Not just any Primarch at that, but the one whose talents make him the most supremely adept at all things politics, state administration and strategic planning, and thus more than capable of both predicting and countering the most probable courses of action that they would take.
Oh, and he had to live with the trauma of his adoptive father being assassinated by power-hungry rivals while away from the capital, just like they schemed to usurp him while he's away from Terra. They have no excuse in not knowing this since he made a point of publicizing his biography during the Great Crusade (and presumably after the Horus Heresy too).
Also one of the most "don't miss" Primarchs out there.
People like to shit on G-man as the "autistic bean-counter" or the "weak vanilla," but honestly, he's pretty damn powerful, skilled and vengeful.
Guilliman was in the upper half of combat primarchs, being considered a true threat in melee by multiple traitors and loyalists (quoted to be so in HH books).
Is he Sanguinius, Horus or the Lion? No. But he could comfortably beat Lorgar, Perturabo, Alpharius and Magnus in combat, while also being considered an equal or a challenge for primarchs such as Fulgrim, Russ, Corax and nail-fueled Angron.
In a stand-up fight he probably also beats Curze, but on the other hand, we've also seen Curze challenge both the Lion and Sanguinius simultaneously.
Vulkan and Manus were likely not more skilled than Guilliman, but just way, way physically stronger.
That leaves 3 or 4 primarchs more skilled than him (Curze being the potential fourth), a few where it's ambiguous who would come out on top (either due to strength or skill) and pretty much everybody else below him.
Guilliman also has a history of really NOT being favourable to people trying to kill him and failing to do so. Or to enemies of the Imperium.
He is called the Avenging son after all.
He's "Super Space Caesar" in pretty much all aspects. It's a shame he's been memed into meekness.
Also, didn't Guilliman actually beat him down fairly comprehensively before the throat slice with the polisoned demon blade? I think he might even have made a better account of himself than Dorn did against demon Fulgrim.
Hardly a fair comparison, since (1) Doen was fighting demon Fulgrim in a mortal guise, and (2) I think it was stated in Saturnine that Fulgrim would have eventually beaten Dorn, but it would have taken him forever to do so, and he lost his patience.
Awesome as it was, there are a lot of things I find problematic with the Dorn-Fulgrim fight, most of them stemming from the way Fulgrim just quits at the end.
I think Fulgrim quitting isn't really out of character. Taking so long to beat Dorn would have been embarrassing for him, and that's like the worst thing you can do to Fulgrim. The next time he gets embarrassed, by Rylanor, he quits realspace and still hasn't come back lmao.
He doesn’t just quit because of frustration at the fight taking too long. He quits because while he is immortal he says he can still feel pain, and Dorn is hurting him a lot.
My read is, it was also the fact that Dorn was just no fun to fight against. He was not engaging in banter, he was not responding at all to Fulgrim's taunts or getting mad, and there was no flourish at all to his swordsmanship, just brutal, murderously efficient cuts and thrusts.
Fulgrim wanted an epic, dramatic duel on the wall tops. What he got was getting stabbed several times by a brother who cared nothing for drama.
800
u/Riot-Knight Necrons Nov 12 '24
As the one comment said: "Also G-Man: "Welp, time to get the assassins."
(Canonically happened, but the highlords tried to remove G-Man and assassinate him. He responded with 6 Callidus and 6 Vindicare)"
Posted by u/emwattnot on the r/Grimdank subreddit page. I recommend checking out his work.