Current Events > Warhammer 40K makes first female custodians causing elements to call woke

(+) Yeah! (+)

evilpresident posted...

Bile is an interesting character, wish he'd get more attention. I like how he's so aggressively atheist that Daemons have difficulty keeping themselves together around him.

I love that the Dark ELdar captured him and he taught them how to torture more effciently.

It's like Hermes in Futurama improving the slave labour camp.

Hospy posted...

I dabble in a lot of different armies (Guard, Admech, Orks) but I stopped playing my marines after the Primaris thing. I just didnt like how they handled it lorewise at all. The real kick in the nuts was when they started converting firstborn marines into Primaris, I just couldnt take it anymore.

Killing off the dreadnought was the final nail in the coffin for me for playing space marines.

Being reminded of all this again has put me in an incoherent rage.

They killd off the DREADNOUGHT WHAT

i know the 'primaris dreadnought' causes aneurysms whenever it comes up and I hate even remembering that it's a thing, but seriously, dreads are getting retired or something? I am entirely a lorefriend, this is news to me.

Guide posted...

They killd off the DREADNOUGHT WHAT

i know the 'primaris dreadnought' causes aneurysms whenever it comes up and I hate even remembering that it's a thing, but seriously, dreads are getting retired or something? I am entirely a lorefriend, this is news to me.

The box naughts have been retired a while ago. There's just the Primaris one and that weird Walker thing now, I believe.

i like the invictus suit, but ya - i don't like the primaris dreadnought

Lokarin posted...

i like the invictus suit, but ya - i don't like the primaris dreadnought

I hate that, lore wise, it just kills its user. Like, I know that it's 40K and it's grimdark but that is just plain stupid.

The primaris dreadnoughts treating honored veteran warriors into disposable batteries is what killed me. I think the model itself looks okay.

I figured my manlet marines went off on a penitent crusade and didnt come back which I suppose is a fitting end.

evilpresident posted...

The box naughts have been retired a while ago. There's just the Primaris one and that weird Walker thing now, I believe.

They really, really should've just gone with "hey we have new bigger models now". Primaris are, at best, awkward within the lore and on the tabletop.

Primaris dreads just make no sense. The whole point is that they're crippled torso-nuggets in a box. Any prim is going to fit in any dreadnought, dreads are huge, and if they somehow don't fit, just chop off the legs they aren't using and probably don't have.

evilpresident posted...

It implies that the girl Custodes is a Daemon of Tzeentch. The three eyes and blue glow are kinda his thing, his followers and Daemons tend to have asymmetrical mutations and blue to purple tones.

Tzeentch is a Chaos God of change. He likes when things happen. He doesn't really have a grand plan, cause as long as things change, he is happy.

Basically implying that girl Custodes are daemons, which sounds about right for certain WH40K fans.

Ah, gotcha, I still feel like it still proves my point in that they could come up with an explanation easily enough that would undercut any hint of valid criticism.

Guide posted...

They really, really should've just gone with "hey we have new bigger models now". Primaris are, at best, awkward within the lore and on the tabletop.

And that's exactly what they did with Chaos, Eldar, etc. they just made them bigger without changing the profile. It's just a stupid cash grab. Just like how now your AoS Stormcast have old armor that doesn't work anymore so you need to buy new ones. And I love Stormcast both from a design and lore perspective, but the armor lore is such a blatant excuse to just keep making new models to replace your current ones.

deoxxys posted...

, plenty of factions are mixed there's whole factions with exclusively females (ex: Sisters of Battle).

Knowing nothing about 40k. Why do I have a feeling that the "Sisters of battle" have giant boob armor.

evilpresident posted...

Slaanesh... well, who knows what they're up to.

Primaris are no tougher against Slaander because their dicks are larger in proportion with their bodies, which is the conduit with which Slaanesh corrupts.

Though really, I'm pretty sure all augmented units aren't going to have any balls at all. Maybe Slaan's dedicated get donation grafts from local wildlife.

Maze_ posted...

Knowing nothing about 40k. Why do I have a feeling that the "Sisters of battle" have giant boob armor.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/5/5dc5e889.jpg

ssjevot posted...

And that's exactly what they did with Chaos, Eldar, etc. they just made them bigger without changing the profile. It's just a stupid cash grab. Just like how now your AoS Stormcast have old armor that doesn't work anymore so you need to buy new ones. And I love Stormcast both from a design and lore perspective, but the armor lore is such a blatant excuse to just keep making new models to replace your current ones.

They're going to end up with the classic mistake of trying to broaden appeal by diluting the core appeal. Just look at the mess being made of MTG.

ssjevot posted...

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/5/5dc5e889.jpg

I am still amused at how the boob armor is still more practical than the massive fucking pauldrons on standard marine units. 90 degrees of vision, limited joint mobility. A thing of beauty.

Guide posted...

I am still amused at how the boob armor is still more practical than the massive fucking pauldrons on standard marine units. 90 degrees of vision, limited joint mobility. A thing of beauty.

Yeah honestly that boob armor really isn't bad.

I was picturing way worse in my head.

Especially if this was designed in the 90s

Maze_ posted...

Yeah honestly that boob armor really isn't bad.

I was picturing way worse in my head.

Especially if this was designed in the 90s

Those are the modern sculpts. Here is the original ones from 1997:
https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/d/d27ecd7c.jpg

ScazarMeltex posted...

Who fucking cares?

That's a hypocritical comment. It goes either way. Somebody cared to get it changed.

Maze_ posted...

Yeah honestly that boob armor really isn't bad.

I was picturing way worse in my head.

Especially if this was designed in the 90s

The bulkiness is a big part of the aesthetic. There are space elves for silly, more overly sexual stuff, I'm glad our girls can get some nice bulky armor.

Guide posted...

I am still amused at how the boob armor is still more practical than the massive fucking pauldrons on standard marine units. 90 degrees of vision, limited joint mobility. A thing of beauty.

In the 40k universe, all the vital organs are located in the shoulders.

Enclave posted...

Ah, gotcha, I still feel like it still proves my point in that they could come up with an explanation easily enough that would undercut any hint of valid criticism.

Eh, 40k fans would find a way to bitch regardless.

What's a custodian? My brother is into Warhammer and he never explained this to me...

DementedDurian posted...

What's a custodian? My brother is into Warhammer and he never explained this to me...

Basically royal guard equivalent. Elite of the elite of the elite.

Enclave posted...

Their mistake wasn't making female Custodes, their mistake was saying there's always been female Custodes when there's apparently lore that directly refutes that.

All they had to do was come up with some new bit of lore about how there's now female Custodes but they took the more lazy way out. Not that I particularly care, I play Orks and don't care too much about 40k lore in general.

I'm by no means a Warhammer 40k fan. Never painted a model, never played the table top game, and I have barely any experience with the video games. This, to me, seems to be the crux of the issue. The lore up until now from my understanding (outside looking in) doesn't support their existence and the proclamation on twitter that they've always existed is lazy and boarder line gaslighting to lore aficionados of the universe. Instead it really seems like they were trying to easily and quickly meet some kind of ESG requirement to get the Black Rock investment that they got. Ultimately this is something for the 40k fan base to sort out, retcons apparently are common in this universe so I have no baseline on how significant this one is by comparison.

Now to opine on a more general level, the reaction to this news has been very interesting from an outside perspective. I've seen perspectives imply that 40k needs to the excise the "facists" from its fan base who don't support this change which is a very interesting take. Like a lot of nerd fandoms that have gone mainstream over the last 10+ years I've seen it proclaimed that a given fandom is unwelcoming and not inclusive enough and therefore the fandom needs to change to be more so. My question is why should a fandom change to suit outsiders to that fandom? Why is it whenever something becomes more mainstream that the original fans who built it up over the years are now the unwelcome ones that are expected to change or be excised? It's a kind of cultural colonialism that I think needs to be pushed back on. The long time fans honestly are the ones that made sure the fandom even existed long enough to become mainstream in the first place, these fans should be celebrated, not scorned for the commitment to their fandom. Fan bases should be welcoming to new comers but those new comers should be mindful of why it is they wanted into that fan base in the first place. If they only want in so that they can twist it to suit them then they should be made to feel unwelcome because they never really wanted to contribute anything meaningful the fandom in the first place.

TL;DR: OG fans should be celebrated and new comers should be welcomed. Gatekeeping is good though if it keeps out people who don't actually care about the fandom that they are joining and just want to use it as another culture war battleground.

Enclave posted...

Ah, gotcha, I still feel like it still proves my point in that they could come up with an explanation easily enough that would undercut any hint of valid criticism.

They could have, instead they pretty much spit on their fanbase. If they absolutely had to have a female custodian(s) - they should have been a a very small faction with nothing to do with the Emperor. Make it some splintered off faction that stole tech and is trying to replicate the process on females for their own uprising or something. The Custodians are the Emperors pet project, and they were always male.

It's messed up that they are trying to silence people, and getting people banned.

SolidxSnake posted...

They could have, instead they pretty much spit on their fanbase. If they absolutely had to have a female custodian(s) - they should have been a a very small faction with nothing to do with the Emperor. Make it some splintered off faction that stole tech and is trying to replicate the process on females for their own uprising or something. The Custodians are the Emperors pet project, and they were always male.

It's messed up that they are trying to silence people, and getting people banned.

It's their lore, they are allowed to change it when ever they want for any reason.

Deegs posted...

I'm by no means a Warhammer 40k fan. Never painted a model, never played the table top game, and I have barely any experience with the video games. This, to me, seems to be the crux of the issue. The lore up until now from my understanding (outside looking in) doesn't support their existence and the proclamation on twitter that they've always existed is lazy and boarder line gaslighting to lore aficionados of the universe. Instead it really seems like they were trying to easily and quickly meet some kind of ESG requirement to get the Black Rock investment that they got. Ultimately this is something for the 40k fan base to sort out, retcons apparently are common in this universe so I have no baseline on how significant this one is by comparison.

Now to opine on a more general level, the reaction to this news has been very interesting from an outside perspective. I've seen perspectives imply that 40k needs to the excise the "facists" from its fan base who don't support this change which is a very interesting take. Like a lot of nerd fandoms that have gone mainstream over the last 10+ years I've seen it proclaimed that a given fandom is unwelcoming and not inclusive enough and therefore the fandom needs to change to be more so. My question is why should a fandom change to suit outsiders to that fandom? Why is it whenever something becomes more mainstream that the original fans who built it up over the years are now the unwelcome ones that are expected to change or be excised? It's a kind of cultural colonialism that I think needs to be pushed back on. The long time fans honestly are the ones that made sure the fandom even existed long enough to become mainstream in the first place, these fans should be celebrated, not scorned for the commitment to their fandom. Fan bases should be welcoming to new comers but those new comers should be mindful of why it is they wanted into that fan base in the first place. If they only want in so that they can twist it to suit them then they should be made to feel unwelcome because they never really wanted to contribute anything meaningful the fandom in the first place.

TL;DR: OG fans should be celebrated and new comers should be welcomed. Gatekeeping is good though if it keeps out people who don't actually care about the fandom that they are joining and just want to use it as another culture war battleground.

I like how you put fascists in quotes there. It tells me you know absolutely nothing about the community. It is absolutely rife with hardcore dyed in the wool fascists. So much so that players and even the company have been complaining about it for years. To the point where games workshop has even published articles about it.
https://www.warhammer-community.com/2021/11/19/the-imperium-is-driven-by-hate-warhammer-is-not/

One of the biggest youtubers in the 40k lore fandom is a dude named Arch. He's one of the dudes who was involved in petitioning games workshop "to keep politics out of warhammer 40k". Several conversations from his discord got leaked and lo and behold they were filled with slurs and shit hating on various minority groups. Also a bunch of shit praising fascist politics and regimes.

These aren't all of the fans, it's not even most of the fans, but they are there, and they are loud, and they do everything they can to gatekeep the community and make it uncomfortable for people not white and male to be in it.

Again, as has been pointed out, GW has always retconned their lore when it suits them. That's all this is, the difference is this time they are doing it in a way that triggers the chuds.

Necrons used to be Chaos Androids. Just had the Chaos Sigil stamped on their forehead.

creativerealms posted...

It's their lore, they are allowed to change it when ever they want for any reason.

Just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. Especially when you're essentially doing it for ESG money & to appease Amazon.

I say they should have just made 1 or 2 female custodians, just to make them stand out how special they are.

evilpresident posted...

Necrons used to be Chaos Androids. Just had the Chaos Sigil stamped on their forehead.

Nids used to be space dinos!

ScazarMeltex posted...

I like how you put fascists in quotes there. It tells me you know absolutely nothing about the community. It is absolutely rife with hardcore dyed in the wool fascists. So much so that players and even the company have been complaining about it for years. To the point where games workshop has even published articles about it.
https://www.warhammer-community.com/2021/11/19/the-imperium-is-driven-by-hate-warhammer-is-not/

One of the biggest youtubers in the 40k lore fandom is a dude named Arch. He's one of the dudes who was involved in petitioning games workshop "to keep politics out of warhammer 40k". Several conversations from his discord got leaked and lo and behold they were filled with slurs and shit hating on various minority groups. Also a bunch of shit praising fascist politics and regimes.

These aren't all of the fans, it's not even most of the fans, but they are there, and they are loud, and they do everything they can to gatekeep the community and make it uncomfortable for people not white and male to be in it.

Again, as has been pointed out, GW has always retconned their lore when it suits them. That's all this is, the difference is this time they are doing it in a way that triggers the chuds.

I put fascist in quotes because people have been using it so loosely these days it's becoming meaningless. You're right I know nothing about the 40k community but I'm always going to be skeptical of anyone using that term unironically.

Deegs posted...

people have been using it so loosely these days it's becoming meaningless.

examples.

luigi33 posted...

examples.

We'd be getting way off topic by diving into this but my area's municipal elections devolved into this recently. Candidates for school board positions were getting called fascists but when challenged nothing could be pointed to that would make the branding accurate.

Deegs posted...

I put fascist in quotes because people have been using it so loosely these days it's becoming meaningless. You're right I know nothing about the 40k community but I'm always going to be skeptical of anyone using that term unironically.

So yeah, because you don't know what the fuck you are talking about.

GW gaslighting their fanbase really set it off. I don't really blame them as this has been something discussed forever and has actual lore discussing it. They already had plenty of avenue for female representation which were counter parts to said Cutodes. GW should have just started with female Space Marines(which the Sister's of Battle already are) if they were really that hung up on doing it.

For those who don't know Space Marines are essentially the poster child for this franchise. Similar to Master Chief, they go thru a grueling biological and technology enhancement to create them. Over the last few years, a new method of creating these "Super Soldiers" was introduced. The new process(Primaris) could've easily been used to explain the creation of female Space Marines, as it was seen as both an improvement and heresy.

Please note Women are apart every other role but this one. Every species with gender,(that's how diverse the universe is) has pretty equal representation. Not only this, but there are female only factions within this race. I don't have much of a dog in this fight, but don't see it necessary. I know the argument will be, "representation", but again the universe is jam packed with representation.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=99tOSmaNSJg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0yMN9H9NbY
https://youtu.be/JCU5Ktx_E5w?t=949
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j82C8Uo8JwU *Spoiler*
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXyyYZt1sGA

ScazarMeltex posted...

So yeah, because you don't know what the fuck you are talking about.

So educate me then and bring me up to speed? Not sorry for refusing to just take people I don't know at their word without evidence.

Are people genuinely that outraged about this though? Games Workshop does something that draws criticism like every other day. The people making youtube videos about it are going to make videos about all of those things because that's what get them views.

I do get that there might be some valid criticism about this specifically, but I honestly just don't see why anyone would care. 40k is such an old and bloated franchise that you can pick out millions of things to be bothered by.

GeneralKenobi85 posted...

Are people genuinely that outraged about this though? Games Workshop does something that draws criticism like every other day. The people making youtube videos about it are going to make videos about all of those things because that's what get them views.

I do get that there might be some valid criticism about this specifically, but I honestly just don't see why anyone would care. 40k is such an old and bloated franchise that you can pick out millions of things to be bothered by.

This is tough to say at the moment. As with any of this stuff there are people looking to capitalize on the outrage as a "culture war" battleground but I'm sure there are genuine players who are upset. Warhammer appears to be rife with inconsistencies and retcons in its lore though.

GeneralKenobi85 posted...

Are people genuinely that outraged about this though? Games Workshop does something that draws criticism like every other day. The people making youtube videos about it are going to make videos about all of those things because that's what get them views.

I do get that there might be some valid criticism about this specifically, but I honestly just don't see why anyone would care. 40k is such an old and bloated franchise that you can pick out millions of things to be bothered by.

Sections of the community were outraged at GWs Warhammer is for everyone statement a few years back, so Im sure they are.

GeneralKenobi85 posted...

Are people genuinely that outraged about this though? Games Workshop does something that draws criticism like every other day. The people making youtube videos about it are going to make videos about all of those things because that's what get them views.

I do get that there might be some valid criticism about this specifically, but I honestly just don't see why anyone would care. 40k is such an old and bloated franchise that you can pick out millions of things to be bothered by.

I would imagine some custodes players would be bothered by their lore being changed, but honestly since Im not a custodes player nor do I know of any custodes players its not a big deal to me.

Everyone who plays a specific faction is going to be a bit angry when something about what they played gets changed. Primaris and muh spiritual liege were the big ones for SM, the Necrons overhaul changing the lore from killer robots with space gods to Tomb Kings in Spaaaace with pokemon gods, squats being turned into a faction

Its just a case of they changed it, now it sucks, but now its a more visible issue because politics are involved.

I guess GW just doesnt care about the people actually buying their products if this pissed them off. Have no dog in this fight so it does not matter to me.

Deegs posted...

I put fascist in quotes because people have been using it so loosely these days it's becoming meaningless.

Explain.

Deegs posted...

We'd be getting way off topic by diving into this but my area's municipal elections devolved into this recently. Candidates for school board positions were getting called fascists but when challenged nothing could be pointed to that would make the branding accurate.

Ok but do you know whay project 2025 or whatever it is called is?

Fascism is a real threat at the moment.
There is even a video of one of the guys saying down with democracy.

I don't know anything about Warhammer but I'm glad women are able to finally get paid for cleaning in that universe now

WingsOfGood posted...

Ok but do you know whay project 2025 or whatever it is called is?

Fascism is a real threat at the moment.
There is even a video of one of the guys saying down with democracy.

Not familiar with it. Found the website but looks like a 400 page book or something with, in its language, conservative policy proposals. Guess I'll read up on what it contains.

Edit: Looks to some Heritage Foundation funded thing. They aren't fascists. Definitely conservative but not fascists though. Unless your implication is that conservatives = fascists which I disagree with.

I only care about Chaos and we already have our share of 'woke' with Slaanesh undoubtedly mass triggering all chuds lol. Fantasy Battle was the best version of Warhammer anyway.

Deegs posted...

So educate me then and bring me up to speed? Not sorry for refusing to just take people I don't know at their word without evidence.

I literally already did. Hell I posted the article the games workshop put out as a statement that the game has a fascist problem and they aren't welcome. It's not my fault you didn't read it.

Deegs posted...

Unless your implication is that conservatives = fascists which I disagree with.

I think his implication for a call to end democracy and install a singular dictator is fascism.

Hard to say, really, as that just sounds like normal conservatism to me as well.