I hear you on the G80 and I have had no complaints so far in bad weather and on unimproved roads. Kinda look at it like dumping more money in for a lift and working around not having a low range with momentum, but seems like a bad idea. 99.5% of our trips the AWD is more than enough, but that 0.5% where we really go off road and up over 11,000 feet it gets hairy and scary.
Really like to practice the as slow as possible and fast as necessary thing off roading.
Last time I ran Imogene Pass, I was in low range the majority of the time, very steep and rocky so need the low speed control also helps with descent control. Actually never needed a rear locker due to awesome traction control; it was a 2020 Land Rover Defender 110 S.
The Denali is also very wide for many of the passes: Imogene, Ophir, Engineer and pretty much everything at Uwharrie National Forest (near me) due to the trees.