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Over the past month I seem to have seen more and more stories about Rogal Dorn (and Fulgrim) coming to 40k. Indeed one former manager(salt ready I suppose) said that the models for both have been ready for some time and are just waiting a release date.

Anyway.

It's Dorn I'm puzzled about. I know very little of him (Dark Angel's are my army), other than he's good at building defences and nearly getting his chapter wiped out by the Iron Warriors (sorry, a little harsh).
So if he returns, what will he bring to the galaxy?

Edit: I was half asleep when I posted and just realized that I totally misread what you wrote... Ignore me...

I would believe very little of what store managers say is getting released "soon". I was told back in 2015 that Battlefleet Gothic was getting a redo as Battlefleet Heresy and was due out at Xmas that year.
As for Dorn there is realistically nothing that he brings to the table that Guilliman already has. They're both brilliant commanders and are the leaders of chapters that follow the Codex Astartes well. Guilliman wins out because he is also a statesman who knows how to run an empire.

 Gert wrote:
I would believe very little of what store managers say is getting released "soon". I was told back in 2015 that Battlefleet Gothic was getting a redo as Battlefleet Heresy and was due out at Xmas that year.
As for Dorn there is realistically nothing that he brings to the table that Guilliman already has. They're both brilliant commanders and are the leaders of chapters that follow the Codex Astartes well. Guilliman wins out because he is also a statesman who knows how to run an empire.

Are they? one of the last 'high-points' of their relationship was almost starting a second-civil war, right after concluding the first one. I can think of pleny of forces in the Imperium who would prefer blunt stewardship under Dorn over the potential ulterior ambitions of Guilliman.

That was about the Codex which Dorn eventually accepted and implemented after he realised his conflict with Guilliman was hurting the Imperium. 10k years after this the Imperial Fists and many of their successors are ardent adherents to the Codex, yes they would follow Dorn before Guilliman but Dorn wouldn't challenge Guilliman for "leader" of the Imperium.

 Gert wrote:
As for Dorn there is realistically nothing that he brings to the table that Guilliman already has.

He adds a choice, and even if their data sheets were identical, it still gives a player more choice, even if it is only to play Imperial Fists instead of Ultramarines.

I thought Dorn was dead, and only his hand was recovered.

Fictional wrote:

 Gert wrote:
As for Dorn there is realistically nothing that he brings to the table that Guilliman already has.

He adds a choice, and even if their data sheets were identical, it still gives a player more choice, even if it is only to play Imperial Fists instead of Ultramarines.

Players can still play Imperial Fists and since Guilliman is a Primarch and part of the new Supreme Command selection they can have both as Guilliman has one rule that doesn't benefit non-Ultramarine forces. IMO besides someone like Russ, I think only Guilliman should be returned. Barring Sanguinius, none of them hold the same level of esteem as Guilliman does nor would they possess either the skills or character to be able to hold what remains of the Imperium together. As for each Primarchs current status:
Dorn - Missing, the Fists recovered a single hand.
Corax - Missing. HOWEVER, SPOILERS
Vulkan - Blew up after punching an Ork WAAAGH reactor, probably dead but maybe not.
Guilliman - Up and about (duh).
Sanguinius - Dead, though his soul still talks to some Blood Angels from time to time.
Russ - Missing, went into the Eye of Terror with the 13th Great Company. He is prophesised to return at the Wolf Time.
The Khan - Missing, chased Drukhari raiders into the Webway. Might be alive in the arenas of Commoragh.
Manus - Very dead.
The Lion - Missing, in reality is hidden deep within the Rock by the Watchers in the Dark.

Of the list, The Lion or Russ make the most sense to reappear, and Sanguinius and Ferrus Manus had better stay dead.

Khan, Vulkan and Dorn all have that "we don't know" factor, though two of them have heavy question marks - but I'm sticking to the comic book rule here, as we haven't seen bodies for them.

Corax is, currently, just weird.

The majority of the loyalist Primarchs that aren't dead (aka Ferrus Manus and ol' Sangy) or currently present (Guilliman) all have MIA tags on them, plot threads that GW can eventually revisit if they ever need a boost in the narrative to bolster faltering sales. Guilliman's return was exactly that, to set off the creation of 8th ed alongside the new Primaris line and the revamping of the core ruleset.

At the moment, outside of Guilliman, the one with the most amount of build-up for a return is currently the Lion, simply because he's similar to Guilliman where we know exactly where he is, inside the Rock, basically in a plot-induced coma until he's needed. With Luther's escape from The Rock and the Fallen gathering, there's even more reason for him to come back. There's also more of a dynamic between him and Guilliman, since they clashed before with Imperium Secundus, and you could see him acting as the Warmaster to Guilliman's Lord Commander role of the Imperium. I think it would also help resolve or progress the DA's current issue of identity being solely focusing on the Fallen and giving them more depth if the Lion were to come back and deal with their compounded secrecy of over a millenia. You could even have a split between those who follow the Lion who wants to focus on bringing the fight to the traitors versus hardliners that seek to erase the Fallen as their primary goal.

jaredb wrote:
I thought Dorn was dead, and only his hand was recovered.

He's missing, presumed dead, with the hand recovered.
He lead an away team against a Chaos battleship, and was probably, most likely, off-screen defeated and 'killed' on the other side of a locked door.
His hand was all that was ever found. So the chapter turned it into a vanity scrimshaw project, as you do with stray skeletal hands.

There's also some uncertainty as to when this happened- he may have been alive during the War of the Beast (Vulkan promises to pass along a good word to him about the Imperial Fists) which was in M32, and the specific class of battleship he 'died' on apparently didn't exist until M36.

But Konrad Curze apparently claimed he was dead and torn to pieces. And as we all know prophecies from traitor primarchs are 100% reliable and there are never any lies or unclear wording involved.

 Dysartes wrote:
Of the list, The Lion or Russ make the most sense to reappear, and Sanguinius and Ferrus Manus had better stay dead.

Ferrus makes sense in one specific case, which they've already used him for in the novels: if they reintroduce Legion of the Damned into 40k.

Thats what gets me about Dorn, his post-Heresy timeline has never been solidified like most of the others and its very wishy washy with the details. As for Curze's foresite, it was pretty accurate. He and Sanguinuis both had it but Curze couldn't handle it and it drove him mad. Sanguinius just got sad all the time, then tried to fight it and finally accepted it. Both had very clear visions of the future we know have come to pass I.e. Sanguinius being dead, Fulgrim being a sneaky snake demon.