethios before being granted independence command, a responsibility he took active pride in as de-facto eldest among his siblings, another aspect of Bithynian culture that translated well to his own Legion's approach to training. Though it cannot be said that the Conqueror was close with all his brothers, and expected to a degree some deferment that was not always appreciated, he would hear no word against any of them by those outwith their brotherhood. In his eyes, any problem or complaint should be resolved in private by them and the Emperor, and anything that did not raise complaint within that circle was not for any other to challenge. Some would later claim that this left him without perspective on matters that should have been addressed before they reached crisis, though just as many have claimed this brought a greater habit of oversight between beings who for many were beyond challenge in their actions.
Unit and Formation Structure within the Legion
Though broadly maintaining the established Terran-pattern organizational structure, Aethios' arrival and essentially unlimited authority brought with it changes that reflected his own military experiences and preferences. Invigorated and vital from their reunion, the Legion adopted these changes eagerly in concert with the shift in culture that was introduced alongside them.
At the highest scale, the phalanx was introduced above the company and cohort as the largest set formation maintained by the Immortals, with ten Lieutenants led by a Captain, and ten Captains led by a Strategos. Beneath this strategic level organisation, each legionnaire, irrespective of rank, was expected to be able to stand on the line, shoulder to shoulder with their brothers, bolter and blade in hand. This lean towards close formation combat practised by the Immortals was a cornerstone of their success across the Crusade, each legionnaire amplifying the strength of those next to them and creating a whole greater than the sum of its parts. It is also very indicative of the view held by both the Legion and its Primarch that inferior numbers of superior troops counted for more than inferior troops in superior numbers.
As befitting the Legion longest in service to the Emperor and with its long list of honours, the standard of equipment available and maintained by the Legion was as high as it was extensive. Bithynia's own industrial capacity was considerable, ranked in the highest tier of quality below what could be produced in soverign Machanicum holdings, and within the Legion's forge complex laboured the planet's finest artisans. In addition to the direct supply of war material from Mars, the lonely, frost-plained world of the neighbouring Bor system, a mineral rich planetoid long home to a forced labour mining camp, was granted to the Mechanicum as part of the pact between Aethios and the Fabricator General, shipping vast quantities of bolt ammunition for the Legion's campaigns. With every weapon in the Imperial arsenal deployed as some point in its history, there was still a preference for the most locally destructive armaments, melta and plasma both regularly seen, and while still able, massed volkite beamers.
Breacher squads, forming dense shield-walls that could rapidly realign and reform as needed, were a ubiquitous feature of their deployments, and an honoured position within the Legion's order of battle. Often composed of veteran legionnaires tested and tempered in the heat of repeated combat, these squads were regularly deployed in a far more aggressive manner than was the norm elsewhere, leading the assault on enemy lines and forcing back opposing formations.
Elite among all forces deployed, the Hetairoi answered only to the Primarch himself, and are said to have been modelled on the example set by the Emperor's own Custodian Guard. Equipped to the highest standards in artificer plate, bearing master crafted plasma and disruption weapons, their skill in battle was only part of the accomplishment needed for consideration. Aethios demanded skilled minds and higher learning, ability in debate and argument on whatever matters might cross his attention, the ability to see the wider perspective of events and offer council. To them was granted the freedom to speak on any subject at any time without bar or censure, symbolised by the Legion seal of carved adamant each carried on their rank chains.
The First were one of the Legions that founded the wider Librarius program, alongside the VIII and XX, an oddity to some given the lack of psychic power Aethios himself manifested, but unsurprising given the civilisation he grew up in. The First's own Librarius was both well developed and refined in application, with a trend towards scrying, psychometry, and defence over the more overtly destructive techniques practised by others. Tightly regulated under Chief Librarian Arrian Dio, who approached his duties with a ruthless scrutiny, intensive screening of all potential recruits was carried out to identify those with any trace of psychic potential, and winnow out those lacking the control for training in its obsidian walls.
While on other worlds the explosion in psyker numbers proved a menace at best, and living nightmare at worst, Bithynia maintained sufficient knowledge and technology to identify and secure those so empowered before they grew to great a threat, and identify if they retained the will to be trained. While the majority failed to meet the stringent levels of control and self discipline demanded (being quietly executed, their ashes then mixed with molten lead and cast into ingots), the ones that did proved their value as scryer-guides on ships and as oracles to generals and statesmen. At the same time, while kept in luxury, psykers lived a life isolated from wider society, housed in specially wrought warding towers situated at the peak of each city.
Legion Hierarchy
Under the Primarch's absolute command, the Legion was organised as one body, under one will, directed to a singular purpose. The chain of command was designed to be streamlined and direct, with no more than ten legionnaires directly under any one officer, and no order or report travelling more than four steps from or to Aethios himself. While lacking the flexibility and rapidly adaptable nature of some other Legions' hierarchies, it fitted perfectly the style of warfare practised by the First and served well across countless battles. It was also under this principle of unity that the Legion saw no distinction between Terran and Bithynian brothers, the Primarch's will being unshakable on the matter that all were his sons equally in his sight.
Advancement through the ranks was a strenuous process, superlative combat ability merely the first trial. The principle of dignitas in officers - that they excel not only as military commanders but rulers - had a large impact on the rate of a legionnaire's rise, and on the character of the Legion's highest ranks, being populated by those that carry the air of statesmen and nobility as much as of warlords and generals. In bringing worlds into compliance, the Legion's leadership gained a reputation for skilled, if at times domineering, diplomacy alongside their record of brutally short military compliances. In many ways this harked back to the techno-barbarian warlords of Strife-Era Terra, expected to lead in the forefront of battle just as much as rule from on high, who inspired the original Legiones Astartes command structure. Perhaps because of this, and the cultural values imported from Bithynia, respect and trust between ranks was high even by the standards of its brother Legions.
Obedience to the chain of command and an exacting level of discipline was expected at all times, those failing to meet the Legion's standards being marked out in some obvious manner for the duration of their castigation, from armour panels stripped of their colours to displays of ritual humiliation and contrition carried out in front of their peers. These disciplinary matters, and the maintenance of the Legion's cohesive warrior culture fell under the authority of the Hierarchs. Selected for their absolute commitment to the Legion's ideals, these rite-leaders oversaw the rituals and traditions of their brothers from behind gold-visaged war-helms, and acted as exemplars on the field of battle. These ceremonies were held open to the sky and formed highly visible displays that encouraged as many witnesses as available, marking important points in the progression of a legionnaire, campaigns, and commemorating events from the Legion's history.
Armorial Conventions
The seal of the Ist Legion is a raptor head, stylised in gold outlines filled white, reminiscent of the campaign honour awarded to veterans of the Unification War and the Primarch's own honorific title. The initial right for all members of the Legion to bear this symbol was granted by edict of the Emperor following the end of fighting on the throneworld, though it acquired its current form following the Primarch's return, losing the lightning bolt iconography of the original.
Standard armour colours are turquoise detailed with white, unit markings on the right shoulder. Rank is displayed by silver and gold icon-medals mounted directly on armour or worn on chains, with battle honours wrought in high level detail whose meaning is largely obscure outside the Legion.
War Disposition
The Immortal Sons maintained an approximately stable strength of 100 000 for the better part of the Great Crusade, Aethios considering the number sufficient for any task that a single Legion might be turned to. Even as many of his brother's expanded their own Legions further, the First Primarch was untouched by any need to match or exceed them, unshakably confident in the ability of his sons. A benefit that came with this stance was the ability to maintain stringently high recruitment standards, possibly the highest of all the Legions, and confine recruitment to its own homeworld and Terra. Competition for a place was fierce among aspirants, selection being a high honour for both recruits and their families, and each hive-city held tournaments merely to select who would go on to try for testing at the Legion's fortress monastery. Without continuous growth, the First were also able to maintain a significant reserve of gene-seed against the chance of unthinkable disaster.
Almost the full strength of the First was present on Bithynia at the time of the Betrayal, the Primarch and his Strategoi preparing to blood the most recently raised legionnaires against reputed xeno-holds emerging in the far Eastern Fringe. Only slightly more than a full cohort were deployed elsewhere, primarily in discharge of honour bonds with various Expeditionary Fleets. A full assessment of the Legion's capacities, however, requires a measure of two other factors beyond a simple tally of legionnaires.
Firstly, by weight, the Legion's warfleet was exceeded only by the IVth and rivalled only by the IXth. On top of this was a predisposition towards heavier ship classes, including the largest concentration of grand cruisers in service to any Legion. Leading this assemblage was the Gloriana-class Lamassu, an aquila-prowed war-galleon whose slab-sided form was set with stepped banks of macrobatteries and lance cannon arrays.
Secondly, are the Bithynian mortal soldiery, that still look to the Primarch as their highest ultimate commander in his status as Basileus. Alongside the hundreds of tercios serving in the Imperial Army and the battle-fleets transporting them, are the full count of auxilia accompanying the Legion and consolidating the aftermath of its campaigns, a duty that sees heavy competition for selection with each new rotation of troops.
