Warhammer 40K fans were shocked by a recent Custodes codex reveal
One point-of-view piece has ignited a social media frenzy
www.polygon.com
The faction was originally depicted as being exclusively male. After the Emperor united the warring factions of Earth under the Imperium's banner over 10,000 years ago, he began a tradition where the noble houses would give up their firstborn infant sons to become material to make Custodes.
But the most recent 10th-edition codexincludes a point-of-view piece of lore from Calladayce Taurovalia Kesh, who uses she/her pronouns. Some fans wondered if this was a Sister of Silence (Custodes work hand in hand with this mysterious order of mute women with a powerful immunity to the Warp), but the official Warhammer account confirmed that she was actually a female Custodes.
Fans weren't thrilled with the reveal. "Ever since 1987, not so much as a whisper in lore or novels, or a single miniature," one fan wrote in response on X. "Now all of a sudden BOOM 'they were always a thing'. No worldbuilding or development. So disappointing and pathetic." The reveal was also discussed on 40K fan forums and subreddits, such as the meme board r/Grimdank, which maintains a "no female Space Marine" rule because it's such a heated and contentious topic in the fandom.
In light of the reveal, the mods are allowing posts on the topic for one week. The pinned post by mods reads, in part: "By then i'll consider the proverbial horse dead and truely beaten, since realistically both topics share the exact same arguments meaning they've already been answered by and from all POVs."
This raises the question of whether this is a retcon — one that goes against the long-standing identity of the Custodes — or whether it's just aligning the lore with ideas from creatives involved with the franchise. Warhammer is no stranger to retcons; a core concept of the setting is that players are piecing together a subjective truth from biased documents and historical events.
The social media furor currently unfolding suggests that female Custodes are a big deal, but it's actually a relatively minor change, especially compared to the other changes Custodes have seen recently. For example, they're now leaving Terra, trekking out into real space alongside Roboute Guilliman and the armies of the Imperium. Games Workshop also hands out retcons regularly, like the change to the Necrons that turned them from mysterious Terminators to fully fleshed-out characters dealing with politics and power struggles.
Change can be good, and the Custodes still retain all the moral ambiguity and lore from their previous iterations. Some fans will simply be delighted at the possibility of a 10-foot-tall woman who could crush the enemies of mankind — and I think that's beautiful.
