Vulkan Vs. Konrad Curze

My favorite loyalist Primarch (give or take Sanguinius) against my favorite traitor Primarch. And actually I think these two do have bad history, so that makes this appropriate. Who wins?

Vs.

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@cheth

@ahzek_ahriman

This is speed vs strength and Vulkan should win because it is insanely hard to kill him

With Konrad as the former and Vulkan as the latter, I'd assume. Though if its really so tough to kill him, wouldn't he also take the edge in durability as well as strength?

Konrad was able to kill Vulkan an apparently exhausting multitude of ways, but mostly through means other than dueling.

When Konrad actually let Vulkan (naked, IIRC) get a hold of his weapon... well, Konrad got a very clear reminder that It's Also A Hammer, in a situation that frankly Konrad had substantial advantage within, and still got beaten like a pinata at a party. And Konrad was in a killing mood with Vulkan - he'd done it plenty of times immediately before then, after all.

Konrad's precognition is a powerful tool, but it isn't insurmountable - The Lion's done it, Sanguinius has done it, and importantly for here, Vulkan's done it.

He's a horrifying opponent, that Konrad... but then, so is Vulkan.

In a friendly sparring match, Konrad will win the vast majority of the time, if not every time. Vulkan explicitly holds back substantially when he spars with his primarch brothers, and to overcome Konrad precognitive edge, he really can't do so and expect a win.

In a fight where both opponents are going for the kill... I have to give the majority to Vulkan. Barely. He's proven he can take a Precog by surprise (Hammertime!), and he seems like he has the strength and durability to last long enough to get his Hit in, which should be enough to turn the tide of most fights. But since the fight would be to incapacitation, Vulkan's perpetual nature is mostly meaningless - he either gets through with his natural Primarch durability, or he's incapacitated and loses the fight. And that's hardly an impossibility when Konrad like the shred as much as he does.

@unusual_suspect: Thanks for the analysis. I also did another battle of the Primarchs if you're interested:

Sanguinius Vs. Fulgrim - Battles - Comic Vine (gamespot.com)

@shroudofsorrow said:

Yeah he would, and technically he's impossible to kill unless u know his secret IIRC

Important to note that Konrad's precog is not a combat precog. His precog is a little.. random. Someone like Ahriman [Pre Heresy] has much better combat precog then Konrad. Konrad was more 'Suffers from visions here and there' like Sang then 'I can see a few moments into the future to perfectly predict what you will do' Ahriman/Eldrad.

Despite the scene with Vulkan smacking Konrad with the hammer, I do think, in a straight fight, Konrad would win. But my heart would want Vulkan to win.

Hey Fizz @kaijuking another 40k debater @wut is back.

Welcome back.

Ot, Konrad wins

@wut: Wut "wuts" up. Been years

Isn't that always how it goes? XD

Sevetar is the one infamous for combat precog and I think people mix the two up. Curze could SORTA do something similar where he could see the future conflict and know how to act, but it's not what people think it is.

Also, I want to add that Curze was massively up his own asshole about his precognition to the point that he would walk right into a loss couldn't even admit he could possibly take because he believed that the future he saw was the only possible future, and didn't believe fate was malleable or his visions could be wrong. His future sight, while good at eliminating surprise factors, is actively a detriment because of his own insanity

@ahzek_ahriman: Honestly people bleeding Sevetor precog feats into Konrad makes a lot of sense. While true that he could have foreseen this duel, his precog is too sporadic and random to be consistent enough to be used in vs debates, imo, unless stated as part of the setup.

Dude let himself die because of them, yeah, up his own ass about them sounds about right.

I think by the time of the Heresy he was able to intentionally see at least some aspect of upcoming fights because he did it in virtually every fight he had in Unremembered Empire, and we basically see it happening. Unless he was just tripping balls the entire time and constantly experiencing uncontrollable visions. Which admittedly is possible given its Konrad Curze

Unremembered Empire is the king of showing how Kurze fights with foreknowledge, and I believe even Russ considered Curze able to beat him in single combat. Lion won in their fight because he wasn't quite the same as Curze's vision. It was this weird thing where at the LAST second he would do something Curze didn't predict

(I think he excluded the Lion from this quote out of salt)

Russ leaned forwards in his throne, his eyes narrowed. 'Can I kill him? Can I kill the Warmaster?'

Before Loken could answer, Russ went on. 'In the old days, in the Crusade I thought I could beat most of my brothers. Maybe not Sanguinius. In him there is a fine blend of skill and fury. He is a berserk in angel's garb. Or the Night Haunter, for he has the heedless power of the insane. But the others… Angron? He's too angry. Fulgrim?' He shrugged. 'Too proud. Perturabo and Dorn are too stolid. Guilliman is too stern to enjoy battle and so I would beat him too. Lorgar I could spit on and that would drop him into the dirt, he's so weak from all that kneeling. Alpharius is a wretched serpent. And we all know what happened to the great sorcerer of Prospero. The rest I could defeat as easily as this.' He snapped his fingers. 'Horus though,' he grimaced. 'Put to it, one on one, I could have beaten him. It would have been hard, and close fought, and had fortune favoured him over me, he would have triumphed. But the feat was within my grasp. So tell me, Garviel Loken, is it now? Can I still kill him?'

@ahzek_ahriman: Refresh my memory, Unremembered Empire is the one where somehow Kurze was able to hold off Gulli and Lion despite the Lion dominating him previously and clearly holding the edge over him in 1v1? Cause Primarchs are swingy as hell in each novel they appear in, especially Kurze, but I'd also take what Leman says in-character with a grain of salt especially since we have seen Leman fight Angron and it... didn't exactly go well for Leman in the duel [His army won the battle, but he ended up on his knees].

@wut: Nah, you got the order wrong. With prep he was able to fight Gulli and the Lion (he rigged the entire place to explode around them) then fucked off

When he fought the Lion later on in a 1v1 he got vaped

I'd also take what Leman says in-character with a grain of salt especially since we have seen Leman fight Angron and it... didn't exactly go well for Leman in the duel [His army won the battle, but he ended up on his knees].

He wasn't attempting to kill Angron notably though. He wouldn't throw the fight (he's far to proud for that) but the goal wasn't to kill Angron. It was trying to prove a point. Angron WAS trying to kill him

Also Leman is pretty down to earth about his abilities in this respect. Especially in this instance, where he was trying to sort out if he could gamble his life and his legion to try and decapitate the traitors by killing Horus. It's about as serious as he ever got. If he thinks he would lose to Curze he probably would and I see no reason for to contest that. After all this isn't him claiming he would BEAT someone.

Vulkan is good but he is absolutely not Russ. If Russ doesn't believe he could confidently beat Curze, Vulkan definitely can't

I also enjoy:

Lorgar I could spit on and that would drop him into the dirt, he's so weak from all that kneeling

@ahzek_ahriman: Honestly if Angron was trying to kill him, he would have killed Leman when he was crawling away. I saw it more as Angron venting and trying to prove a point [a wrong point as Lemans was better] then Angron actually going all out to kill Leman.

I don't see a duel between them going differently even if both were trying to kill the other [Even if the rule writers don't seem to agree with how broken they make HH Leman's melee rules].

@wut: Again the relevant point is that Russ thinks he would lose to Curze and I don't see him fudging that given his pride.

Vulkan isn't really comparable to Russ as a warrior. His skills were elsewhere, although he was probably the physically strongest Primarch giving credit where credit is due. I just can't see him beating Curze in a straight duel because Curze IS great fighter and is also mind rendingly insane and unpredictable

Russ did kind of have a training montage arc before he went to try and assassinate Horus where he did become stronger/more skilled. But Angron became a daemon prince so its not like the duel would go differently lol

@ahzek_ahriman: True enough, if Leman says he'd lose, probably some point in there.

I agree that Kurze should beat Vulkan.

I feel like Vulkan should win here but Kurze would give him a good fight, especially due to his precognition.