Now before this thread gets derailed right from the start, let me begin by saying I play the golden bananaboys myself and I love their models and their lore.
Alright, as described in the Codex the Adeptus Custodes are unique in the Imperium of mankind, in that they have the opportunity and the luxury to be individualists. They can form their own opinion, as opposed to most other indoctrinated members of the imperium of man, like space marines for example. They are also technically not part of the imperium, so they are not really bound by any laws. They basically take orders from no one, since the only person who can actually order them around, sits on the golden throne.
To summarize: we have a legion of warrior-scholars, who not only train their martial prowess, but also have to study philosophy, science, religion etc, they are not bound by any imperial law and we know that their word carries tremendous weight, since they are the emperors companions.
So why do I think they are hypocrites? Well, let my quote directly from the codex: "The Emperpr's realm is a festering ruin of overcrowded worlds drowning in their own ignorance and fear. ...They do not deserve their Emperor. They do not deserve us...." Telchor, Custodian Guard. (p. 72)
Now since we know the custodes are all individualists and unique, this opinion may vary from Custodian to Custodian, however we know that they have not been active politically or in a guiding leadership role since the heresy because of the edict where Guilliman and the Captain General agreed that the Custodes should only guard the emperor and are functionally not a part of the imperium anymore (I know they have done stuff since the heresy, but the important part for me now is the political one). BUT they are under not obligation to uphold this edict, since we have established before the Custodes answer to the emperor and to the emperor alone.
So where am I getting with this? In the quote I gave as an example and in various black library publications different Custodians lament the state of the Imperium in the 41st milennium. They are not happy at the direction this vast empire has taken and how far it has strayed from the emperors vision....and that it why I think they are hypocrites. They could have done something. As I've already said their word carries tremendous weight and they are not as clouded by fanaticism and religious zeal as most other members of the imperium, so they could have helped to shape the imperium for the better since the heresy, but they didn't. I am not saying that they should have led the imperium, but I think they could have influenced things for the better even if they only had acted as more active advisers and use their authority to veto bad decisions.
Let me end this by saying that I think this is a good thing. Simply because the custodes are almost too perfect for the grimdarkness of 40k in my opinion. They are perfect warriors, scholars, and are not psychologically indoctrinated murdermachines with the single purpose to purge xenos and heretics like the space marines, which would make them sorta boring...they would have no real flaws. So them being sort of hypocritical and kind of arrogant in this regard, helps to keep them interesting, at least to me.
I just realized how lucky and wonderful they are just by having...their own will and thoughts. Thinking that even the most impressive warriors mankind and the galaxy ever produced, the Space Marines, can't even really think by themselves, is kinda sad.
godardc wrote: I just realized how lucky and wonderful they are just by having...their own will and thoughts. Thinking that even the most impressive warriors mankind and the galaxy ever produced, the Space Marines, can't even really think by themselves, is kinda sad.
Well I do think space marines could think for themselves if you would let them, but since they are massively indoctrinated, they don't really have that opportunity. And if one space marine were to turn out a free thinker the chaplain of that chapter would probably take him aside and beat the critical thoughts out of him.
The only exception to this as far as Astartes are concerned are the space wolves in my opinion....they are the only (or one of the only) chapters who place more value on individualism and common sense.
But yes, in 40k being a member of the Legio Custodes means you're really lucky.
Edit: one last thing regarding the Custodes: we know from the codex that, when the emperor was still around, he expected his Custodes to be able to converse with him and maybe even challenge his ideas, which is a unique concept in 40k all by itself for most factions.
But one could argue that the Custodes might not have a completely free will. We do not know this I think, but I believe the Emperor designed and built the Custodes in a way where it was virtually impossible for them to betray him or be corrupted by the chaos forces. So they do not choose to follow the emperor with everything they've got, it was built into them....they have no choice in the matter, at least I think so.
godardc wrote: I just realized how lucky and wonderful they are just by having...their own will and thoughts. Thinking that even the most impressive warriors mankind and the galaxy ever produced, the Space Marines, can't even really think by themselves, is kinda sad.
You see will and conciousness are funny things.
Take their indoctrination for exemple which applies all knowledge to a marine including behavioural patterns mostlikely either directly or indirectly.
You would still however apply them under cogito ergo sum.
As in they still have selfawareness and a will to act on their own.
Compare that to a servitor which in most cases has none.
However Philosophy has multiple schools on conciousness and how it interacts.
Some go so far as to state we have no influence on the World with our will regardless and that all things and actions are predetermined.
Others say that the will and mind is bound within it's own sphere.
Depending on your position a normal human has no will no free will or just free will and free will and power to act.
We do have mandatory philosophy classes in high school in France and do remember an allegory: if you throw a rock in the sky, and it suddenly became alive, would he thinking he is flying because he wants it ? Will he be able to understand his path was given to him by the hand that threw him ?
Tiberias wrote: Let me end this by saying that I think this is a good thing. Simply because the custodes are almost too perfect for the grimdarkness of 40k in my opinion. They are perfect warriors, scholars, and are not psychologically indoctrinated murdermachines with the single purpose to purge xenos and heretics like the space marines, which would make them sorta boring...they would have no real flaws. So them being sort of hypocritical and kind of arrogant in this regard, helps to keep them interesting, at least to me.
The Custodes have already failed, their time is done. Their job was to protect the emperor, and they failed and he is dead. They really serve no purpose, except as a fragment of what could have been and as more bodies for the galactic grinder. I think that is what makes them so compelling, they are quintessentially 40k. This passage is what turned 40k from a passing fancy to a serious hobby for me.
Spoiler:
We were never soldiers.
Whenever we are seen outside the walls of this place, as rare as that is, it is in
our martial aspect. We are clad in gold, just as we were in the earliest days when
He was our living captain, and mortals fall on their faces as if before gods. To
them, it must seem as if we are wrath incarnate. To them, it must seem as if we
were created for destruction and nothing else.
But we were His companions, once. We were the ones in whom He confided.
We were His counsellors, we were His artisans. We were the first glimpse at
what the species could become, if shepherded aright and unshackled from its
vicious weaknesses.
Of course, we were taught to fight. He knew that war would come. It was a
necessary part of the ascension, though it was never destined to last for eternity.
We were the guardians of a new age, and had to be strong enough to keep it
secure.
We failed in that, and now wear the mark of that failure in the black robes that
cover our auramite. It is a permanent reminder, replacing the cloaks of blood-red
that once adorned our battleplate. It weighs heavy with every one of us, for we
know more of the nature of the fall than most. We still recite the old stories, and
we study in the lost archives where we alone are suffered to tread, and so do not
have the comforting illusions of ignorance to salve the wound. In a galaxy
defined by ignorance, we remember. We cultivate the shards of the thing that
was broken, and remain aware of what would have been.
I think sometimes that this knowledge is the most severe of our many burdens.
Any brutal soul may fight if he has the goal ahead of him. We fight knowing that
our truest purpose lies behind us, and all that remains is faithfulness to an
extinguished vision.
But still we preserve. We tend the things of value that have survived. We seek
to embody His will in all things. We cleave to His light as the darkness gathers.
We interpret, we study, we delve into the philosophy of the ages.
We have many duties. But that is just as it should be, for we are not simple
creations. The aeons have changed us in many ways, but not in that.
We were a thousand things to a thousand souls, but we were never soldiers.
What are they to do? Fighting back is a fool's errand. Nothing they can do will ever fix the imperium, return it to what could have been. How could they secure webway without the Emperor or an equivalent psyker? How can they fully separate humanity, even a part of humanity, from the warp? All they can do is slow down their death.
The Custodes are humanity perfected, in their minds they are the baseline normal human and everyone else is a deviant. It is no wonder they regard us humans as we regard monkeys, subhuman. On top of that, imagine if you lived on top of a veritable continent of monkeys, one of only a few thousand humans surrounded by trillions of savages. It speaks to their foritude that they haven't tried to kill us all. Now imagine that the monkeys are constantly, intentionally fething up and summoning deamons or otherwise courting the dark gods. No human is immune to the temptations of the warp given the right circumstances, but at the same time one must intentionally fall to chaos. As a result, every human is capable of intentionally and consciously embracing chaos (philosophy side note here: even if humans did not want to join chaos but did, no matter how you define want, then that only shows that they lack control over their own emotions and power, which is not any better than being prone to corruption from the beginning). Custodes are not, or at least orders of magnitude less likely to do the same. Now why are Custodes so critical of the conditions of imperial citizens? Humans deserve the galaxy they live in since they created it. Well the Astartes created it, but Custodes see Astartes as slightly better than a normal human at best and an evolutionary dead-end at worst.
I am glad to see that Custodes are doing some stuff now. I don't like old lore where they stayed in the imperial palace all this time. I hope GW quietly retcons it to where Custodes were doing some stuff for the past 10,000 years, but only with the battle at the lion's gate did they decide to take a more active role. I don't think GW knew how popular Custodes would be until Alfabusa released TTS, so never thought of them as a faction any more significant than the Hrud.
godardc wrote: I just realized how lucky and wonderful they are just by having...their own will and thoughts. Thinking that even the most impressive warriors mankind and the galaxy ever produced, the Space Marines, can't even really think by themselves, is kinda sad.
Well I do think space marines could think for themselves if you would let them, but since they are massively indoctrinated, they don't really have that opportunity. And if one space marine were to turn out a free thinker the chaplain of that chapter would probably take him aside and beat the critical thoughts out of him.
The only exception to this as far as Astartes are concerned are the space wolves in my opinion....they are the only (or one of the only) chapters who place more value on individualism and common sense.
But yes, in 40k being a member of the Legio Custodes means you're really lucky.
Edit: one last thing regarding the Custodes: we know from the codex that, when the emperor was still around, he expected his Custodes to be able to converse with him and maybe even challenge his ideas, which is a unique concept in 40k all by itself for most factions.
But one could argue that the Custodes might not have a completely free will. We do not know this I think, but I believe the Emperor designed and built the Custodes in a way where it was virtually impossible for them to betray him or be corrupted by the chaos forces. So they do not choose to follow the emperor with everything they've got, it was built into them....they have no choice in the matter, at least I think so.
BrianDavion wrote: there's actually a lot of evidance custodes hold the astartes in partiuclar contempt
They hold the GK and primarchs in contempt, or some other negative emotion. I don't think they have any more contempt towards normal Astartes than they do towards normal humans. In MoM a Custodian was able to have a conversation with a BA, for a while. That's better than the interaction he had with some children, almost killing them.
Tiberias wrote: Let me end this by saying that I think this is a good thing. Simply because the custodes are almost too perfect for the grimdarkness of 40k in my opinion. They are perfect warriors, scholars, and are not psychologically indoctrinated murdermachines with the single purpose to purge xenos and heretics like the space marines, which would make them sorta boring...they would have no real flaws. So them being sort of hypocritical and kind of arrogant in this regard, helps to keep them interesting, at least to me.
The Custodes have already failed, their time is done. Their job was to protect the emperor, and they failed and he is dead. They really serve no purpose, except as a fragment of what could have been and as more bodies for the galactic grinder. I think that is what makes them so compelling, they are quintessentially 40k. This passage is what turned 40k from a passing fancy to a serious hobby for me.
Spoiler:
We were never soldiers.
Whenever we are seen outside the walls of this place, as rare as that is, it is in
our martial aspect. We are clad in gold, just as we were in the earliest days when
He was our living captain, and mortals fall on their faces as if before gods. To
them, it must seem as if we are wrath incarnate. To them, it must seem as if we
were created for destruction and nothing else.
But we were His companions, once. We were the ones in whom He confided.
We were His counsellors, we were His artisans. We were the first glimpse at
what the species could become, if shepherded aright and unshackled from its
vicious weaknesses.
Of course, we were taught to fight. He knew that war would come. It was a
necessary part of the ascension, though it was never destined to last for eternity.
We were the guardians of a new age, and had to be strong enough to keep it
secure.
We failed in that, and now wear the mark of that failure in the black robes that
cover our auramite. It is a permanent reminder, replacing the cloaks of blood-red
that once adorned our battleplate. It weighs heavy with every one of us, for we
know more of the nature of the fall than most. We still recite the old stories, and
we study in the lost archives where we alone are suffered to tread, and so do not
have the comforting illusions of ignorance to salve the wound. In a galaxy
defined by ignorance, we remember. We cultivate the shards of the thing that
was broken, and remain aware of what would have been.
I think sometimes that this knowledge is the most severe of our many burdens.
Any brutal soul may fight if he has the goal ahead of him. We fight knowing that
our truest purpose lies behind us, and all that remains is faithfulness to an
extinguished vision.
But still we preserve. We tend the things of value that have survived. We seek
to embody His will in all things. We cleave to His light as the darkness gathers.
We interpret, we study, we delve into the philosophy of the ages.
We have many duties. But that is just as it should be, for we are not simple
creations. The aeons have changed us in many ways, but not in that.
We were a thousand things to a thousand souls, but we were never soldiers.
What are they to do? Fighting back is a fool's errand. Nothing they can do will ever fix the imperium, return it to what could have been. How could they secure webway without the Emperor or an equivalent psyker? How can they fully separate humanity, even a part of humanity, from the warp? All they can do is slow down their death.
The Custodes are humanity perfected, in their minds they are the baseline normal human and everyone else is a deviant. It is no wonder they regard us humans as we regard monkeys, subhuman. On top of that, imagine if you lived on top of a veritable continent of monkeys, one of only a few thousand humans surrounded by trillions of savages. It speaks to their foritude that they haven't tried to kill us all. Now imagine that the monkeys are constantly, intentionally fething up and summoning deamons or otherwise courting the dark gods. No human is immune to the temptations of the warp given the right circumstances, but at the same time one must intentionally fall to chaos. As a result, every human is capable of intentionally and consciously embracing chaos (philosophy side note here: even if humans did not want to join chaos but did, no matter how you define want, then that only shows that they lack control over their own emotions and power, which is not any better than being prone to corruption from the beginning). Custodes are not, or at least orders of magnitude less likely to do the same. Now why are Custodes so critical of the conditions of imperial citizens? Humans deserve the galaxy they live in since they created it. Well the Astartes created it, but Custodes see Astartes as slightly better than a normal human at best and an evolutionary dead-end at worst.
I am glad to see that Custodes are doing some stuff now. I don't like old lore where they stayed in the imperial palace all this time. I hope GW quietly retcons it to where Custodes were doing some stuff for the past 10,000 years, but only with the battle at the lion's gate did they decide to take a more active role. I don't think GW knew how popular Custodes would be until Alfabusa released TTS, so never thought of them as a faction any more significant than the Hrud.
I get your point, but we all know that the Custodes failed their sworn duty, that was not my main point. My main point was that they lament the state of the imperium, but did nothing since the heresy to shape it for the better. And no of course they cant change it by the power of their military force, they are only 10000. But as I said, had they acted as advisers, they could have helped to prevent the clusterfeth that is the Imperium in 40k at least to some extent....at least in my opinion.
I mean say what you will about Guilliman, but hey immediatly tried to do his best to turn things around for the imperium as soon as he woke up....the Custodes needed a wake up call from him. (again I KNOW that the Custodes did stuff since the heresy, but they did not lead in a political sense, which was my point)
godardc wrote: I just realized how lucky and wonderful they are just by having...their own will and thoughts. Thinking that even the most impressive warriors mankind and the galaxy ever produced, the Space Marines, can't even really think by themselves, is kinda sad.
Well I do think space marines could think for themselves if you would let them, but since they are massively indoctrinated, they don't really have that opportunity. And if one space marine were to turn out a free thinker the chaplain of that chapter would probably take him aside and beat the critical thoughts out of him.
The only exception to this as far as Astartes are concerned are the space wolves in my opinion....they are the only (or one of the only) chapters who place more value on individualism and common sense.
But yes, in 40k being a member of the Legio Custodes means you're really lucky.
Edit: one last thing regarding the Custodes: we know from the codex that, when the emperor was still around, he expected his Custodes to be able to converse with him and maybe even challenge his ideas, which is a unique concept in 40k all by itself for most factions.
But one could argue that the Custodes might not have a completely free will. We do not know this I think, but I believe the Emperor designed and built the Custodes in a way where it was virtually impossible for them to betray him or be corrupted by the chaos forces. So they do not choose to follow the emperor with everything they've got, it was built into them....they have no choice in the matter, at least I think so.
>Space Wolves
>Common Sense
Pick one
The Space Wolves in 40k under Logan Grimnar display more compassion and common sense than many other chapters. There is a good example in "The emperors gift" from Aaron Dembsky-Bowden, where the Space Wolves try to prevent the genocide of those soldiers who fought valiantly along side them on Armageddon by the hands of the inquisition. Generally they do not give a gak what the inquisition or the ecclesiarchy says, they also don't really give a gak about the Codex Astartes, which further emphasises that they are very much capable of critical thinking towards the machinachions of the imperium.
30k Space Wolves under Leman Russ can be stubborn, simple minded douchebags, but this thread is not about Space Wolves so let's leave it at that.
godardc wrote: We do have mandatory philosophy classes in high school in France and do remember an allegory: if you throw a rock in the sky, and it suddenly became alive, would he thinking he is flying because he wants it ? Will he be able to understand his path was given to him by the hand that threw him ?
Pretty much.
Is the existence of free will even possible.
Is probably one of the oldest questions in Philosophy.
godardc wrote: We do have mandatory philosophy classes in high school in France and do remember an allegory: if you throw a rock in the sky, and it suddenly became alive, would he thinking he is flying because he wants it ? Will he be able to understand his path was given to him by the hand that threw him ?
Pretty much.
Is the existence of free will even possible.
Is probably one of the oldest questions in Philosophy.
Though fascinating, I don't think we will solve the philosophical issue of free will in this tread.
Another thing I might need to correct from my OP is this: I said the word of a Custodian carries tremendous weight and therefore they could have acted as advisors more actively in the time following the heresy. This was surely the case during the heresy and shortly after, but I think we actually do not know if their word still carries the same weight in 40k. I mean they have been rather inactive politically for 10000 years, they might just be a distant memory for most members of the imperium who are not directly from terra or members of the inquisition.
godardc wrote: We do have mandatory philosophy classes in high school in France and do remember an allegory: if you throw a rock in the sky, and it suddenly became alive, would he thinking he is flying because he wants it ? Will he be able to understand his path was given to him by the hand that threw him ?
Pretty much.
Is the existence of free will even possible.
Is probably one of the oldest questions in Philosophy.
Though fascinating, I don't think we will solve the philosophical issue of free will in this tread.
Another thing I might need to correct from my OP is this: I said the word of a Custodian carries tremendous weight and therefore they could have acted as advisors more actively in the time following the heresy. This was surely the case during the heresy and shortly after, but I think we actually do not know if their word still carries the same weight in 40k. I mean they have been rather inactive politically for 10000 years, they might just be a distant memory for most members of the imperium who are not directly from terra or members of the inquisition.
Yes and no, basically it depends on how their indoctrination works compared to that of a marine.
And the assumption that a marine that is indoctrinated has atleast his free will impaired.
That said, they are hypocrtis, they could've easily been usefull or sent one or two of their morons to the meetings with the highlords of terra atleast.
godardc wrote: We do have mandatory philosophy classes in high school in France and do remember an allegory: if you throw a rock in the sky, and it suddenly became alive, would he thinking he is flying because he wants it ? Will he be able to understand his path was given to him by the hand that threw him ?
Pretty much.
Is the existence of free will even possible.
Is probably one of the oldest questions in Philosophy.
No, true free will does not exist, at least not in humans. We can consciously restrain and steer our instincts and impulses up to a certain degree to exhibit proper behaviour given the (social) context you find yourself in but that doesn't equal true free will.
Tiberias wrote: Let me end this by saying that I think this is a good thing. Simply because the custodes are almost too perfect for the grimdarkness of 40k in my opinion. They are perfect warriors, scholars, and are not psychologically indoctrinated murdermachines with the single purpose to purge xenos and heretics like the space marines, which would make them sorta boring...they would have no real flaws. So them being sort of hypocritical and kind of arrogant in this regard, helps to keep them interesting, at least to me.
The Custodes have already failed, their time is done. Their job was to protect the emperor, and they failed and he is dead. They really serve no purpose, except as a fragment of what could have been and as more bodies for the galactic grinder. I think that is what makes them so compelling, they are quintessentially 40k. This passage is what turned 40k from a passing fancy to a serious hobby for me.
Spoiler:
We were never soldiers. Whenever we are seen outside the walls of this place, as rare as that is, it is in our martial aspect. We are clad in gold, just as we were in the earliest days when He was our living captain, and mortals fall on their faces as if before gods. To them, it must seem as if we are wrath incarnate. To them, it must seem as if we were created for destruction and nothing else. But we were His companions, once. We were the ones in whom He confided. We were His counsellors, we were His artisans. We were the first glimpse at what the species could become, if shepherded aright and unshackled from its vicious weaknesses. Of course, we were taught to fight. He knew that war would come. It was a necessary part of the ascension, though it was never destined to last for eternity. We were the guardians of a new age, and had to be strong enough to keep it secure. We failed in that, and now wear the mark of that failure in the black robes that cover our auramite. It is a permanent reminder, replacing the cloaks of blood-red that once adorned our battleplate. It weighs heavy with every one of us, for we know more of the nature of the fall than most. We still recite the old stories, and we study in the lost archives where we alone are suffered to tread, and so do not have the comforting illusions of ignorance to salve the wound. In a galaxy defined by ignorance, we remember. We cultivate the shards of the thing that was broken, and remain aware of what would have been. I think sometimes that this knowledge is the most severe of our many burdens. Any brutal soul may fight if he has the goal ahead of him. We fight knowing that our truest purpose lies behind us, and all that remains is faithfulness to an extinguished vision. But still we preserve. We tend the things of value that have survived. We seek to embody His will in all things. We cleave to His light as the darkness gathers. We interpret, we study, we delve into the philosophy of the ages. We have many duties. But that is just as it should be, for we are not simple creations. The aeons have changed us in many ways, but not in that. We were a thousand things to a thousand souls, but we were never soldiers.
What are they to do? Fighting back is a fool's errand. Nothing they can do will ever fix the imperium, return it to what could have been. How could they secure webway without the Emperor or an equivalent psyker? How can they fully separate humanity, even a part of humanity, from the warp? All they can do is slow down their death.
The Custodes are humanity perfected, in their minds they are the baseline normal human and everyone else is a deviant. It is no wonder they regard us humans as we regard monkeys, subhuman. On top of that, imagine if you lived on top of a veritable continent of monkeys, one of only a few thousand humans surrounded by trillions of savages. It speaks to their foritude that they haven't tried to kill us all. Now imagine that the monkeys are constantly, intentionally fething up and summoning deamons or otherwise courting the dark gods. No human is immune to the temptations of the warp given the right circumstances, but at the same time one must intentionally fall to chaos. As a result, every human is capable of intentionally and consciously embracing chaos (philosophy side note here: even if humans did not want to join chaos but did, no matter how you define want, then that only shows that they lack control over their own emotions and power, which is not any better than being prone to corruption from the beginning). Custodes are not, or at least orders of magnitude less likely to do the same. Now why are Custodes so critical of the conditions of imperial citizens? Humans deserve the galaxy they live in since they created it. Well the Astartes created it, but Custodes see Astartes as slightly better than a normal human at best and an evolutionary dead-end at worst.
I am glad to see that Custodes are doing some stuff now. I don't like old lore where they stayed in the imperial palace all this time. I hope GW quietly retcons it to where Custodes were doing some stuff for the past 10,000 years, but only with the battle at the lion's gate did they decide to take a more active role. I don't think GW knew how popular Custodes would be until Alfabusa released TTS, so never thought of them as a faction any more significant than the Hrud.
I get your point, but we all know that the Custodes failed their sworn duty, that was not my main point. My main point was that they lament the state of the imperium, but did nothing since the heresy to shape it for the better. And no of course they cant change it by the power of their military force, they are only 10000. But as I said, had they acted as advisers, they could have helped to prevent the clusterfeth that is the Imperium in 40k at least to some extent....at least in my opinion. I mean say what you will about Guilliman, but hey immediately tried to do his best to turn things around for the imperium as soon as he woke up....the Custodes needed a wake up call from him. (again I KNOW that the Custodes did stuff since the heresy, but they did not lead in a political sense, which was my point)
What I was trying to say is that the Custodes are not mary sues, even before you get into their personal flaws.
I am skeptical about how much the Custodes could change the imperium's bureaucracy on their own. A custodian has about the same authority level as an inquisitor (that is to say, all of it), and the inquisition certainly hasn't solved much. I don't think it's a question of knowledge either. How much progress has Gulliman made in restructuring the Imperium's political structure? He can't simply do away with the ecclesiarchy. He even had to reinstate the high lords. Ultramar seems to be the only area where Gulliman can do much, and that is just 500 worlds. All he has done for the wider imperium is to tell the mechanics to stop salvaging space hulks and make new ships instead (it's more expensive but it keeps chaos away, and we don't know how well they will follow through) and he started a civil war over timekeeping. He also killed a bunch of officials on Terra, but they just got temporarily less corrupt replacements. I don't think they Custodes would be any more successful, especially since they are working with Gulliman on all of these. Even then, government has never been the biggest problem to face the Imperium. Information and resource transportation are the biggest problems (source: Watchers of the Throne), and only the Emperor has a slim chance of fixing those.
Tiberias wrote: Let me end this by saying that I think this is a good thing. Simply because the custodes are almost too perfect for the grimdarkness of 40k in my opinion. They are perfect warriors, scholars, and are not psychologically indoctrinated murdermachines with the single purpose to purge xenos and heretics like the space marines, which would make them sorta boring...they would have no real flaws. So them being sort of hypocritical and kind of arrogant in this regard, helps to keep them interesting, at least to me.
The Custodes have already failed, their time is done. Their job was to protect the emperor, and they failed and he is dead. They really serve no purpose, except as a fragment of what could have been and as more bodies for the galactic grinder. I think that is what makes them so compelling, they are quintessentially 40k. This passage is what turned 40k from a passing fancy to a serious hobby for me.
Spoiler:
We were never soldiers.
Whenever we are seen outside the walls of this place, as rare as that is, it is in
our martial aspect. We are clad in gold, just as we were in the earliest days when
He was our living captain, and mortals fall on their faces as if before gods. To
them, it must seem as if we are wrath incarnate. To them, it must seem as if we
were created for destruction and nothing else.
But we were His companions, once. We were the ones in whom He confided.
We were His counsellors, we were His artisans. We were the first glimpse at
what the species could become, if shepherded aright and unshackled from its
vicious weaknesses.
Of course, we were taught to fight. He knew that war would come. It was a
necessary part of the ascension, though it was never destined to last for eternity.
We were the guardians of a new age, and had to be strong enough to keep it
secure.
We failed in that, and now wear the mark of that failure in the black robes that
cover our auramite. It is a permanent reminder, replacing the cloaks of blood-red
that once adorned our battleplate. It weighs heavy with every one of us, for we
know more of the nature of the fall than most. We still recite the old stories, and
we study in the lost archives where we alone are suffered to tread, and so do not
have the comforting illusions of ignorance to salve the wound. In a galaxy
defined by ignorance, we remember. We cultivate the shards of the thing that
was broken, and remain aware of what would have been.
I think sometimes that this knowledge is the most severe of our many burdens.
Any brutal soul may fight if he has the goal ahead of him. We fight knowing that
our truest purpose lies behind us, and all that remains is faithfulness to an
extinguished vision.
But still we preserve. We tend the things of value that have survived. We seek
to embody His will in all things. We cleave to His light as the darkness gathers.
We interpret, we study, we delve into the philosophy of the ages.
We have many duties. But that is just as it should be, for we are not simple
creations. The aeons have changed us in many ways, but not in that.
We were a thousand things to a thousand souls, but we were never soldiers.
What are they to do? Fighting back is a fool's errand. Nothing they can do will ever fix the imperium, return it to what could have been. How could they secure webway without the Emperor or an equivalent psyker? How can they fully separate humanity, even a part of humanity, from the warp? All they can do is slow down their death.
The Custodes are humanity perfected, in their minds they are the baseline normal human and everyone else is a deviant. It is no wonder they regard us humans as we regard monkeys, subhuman. On top of that, imagine if you lived on top of a veritable continent of monkeys, one of only a few thousand humans surrounded by trillions of savages. It speaks to their foritude that they haven't tried to kill us all. Now imagine that the monkeys are constantly, intentionally fething up and summoning deamons or otherwise courting the dark gods. No human is immune to the temptations of the warp given the right circumstances, but at the same time one must intentionally fall to chaos. As a result, every human is capable of intentionally and consciously embracing chaos (philosophy side note here: even if humans did not want to join chaos but did, no matter how you define want, then that only shows that they lack control over their own emotions and power, which is not any better than being prone to corruption from the beginning). Custodes are not, or at least orders of magnitude less likely to do the same. Now why are Custodes so critical of the conditions of imperial citizens? Humans deserve the galaxy they live in since they created it. Well the Astartes created it, but Custodes see Astartes as slightly better than a normal human at best and an evolutionary dead-end at worst.
I am glad to see that Custodes are doing some stuff now. I don't like old lore where they stayed in the imperial palace all this time. I hope GW quietly retcons it to where Custodes were doing some stuff for the past 10,000 years, but only with the battle at the lion's gate did they decide to take a more active role. I don't think GW knew how popular Custodes would be until Alfabusa released TTS, so never thought of them as a faction any more significant than the Hrud.
I get your point, but we all know that the Custodes failed their sworn duty, that was not my main point. My main point was that they lament the state of the imperium, but did nothing since the heresy to shape it for the better. And no of course they cant change it by the power of their military force, they are only 10000. But as I said, had they acted as advisers, they could have helped to prevent the clusterfeth that is the Imperium in 40k at least to some extent....at least in my opinion.
I mean say what you will about Guilliman, but hey immediately tried to do his best to turn things around for the imperium as soon as he woke up....the Custodes needed a wake up call from him. (again I KNOW that the Custodes did stuff since the heresy, but they did not lead in a political sense, which was my point)
What I was trying to say is that the Custodes are not mary sues, even before you get into their personal flaws.
I am skeptical about how much the Custodes could change the imperium's bureaucracy on their own. A custodian has about the same authority level as an inquisitor (that is to say, all of it), and the inquisition certainly hasn't solved much. I don't think it's a question of knowledge either. How much progress has Gulliman made in restructuring the Imperium's political structure? He can't simply do away with the ecclesiarchy. He even had to reinstate the high lords. Ultramar seems to be the only area where Gulliman can do much, and that is just 500 worlds. All he has done for the wider imperium is to tell the mechanics to stop salvaging space hulks and make new ships instead and he started a civil war over timekeeping. He also killed a bunch of bureaucrats on Terra, but they just got temporarily less corrupt replacements. I don't think they Custodes would be any more successful, especially since they are working with Gulliman on all of these. Even then, bad government has never been the biggest problem to face the Imperium. Information and resource transportation are the biggest problems (source: Watchers of the Throne), and only the Emperor can fix those (with the webway).
I largely agree with you, changing the imperium as it is now is almost certainly doomed to fail....way too much has gone wrong since the heresy. However, and again that was my original point, had the custodes acted as leaders and advisers right after the heresy and had they continued to do so, I believe they could have made a difference.
Also it's not that important for this discussion, but I would argue that a custodian has a bit more authority and prestige than a inquisitor. I mean I think there is one example in a black library publication where one inquisitor tried to order a custodian around at the risk of losing his head on the spot.
Forgive me for the derailing but why DID the Custodes start doing things again? They spent millenia bumming around then started to do their jobs properly.
pm713 wrote: Forgive me for the derailing but why DID the Custodes start doing things again? They spent millenia bumming around then started to do their jobs properly.
Because gulliman threatened them to or else they would need to fully read the codex
I largely agree with you, changing the imperium as it is now is almost certainly doomed to fail....way too much has gone wrong since the heresy. However, and again that was my original point, had the custodes acted as leaders and advisers right after the heresy and had they continued to do so, I believe they could have made a difference.
Also it's not that important for this discussion, but I would argue that a custodian has a bit more authority and prestige than a inquisitor. I mean I think there is one example in a black library publication where one inquisitor tried to order a custodian around at the risk of losing his head on the spot.
To be fair that’s always been part and parcel of being an inquisitor, theoretically your powers are unlimited but practically you can only get away with what you can convince people you can get away with. Picking a fight with a custodian is probably as smart as picking a fight with a chapter of marines as a junio inquisitor with little to no backing.
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pm713 wrote: Forgive me for the derailing but why DID the Custodes start doing things again? They spent millenia bumming around then started to do their jobs properly.
Cause GW needed an explanation of why you could suddenly purchase the models for use in 40k. Forgive me if I’m wrong but custodes and sisters of silence were first introduced at 30k units with a 40k port over?
pm713 wrote: Forgive me for the derailing but why DID the Custodes start doing things again? They spent millenia bumming around then started to do their jobs properly.
Well they did not spend millennia doing nothing as evidenced by their new codex. They were very active eliminating threats that could one day threaten the segmentum solar or terra itself, but they have operated completely outside of the machinations of the imperium of man. They were not bound by any authority or law essentially, but they kept their pact with guilliman to not interfere politically and just protect the emperor (and by extension the segmentum solar).
Now since guilliman came back, he's had a nice chat with the emperor and the captain general of the custodes trajann valoris and they came to the conclusion that the custodes should become more active again and take leadership roles and help guide and secure the imperium at a larger scale and not only focus most of their attention to terra and the golden throne.
So yeah, the point of this thread was basically that they could have done this way earlier when they recognized, that the imperium is slowly going to gak after the heresy.
One more thing though! We know that during the later days of the heresy most forces of the custodes were bound to fight in the webway portal beneath the golden throne, because magnus screwed up the emperors psychic defenses. And we know that they had suffered massive casualties in the war for the webway. So there could also be an argument made that in the time after the heresy, the legio custodes didn't even have the manpower to guide the imperium and they could not have done so in an effective way because we know it takes a really long time for them to replenish their numbers.
So maybe they were not too arrogant and hypocritical to act, maybe they couldn't do so because of lacking manpower....at least for a couple thousand years after the heresy.
pm713 wrote: Forgive me for the derailing but why DID the Custodes start doing things again? They spent millenia bumming around then started to do their jobs properly.
Well they did not spend millennia doing nothing as evidenced by their new codex. They were very active eliminating threats that could one day threaten the segmentum solar or terra itself, but they have operated completely outside of the machinations of the imperium of man. They were not bound by any authority or law essentially, but they kept their pact with guilliman to not interfere politically and just protect the emperor (and by extension the segmentum solar).
Now since guilliman came back, he's had a nice chat with the emperor and the captain general of the custodes trajann valoris and they came to the conclusion that the custodes should become more active again and take leadership roles and help guide and secure the imperium at a larger scale and not only focus most of their attention to terra and the golden throne.
So yeah, the point of this thread was basically that they could have done this way earlier when they recognized, that the imperium is slowly going to gak after the heresy.
One more thing though! We know that during the later days of the heresy most forces of the custodes were bound to fight in the webway portal beneath the golden throne, because magnus screwed up the emperors psychic defenses. And we know that they had suffered massive casualties in the war for the webway. So there could also be an argument made that in the time after the heresy, the legio custodes didn't even have the manpower to guide the imperium and they could not have done so in an effective way because we know it takes a really long time for them to replenish their numbers.
So maybe they were not too arrogant and hypocritical to act, maybe they couldn't do so because of lacking manpower....at least for a couple thousand years after the heresy.
But they're so massively OP they don't need all of them to defend Segmentum Solar.
Honestly, it feels to me a lot like their activity is less to do with Guilliman being back and more to do with some of the Custodes getting plastic models. The idea of not enough numbers doesn't really do it for me because unless they replenish at something like a man per year they easily had the strength to do more and even in the lore I've seen they seem to wait until someone forces them to do things before doing anything..
pm713 wrote: Forgive me for the derailing but why DID the Custodes start doing things again? They spent millenia bumming around then started to do their jobs properly.
Well they did not spend millennia doing nothing as evidenced by their new codex. They were very active eliminating threats that could one day threaten the segmentum solar or terra itself, but they have operated completely outside of the machinations of the imperium of man. They were not bound by any authority or law essentially, but they kept their pact with guilliman to not interfere politically and just protect the emperor (and by extension the segmentum solar).
Now since guilliman came back, he's had a nice chat with the emperor and the captain general of the custodes trajann valoris and they came to the conclusion that the custodes should become more active again and take leadership roles and help guide and secure the imperium at a larger scale and not only focus most of their attention to terra and the golden throne.
So yeah, the point of this thread was basically that they could have done this way earlier when they recognized, that the imperium is slowly going to gak after the heresy.
One more thing though! We know that during the later days of the heresy most forces of the custodes were bound to fight in the webway portal beneath the golden throne, because magnus screwed up the emperors psychic defenses. And we know that they had suffered massive casualties in the war for the webway. So there could also be an argument made that in the time after the heresy, the legio custodes didn't even have the manpower to guide the imperium and they could not have done so in an effective way because we know it takes a really long time for them to replenish their numbers.
So maybe they were not too arrogant and hypocritical to act, maybe they couldn't do so because of lacking manpower....at least for a couple thousand years after the heresy.
But they're so massively OP they don't need all of them to defend Segmentum Solar.
Honestly, it feels to me a lot like their activity is less to do with Guilliman being back and more to do with some of the Custodes getting plastic models. The idea of not enough numbers doesn't really do it for me because unless they replenish at something like a man per year they easily had the strength to do more and even in the lore I've seen they seem to wait until someone forces them to do things before doing anything..
I agree and I only said and argument could be made in this case, not that it was a good argument.
Also as far as we knor constantin valdor survived the heresy and then disappeared, right? He could have made a massive difference in the time after the heresy. I mean he was one of the closest companions to the emperor since the unification wars and one of the very, very few people the emperor may have considered as a close personal friend. So he could have definitely done something....at least in theory, we do not know exactly what happened to him as far as I know (but I am so pumped about chris wraights book about him and hopefully find out).
And you are also correct than many pieces of lore seem to be hamfisted into the setting, because their plastic models turned out to be way more popular than GW had thought. One of the best examples for me is this:
In the 8th ed custodes codex there are many examples listed where the custodes eliminate threats and/or protect important people that could maybe one day do great deeds for the imperium and those examples happened way before guilliman came back.
And then we have goge vandire and the age of apostasy, a time where the imperium almost fell apart, but the custodes did nothing until the last second where they granted a squad of sisters an audience with the emperor and after big E talked some sense into them, the sisters killed vandire. The custodes did nothing basically.
This massively contradicts how the custodes are portrayed in their 8th ed codex and further emphasizes your point that GW never expected that they actually had to expand and explore the lore of the adeptus custodes in detail and make them a dedicated faction. They can't portray them as unable imeciles, who did nothing for 10000years, but if you add to their lore in retrospect and display them as active (but in secret) you run into contradictions with old and established lore, where they did nothing (because they were not established as a faction that sells GW models) but could have done something.
Tiberias wrote: [I largely agree with you, changing the imperium as it is now is almost certainly doomed to fail....way too much has gone wrong since the heresy. However, and again that was my original point, had the custodes acted as leaders and advisers right after the heresy and had they continued to do so, I believe they could have made a difference.
Also it's not that important for this discussion, but I would argue that a custodian has a bit more authority and prestige than a inquisitor. I mean I think there is one example in a black library publication where one inquisitor tried to order a custodian around at the risk of losing his head on the spot.
I guess Custodes would outrank inquisitors, not it matters to anyone else. The only problem with asking the Custodes to do stuff right after the herey is that there were basically no Custodes left. The took a 90% casualty rates during the war in the webway and probably suffered even more during the Siege of terra. There were almost certainly less than 100 at the end, not even enough to thoroughly guard the throne room (that takes 300). It would have taken 2000 years to build the Custodes up to 10000 in the first place. I would have taken much longer to build up without the Emperor to train them and having all of their other duties to attend to. Say it took 4000 years to recover their numbers, that would mean they would only have been able to act by the age of apostasy. I doubt the imperium was in much better shape in M34 than it is in M41.
Tiberias wrote: [I largely agree with you, changing the imperium as it is now is almost certainly doomed to fail....way too much has gone wrong since the heresy. However, and again that was my original point, had the custodes acted as leaders and advisers right after the heresy and had they continued to do so, I believe they could have made a difference.
Also it's not that important for this discussion, but I would argue that a custodian has a bit more authority and prestige than a inquisitor. I mean I think there is one example in a black library publication where one inquisitor tried to order a custodian around at the risk of losing his head on the spot.
I guess Custodes would outrank inquisitors, not it matters to anyone else. The only problem with asking the Custodes to do stuff right after the herey is that there were basically no Custodes left. The took a 90% casualty rates during the war in the webway and probably suffered even more during the Siege of terra. There were almost certainly less than 100 at the end, not even enough to thoroughly guard the throne room (that takes 300). It would have taken 2000 years to build the Custodes up to 10000 in the first place. I would have taken much longer to build up without the Emperor to train them and having all of their other duties to attend to. Say it took 4000 years to recover their numbers, that would mean they would only have been able to act by the age of apostasy. I doubt the imperium was in much better shape in M34 than it is in M41.
I've made a similar point a few posts up, but 100 custodians could have still made a differnce in the time after the heresy I think....not in a military sense, but as advisers. And yes, their numbers were down and it takes them a considerable time to rebuild them, but at he time of the age of apostasy there would have been enough custodes around to kill vandire themselves. Hell, 100 of them could have just walked up to his palace on terra, demanded an audience and then killed him. Afterwards they only need to tell everyone the emperor directly told them to do so...who would challenge their claims on that?
Except we know the Custodes occasionally DID get involved. it was rare and often subtle but the did. their hand in getting the sisters of battle to turn on Valdare is proably the most obvious example. It seems clear to me that the Custodes likely acted quietly behind the scenes to address perceived dangers. that said you have to keep in mind where their loyalty falls. Their loyalty is to the EMPEROR, not his Imperium.
BrianDavion wrote: Except we know the Custodes occasionally DID get involved. it was rare and often subtle but the did. their hand in getting the sisters of battle to turn on Valdare is proably the most obvious example. It seems clear to me that the Custodes likely acted quietly behind the scenes to address perceived dangers. that said you have to keep in mind where their loyalty falls. Their loyalty is to the EMPEROR, not his Imperium.
Yeah sry, but I adressed this exact point in this thread. They took the sisters to the emperor at the very last moment, when vandires quasi dictatorship was already falling apart. They did nothing the main period of time that lunatic was basically at the top of the imperium. And I also pointed out that this is in direct contradiction to the custodes 8th ed codex, where GW gives multiple examples of the custodes intervening in much smaller matters than goge vandire. So you would think having an absolute madman steering the imperium against a wall would make them act earlier.
Maybe offing a member of the Council Of Terra would have been too much of an overt political move and been in a contradiction of their agreement with Guilliman post-Heresy?
What about Vangorich? Why didn't the custodes step in when he had all the other highlords assassinated and basically took control of Terra? The space marines had to do the dirty work.
agurus1 wrote:Maybe offing a member of the Council Of Terra would have been too much of an overt political move and been in a contradiction of their agreement with Guilliman post-Heresy?
Yeah probably, but honestly why should they care? They are outside the law anyway and they could have granted the Sisters of Battle and audience with the emperor way earlier and not in the very last second.
w1zard wrote:What about Vangorich? Why didn't the custodes step in when he had all the other highlords assassinated and basically took control of Terra? The space marines had to do the dirty work.
True, but to be fair the whole "the beast arises" saga was very poorly written from a lore perspective in my opinion....but yes, they could and should have done something.
Yet again, the Custodes seem to rarely get directly involved and when they do typically act with a degree of subtly, often simply allowing the Emperor's will to be known. my guess is they stay out of the various feuds, spats and outright wars going on in the IoM for a varity of very good reasons. getting involved would SWIFTLY result in their becoming kingmakers. and likely lead to a degredation of respect for their insisution. best to let the humans deal with their own petty problems and only intervene when the Emperor himself is directly threatened. Was this short sighted and stupid on the part of the custodes, allowing perhaps threats to fester and becomne a dire threat to the emperor himself? Absoltuely, which is why Gulliman and the captain general let the custodes off their leash.
BrianDavion wrote: Yet again, the Custodes seem to rarely get directly involved and when they do typically act with a degree of subtly, often simply allowing the Emperor's will to be known. my guess is they stay out of the various feuds, spats and outright wars going on in the IoM for a varity of very good reasons. getting involved would SWIFTLY result in their becoming kingmakers. and likely lead to a degredation of respect for their insisution. best to let the humans deal with their own petty problems and only intervene when the Emperor himself is directly threatened. Was this short sighted and stupid on the part of the custodes, allowing perhaps threats to fester and becomne a dire threat to the emperor himself? Absoltuely, which is why Gulliman and the captain general let the custodes off their leash.
Yes, but then they have no right to complain about the state of the imperium and they have no right to be arrogant about how much better they are, hence why I think they are hypocrits.
the_scotsman wrote: I'm just really glad with the introduction of custodes nobody will ever say tau don't fit the aesthetic of 40k anymore.
I am curious, how so? Please elaborate. Is it because the custodes border on mary sues?
Mary Sue is kind of a meaningless term at this point, which basically gets applied to everything and anything a person dislikes.
The people who complain Tau have no place in 40k are the people who just look at them and go "Thing looks like Gundam, not covered in skulls, therefore not 40k."
By that metric, Custodes also don't fit - them next to a space marine basically looks like one of those advertisements for mobile games that go "You start as this character, then you LEVEL UP and become THIS CHARACTER!!!"
They're shiny, gold, clean, uniform and uncompromisingly heroic. In terms of "Grimdark aesthetic", they have zero.
But, honestly...that's OK. There are plenty of 40k factions that do not have judge dredd/HR Geiger "Grimdark Aesthetic". Tau don't, admittedly. Eldar most definitely don't. A lot of daemons stuff doesn't. I'm not one of those people that believes that everything in 40k has to have a perfectly unified aesthetic and I'm really glad that it doesn't. What bugs me about Custodes is the fact that they're so dang functional.
Tau fit into 40k's world by being a naive narrative lamb to the slaughter. The fact that they're a small, young, optimistic race engaging with an impossibly hostile and powerful galaxy is basically why they work in 40k's overall narrative. The clean aesthetic of the eldar works because they're a race in massive decline. Tau function their best when they're operating basically like the Federation from Star Trek would within the 40k universe and you see the consequences of that behavior within the 40k universe - getting mired in hideous wars of attrition, sending sphere expansions blindly out into the warp to disappear, sending diplomatic delegations of friendship to the dark eldar to have them come back as monstrous tortured grotesques, that's a good role to have.
Custodes (and marine stuff in general) get my goat because they're both aesthetically and narratively dissonant. 40k isn't really a narrative where you're supposed to come up with a special new fancy technology or ancient fighting force that works perfectly and is unstoppable and the day is saved without the shiny heroes having to corrupt themselves or compromise their morals in any way. And that is fundamentally at conflict with the real reason the lore exists - to accompany new plastic model releases by Games Workshop PLC. Games Workshop PLC really likes special fancy new technology that works perfectly because it hypes people up and gets them to buy new models.
BrianDavion wrote: Except we know the Custodes occasionally DID get involved. it was rare and often subtle but the did. their hand in getting the sisters of battle to turn on Valdare is proably the most obvious example. It seems clear to me that the Custodes likely acted quietly behind the scenes to address perceived dangers. that said you have to keep in mind where their loyalty falls. Their loyalty is to the EMPEROR, not his Imperium.
This is the key point to understanding Custodes, their loyalty preference is: Emperor >>> Humanity == Imperium
Compare that to Gulliman, who is loyal to: Humanity > Ultramar >>> Imperium > Emperor.
Tiberias wrote:
Yeah sry, but I adressed this exact point in this thread. They took the sisters to the emperor at the very last moment, when vandires quasi dictatorship was already falling apart. They did nothing the main period of time that lunatic was basically at the top of the imperium. And I also pointed out that this is in direct contradiction to the custodes 8th ed codex, where GW gives multiple examples of the custodes intervening in much smaller matters than goge vandire. So you would think having an absolute madman steering the imperium against a wall would make them act earlier.
The Custodes don't care about the political structure of the Imperium, they aren't bound to it and it doesn't affect them. They don't care about any individual human either, except as their existence protects the Emperor. They aren't so blind as to not recognize the state it is in and to not be critical of it, but they have little reason to try to change it so long as it doesn't affect them or the Emperor (or so they think).
Tiberias wrote: [I largely agree with you, changing the imperium as it is now is almost certainly doomed to fail....way too much has gone wrong since the heresy. However, and again that was my original point, had the custodes acted as leaders and advisers right after the heresy and had they continued to do so, I believe they could have made a difference.
Also it's not that important for this discussion, but I would argue that a custodian has a bit more authority and prestige than a inquisitor. I mean I think there is one example in a black library publication where one inquisitor tried to order a custodian around at the risk of losing his head on the spot.
I guess Custodes would outrank inquisitors, not it matters to anyone else. The only problem with asking the Custodes to do stuff right after the herey is that there were basically no Custodes left. The took a 90% casualty rates during the war in the webway and probably suffered even more during the Siege of terra. There were almost certainly less than 100 at the end, not even enough to thoroughly guard the throne room (that takes 300). It would have taken 2000 years to build the Custodes up to 10000 in the first place. I would have taken much longer to build up without the Emperor to train them and having all of their other duties to attend to. Say it took 4000 years to recover their numbers, that would mean they would only have been able to act by the age of apostasy. I doubt the imperium was in much better shape in M34 than it is in M41.
I've made a similar point a few posts up, but 100 custodians could have still made a differnce in the time after the heresy I think....not in a military sense, but as advisers. And yes, their numbers were down and it takes them a considerable time to rebuild them, but at he time of the age of apostasy there would have been enough custodes around to kill vandire themselves. Hell, 100 of them could have just walked up to his palace on terra, demanded an audience and then killed him. Afterwards they only need to tell everyone the emperor directly told them to do so...who would challenge their claims on that?
300 are required to guard the Emperor in the throne room alone and more are needed elsewhere in more important places (fighting particularly bad nasties, watching over corrupted DAoT relics, and training new Custodes are all more much important than the affairs of normal humans). The would not have the men to spare to act as "advisors" for hundreds or thousands of years.
Imagine you believe you are acting through the emperor himself by following Vandire. Then some guys who are sort of related to the Emperor kill they guy you believe, without a shadow of a doubt, is divinely sanctioned with the Emperor's own blessing. What do you think/do? The most logical conclusion is that the Emperor has been betrayed by his own guardians, all for 30 pieces of silver. The Custodes are heretics and must be purged.
I think they made a good move by waiting until Vandire had been discredited before getting his own guardians to kill him. If someone else killed him, the civil war would not have ended and there would be another long war.
BrianDavion wrote:Yet again, the Custodes seem to rarely get directly involved and when they do typically act with a degree of subtly, often simply allowing the Emperor's will to be known. my guess is they stay out of the various feuds, spats and outright wars going on in the IoM for a varity of very good reasons. getting involved would SWIFTLY result in their becoming kingmakers. and likely lead to a degredation of respect for their insisution. best to let the humans deal with their own petty problems and only intervene when the Emperor himself is directly threatened. Was this short sighted and stupid on the part of the custodes, allowing perhaps threats to fester and becomne a dire threat to the emperor himself? Absoltuely, which is why Gulliman and the captain general let the custodes off their leash.
Only now do the Custodes realize that the walls of the Imperial Palace extend to the very edges of the Galaxy, and that the Emperor and the Imperium are one and the same. Maybe it wouldn't be obvious that the Emperor's physical state is a metaphor for the wider Imperium, but you would think they would figure it out faster. Again, I hope they retcon the Custodes into being more active these past 10,000 years. Perhaps there was a long debate about this, and only now has proactivity been proven to be necessary.
Tiberias wrote:
Yes, but then they have no right to complain about the state of the imperium and they have no right to be arrogant about how much better they are, hence why I think they are hypocrits.
The Custodes are very critical of their own failings too. They even wonder if the GK have more of a claim to be the Emperor's favorite than they do. Arrogance and hypocrisy are not the right words, but pessimism is.
Custodes (and marine stuff in general) get my goat because they're both aesthetically and narratively dissonant. 40k isn't really a narrative where you're supposed to come up with a special new fancy technology or ancient fighting force that works perfectly and is unstoppable and the day is saved without the shiny heroes having to corrupt themselves or compromise their morals in any way. And that is fundamentally at conflict with the real reason the lore exists - to accompany new plastic model releases by Games Workshop PLC. Games Workshop PLC really likes special fancy new technology that works perfectly because it hypes people up and gets them to buy new models.
in other words "the grimdark isn't obvious at a glance so it isn't"?
w1zard wrote: What about Vangorich? Why didn't the custodes step in when he had all the other highlords assassinated and basically took control of Terra? The space marines had to do the dirty work.
Because they were all inept and corrupt and frankly deserved it. And Vangorich was moderately competent. A better question is why they didn't intervene when the orks parked an attack moon over terra immediately before that....
...A good question is how may there were at that time. They are referred to as the Ten Thousand in 40k but I severely doubt there were anything like that number left after the War in the Web and the Siege; for all we know, only 1,000 years after the heresy they'd basically only rebuilt the Companion Guard...
w1zard wrote: What about Vangorich? Why didn't the custodes step in when he had all the other highlords assassinated and basically took control of Terra? The space marines had to do the dirty work.
Because they were all inept and corrupt and frankly deserved it. And Vangorich was moderately competent. A better question is why they didn't intervene when the orks parked an attack moon over terra immediately before that....
...A good question is how may there were at that time. They are referred to as the Ten Thousand in 40k but I severely doubt there were anything like that number left after the War in the Web and the Siege; for all we know, only 1,000 years after the heresy they'd basically only rebuilt the Companion Guard...
except the codex clarifies this, they are indeed ten thousand strong as of 40k. They rebuilt.
w1zard wrote: What about Vangorich? Why didn't the custodes step in when he had all the other highlords assassinated and basically took control of Terra? The space marines had to do the dirty work.
Because they were all inept and corrupt and frankly deserved it. And Vangorich was moderately competent. A better question is why they didn't intervene when the orks parked an attack moon over terra immediately before that....
Its best to just forget the fact that the Beast Series ever happened.
...A good question is how may there were at that time. They are referred to as the Ten Thousand in 40k but I severely doubt there were anything like that number left after the War in the Web and the Siege; for all we know, only 1,000 years after the heresy they'd basically only rebuilt the Companion Guard...
Likely back to being Ten Thousand, considering even at current time they are at Ten Thousand.
In many parts I do agree with you. Though I think arrogance and hyporcisy still apply as fitting descriptions. You are right the custodes can be very critical of themselves and their failings. The prime example of this is shield captain valerian from watchers of the throne (whom I think you were referencing in regards to his opinions of the grey knights), but we have other examples in black library publications and from the new codex itself where they lament and criticise the state of the imperium, which they did nothing to help fix that. Now as I've said it is probably not accurate to display for example the opinions of valerian as those of the custodes as a whole, because they are such individualists and I also grant you that right after the heresy they did not have the manpower to lead, because their focus probably was on the imperial palace and the golden throne as you said. But lets say a thousand years after the heresy they could have acted as leaders.
I also don't share the opinion that the custodes don't relly care about the political structure of the imperium. Yes they very much stand in a sort of outside position and operate on their own, but they knew of the emperors plans for humanity and for them. They knew that they were originally meant to lead, advise and protect humanity after the webway project was completed. Of course this plan ultimately failed as we all know when magnus accidentally screwed the webway project up big time and because of that whole heresy thing. The emperor even admitted that his plan had failed and everything he can do now is keep this whole thing going as long as he can. Now it seems to me that after the heresy the custodes accepted that the emperors long term plan for humanity had failed and sort of gave up, instead of trying to salvage whatever they could.
BrianDavion wrote: Except we know the Custodes occasionally DID get involved. it was rare and often subtle but the did. their hand in getting the sisters of battle to turn on Valdare is proably the most obvious example. It seems clear to me that the Custodes likely acted quietly behind the scenes to address perceived dangers. that said you have to keep in mind where their loyalty falls. Their loyalty is to the EMPEROR, not his Imperium.
Yeah sry, but I adressed this exact point in this thread. They took the sisters to the emperor at the very last moment, when vandires quasi dictatorship was already falling apart. They did nothing the main period of time that lunatic was basically at the top of the imperium. And I also pointed out that this is in direct contradiction to the custodes 8th ed codex, where GW gives multiple examples of the custodes intervening in much smaller matters than goge vandire. So you would think having an absolute madman steering the imperium against a wall would make them act earlier.
That particular element of background has been around since at least 2nd edition, where it featured in the original Codex: SoB - people would notice if it got changed up too much to be in line with the new material in terms of how hands-on they were.
BrianDavion wrote: Except we know the Custodes occasionally DID get involved. it was rare and often subtle but the did. their hand in getting the sisters of battle to turn on Valdare is proably the most obvious example. It seems clear to me that the Custodes likely acted quietly behind the scenes to address perceived dangers. that said you have to keep in mind where their loyalty falls. Their loyalty is to the EMPEROR, not his Imperium.
Yeah sry, but I adressed this exact point in this thread. They took the sisters to the emperor at the very last moment, when vandires quasi dictatorship was already falling apart. They did nothing the main period of time that lunatic was basically at the top of the imperium. And I also pointed out that this is in direct contradiction to the custodes 8th ed codex, where GW gives multiple examples of the custodes intervening in much smaller matters than goge vandire. So you would think having an absolute madman steering the imperium against a wall would make them act earlier.
That particular element of background has been around since at least 2nd edition, where it featured in the original Codex: SoB - people would notice if it got changed up too much to be in line with the new material in terms of how hands-on they were.
GW aren't going to stop at that. Exarchs are supposed to be stuck serving Khaine but one toddled off to chase Yvraine for no reason, new kinds of armour magically pop up and whatever else GW wants.
w1zard wrote: What about Vangorich? Why didn't the custodes step in when he had all the other highlords assassinated and basically took control of Terra? The space marines had to do the dirty work.
Because they were all inept and corrupt and frankly deserved it. And Vangorich was moderately competent. A better question is why they didn't intervene when the orks parked an attack moon over terra immediately before that....
Its best to just forget the fact that the Beast Series ever happened.
...A good question is how may there were at that time. They are referred to as the Ten Thousand in 40k but I severely doubt there were anything like that number left after the War in the Web and the Siege; for all we know, only 1,000 years after the heresy they'd basically only rebuilt the Companion Guard...
Likely back to being Ten Thousand, considering even at current time they are at Ten Thousand.
They got a kicking in the Beast series, I think it was book six, when a troupe of Harlequins show up and take out dozens if not hundreds of them (while claiming to come in peace..) must have taken a while to rebuild those losses too
w1zard wrote: What about Vangorich? Why didn't the custodes step in when he had all the other highlords assassinated and basically took control of Terra? The space marines had to do the dirty work.
Because they were all inept and corrupt and frankly deserved it. And Vangorich was moderately competent. A better question is why they didn't intervene when the orks parked an attack moon over terra immediately before that....
Its best to just forget the fact that the Beast Series ever happened.
...A good question is how may there were at that time. They are referred to as the Ten Thousand in 40k but I severely doubt there were anything like that number left after the War in the Web and the Siege; for all we know, only 1,000 years after the heresy they'd basically only rebuilt the Companion Guard...
Likely back to being Ten Thousand, considering even at current time they are at Ten Thousand.
They got a kicking in the Beast series, I think it was book six, when a troupe of Harlequins show up and take out dozens if not hundreds of them (while claiming to come in peace..) must have taken a while to rebuild those losses too
Which is such crappy writing in my personal opinion....sure harlequins are extremely deadly, but them slaughtering hundreds of custodes? Inside the imperial palace?!?!?! No freakin way.....as someone in this thread already said, let's forget this series exists...
Edit: Just had to add this, becaus it bugs me since forever. Black library writers often have a really hard time to portray power levels in their own lore accordingly. Yes this is a universe where green fungus people fight space elves, but if you as a writer never adhere to the rules of the universe you yourself set up, readers will stop suspending their disbelief and nothing you write carries any weight any more. It's sensible that Harlequins could on take some custodians, given that they are extremely deadly themselves, but not dozens or hundreds of them and again, not in the imperial palace! The Custodes have to know that place better than any other living being in the galaxy, there is no freakin way that a troupe of harlequins just walzes in there and almost gets to the golden throne...it's freaking ridiculous.
Also there is a scene in a horus heresy book where a world eater I belive punches through a custodians armor with his bare hands, killing him. I mean what the hell is this bogus writing? It makes no freaking sense in any way shape or form.
Tiberias wrote: Which is such crappy writing in my personal opinion....sure harlequins are extremely deadly, but them slaughtering hundreds of custodes? Inside the imperial palace?!?!?! No freakin way...
Absolutely agreed. I can see a harlequin taking on a custode 1v1 and having it go either way. But dozens of custodes vs 3-4 harlequins is only ever going to end one way. Was the Beast series written before the custodes got their revamp? That would make total sense, because before the revamp the custodes were only portrayed as slightly better than normal space marines, like on the level of deathwatch.
Tiberias wrote: Which is such crappy writing in my personal opinion....sure harlequins are extremely deadly, but them slaughtering hundreds of custodes? Inside the imperial palace?!?!?! No freakin way...
Absolutely agreed. I can see a harlequin taking on a custode 1v1 and having it go either way. But dozens of custodes vs 3-4 harlequins is only ever going to end one way. Was the Beast series written before the custodes got their revamp? That would make total sense, because before the revamp the custodes were only portrayed as slightly better than normal space marines, like on the level of deathwatch.
It was written after they were revamped. The problem is that Guy Haley is only capable of writing his protagonists completely stomping the NPCs.
Tiberias wrote: In many parts I do agree with you. Though I think arrogance and hyporcisy still apply as fitting descriptions. You are right the custodes can be very critical of themselves and their failings. The prime example of this is shield captain valerian from watchers of the throne (whom I think you were referencing in regards to his opinions of the grey knights), but we have other examples in black library publications and from the new codex itself where they lament and criticise the state of the imperium, which they did nothing to help fix that. Now as I've said it is probably not accurate to display for example the opinions of valerian as those of the custodes as a whole, because they are such individualists and I also grant you that right after the heresy they did not have the manpower to lead, because their focus probably was on the imperial palace and the golden throne as you said. But lets say a thousand years after the heresy they could have acted as leaders.
I also don't share the opinion that the custodes don't relly care about the political structure of the imperium. Yes they very much stand in a sort of outside position and operate on their own, but they knew of the emperors plans for humanity and for them. They knew that they were originally meant to lead, advise and protect humanity after the webway project was completed. Of course this plan ultimately failed as we all know when magnus accidentally screwed the webway project up big time and because of that whole heresy thing. The emperor even admitted that his plan had failed and everything he can do now is keep this whole thing going as long as he can. Now it seems to me that after the heresy the custodes accepted that the emperors long term plan for humanity had failed and sort of gave up, instead of trying to salvage whatever they could.
Maybe it was arrogance in the sense that if they were so great and still failed, what hope is there for the rest of us (a bit of pessimism too). They could then be called hypocrites for not giving us the chance. That would be why they gave up and are forget so much of the old crusade tenants, as Valdor says in Two Metaphysical Blades.
But after Lion's Gate their attitude has completely changed. Was that event so traumatic for them (maybe, they lost several thousand, but if they thought everything was done why would they try to fight back even after something like that) was Gulliman so convincing (I doubt it) or were they always debating taking a more active role and this tipped it to one side (we know they like to debate). GW seems to be writing Custodes lore in reverse right now, so anything could happen. Door 3 would be the most interest, ideally with many sides. Maybe having to do with the Shield Hosts, where each emerged as a response to what the Custodes should do next.
Tiberias wrote: Which is such crappy writing in my personal opinion....sure harlequins are extremely deadly, but them slaughtering hundreds of custodes? Inside the imperial palace?!?!?! No freakin way...
Absolutely agreed. I can see a harlequin taking on a custode 1v1 and having it go either way. But dozens of custodes vs 3-4 harlequins is only ever going to end one way. Was the Beast series written before the custodes got their revamp? That would make total sense, because before the revamp the custodes were only portrayed as slightly better than normal space marines, like on the level of deathwatch.
It was written after they were revamped. The problem is that Guy Haley is only capable of writing his protagonists completely stomping the NPCs.
We could also take a second to look at what actually happened. Standard Harlequins butchered their way through normal humans but went down fast to Custodes. The ones who did most of the killing were a Shadowseer and a Death Jester who got most killing done with the bio rounds of the shrieker cannon and it was nowhere near hundreds of kills.
Tiberias wrote: Which is such crappy writing in my personal opinion....sure harlequins are extremely deadly, but them slaughtering hundreds of custodes? Inside the imperial palace?!?!?! No freakin way...
Absolutely agreed. I can see a harlequin taking on a custode 1v1 and having it go either way. But dozens of custodes vs 3-4 harlequins is only ever going to end one way. Was the Beast series written before the custodes got their revamp? That would make total sense, because before the revamp the custodes were only portrayed as slightly better than normal space marines, like on the level of deathwatch.
It was written after they were revamped. The problem is that Guy Haley is only capable of writing his protagonists completely stomping the NPCs.
We could also take a second to look at what actually happened. Standard Harlequins butchered their way through normal humans but went down fast to Custodes. The ones who did most of the killing were a Shadowseer and a Death Jester who got most killing done with the bio rounds of the shrieker cannon and it was nowhere near hundreds of kills.
We could also just pretend the series was never dribbled onto the page, even by BL’s low standards it is terrible.
Tiberias wrote: Which is such crappy writing in my personal opinion....sure harlequins are extremely deadly, but them slaughtering hundreds of custodes? Inside the imperial palace?!?!?! No freakin way...
Absolutely agreed. I can see a harlequin taking on a custode 1v1 and having it go either way. But dozens of custodes vs 3-4 harlequins is only ever going to end one way. Was the Beast series written before the custodes got their revamp? That would make total sense, because before the revamp the custodes were only portrayed as slightly better than normal space marines, like on the level of deathwatch.
It was written after they were revamped. The problem is that Guy Haley is only capable of writing his protagonists completely stomping the NPCs.
We could also take a second to look at what actually happened. Standard Harlequins butchered their way through normal humans but went down fast to Custodes. The ones who did most of the killing were a Shadowseer and a Death Jester who got most killing done with the bio rounds of the shrieker cannon and it was nowhere near hundreds of kills.
We could also just pretend the series was never dribbled onto the page, even by BL’s low standards it is terrible.
You can but much like me ignoring newcrons you're just ignoring canon at that point.
Nah in universe it's ancient history with little in the way of records and it turns out that the information they did have was bad fanfic written by a malfunctioning servitor that should have been cleaning the lavatories.
Tiberias wrote: Which is such crappy writing in my personal opinion....sure harlequins are extremely deadly, but them slaughtering hundreds of custodes? Inside the imperial palace?!?!?! No freakin way...
Absolutely agreed. I can see a harlequin taking on a custode 1v1 and having it go either way. But dozens of custodes vs 3-4 harlequins is only ever going to end one way. Was the Beast series written before the custodes got their revamp? That would make total sense, because before the revamp the custodes were only portrayed as slightly better than normal space marines, like on the level of deathwatch.
It was written after they were revamped. The problem is that Guy Haley is only capable of writing his protagonists completely stomping the NPCs.
We could also take a second to look at what actually happened. Standard Harlequins butchered their way through normal humans but went down fast to Custodes. The ones who did most of the killing were a Shadowseer and a Death Jester who got most killing done with the bio rounds of the shrieker cannon and it was nowhere near hundreds of kills.
They still killed "dozens" and Death Jesters and Shadowseers arent that good.
BrianDavion wrote: there's actually a lot of evidance custodes hold the astartes in partiuclar contempt
They hold the GK and primarchs in contempt, or some other negative emotion. I don't think they have any more contempt towards normal Astartes than they do towards normal humans. In MoM a Custodian was able to have a conversation with a BA, for a while. That's better than the interaction he had with some children, almost killing them.
I don't understand why the GK? The GK are closer to Custodes than any other force, being made from the Emperor's genes, being utterly pure, sanctioned by the Emperor himself and fighting the good fight against Daemons for 10k years.
Space Marines on the other hand, they actively distrust. 9 traitor legions fethed everything up and any given astartes could try the same now.
BrianDavion wrote: there's actually a lot of evidance custodes hold the astartes in partiuclar contempt
They hold the GK and primarchs in contempt, or some other negative emotion. I don't think they have any more contempt towards normal Astartes than they do towards normal humans. In MoM a Custodian was able to have a conversation with a BA, for a while. That's better than the interaction he had with some children, almost killing them.
I don't understand why the GK? The GK are closer to Custodes than any other force, being made from the Emperor's genes, being utterly pure, sanctioned by the Emperor himself and fighting the good fight against Daemons for 10k years.
Space Marines on the other hand, they actively distrust. 9 traitor legions fethed everything up and any given astartes could try the same now.
Source for that?
The Primarchs were made like that and most of them went traitor in some way. Considering Custodes are fanatics they're not going to say "hold up, maybe the reason everyone goes traitor, fails or somehow sucks is because the Emperor does not everyone except up."
BrianDavion wrote: there's actually a lot of evidance custodes hold the astartes in partiuclar contempt
They hold the GK and primarchs in contempt, or some other negative emotion. I don't think they have any more contempt towards normal Astartes than they do towards normal humans. In MoM a Custodian was able to have a conversation with a BA, for a while. That's better than the interaction he had with some children, almost killing them.
I don't understand why the GK? The GK are closer to Custodes than any other force, being made from the Emperor's genes, being utterly pure, sanctioned by the Emperor himself and fighting the good fight against Daemons for 10k years.
Space Marines on the other hand, they actively distrust. 9 traitor legions fethed everything up and any given astartes could try the same now.
Source for that?
The Primarchs were made like that and most of them went traitor in some way. Considering Custodes are fanatics they're not going to say "hold up, maybe the reason everyone goes traitor, fails or somehow sucks is because the Emperor does not everyone except up."
Source for what? That the GK are closer to Custodes because they're made out of Emperor geneseed? Well, the truth of Emperor geneseed is debated long and hard on these forums even though its been explicitly stated in multiple GK codices, but if you take it to be true, then yes, the GK are closer to the Custodes who are also rumoured to use some of the Emperor's genes in their making (although not Geneseed), and at the very least, each GK is therefore at least 1% Emperor so therefore, closer to the Custodes.
The other parts, being sanctioned by the Emperor as his dying wish, being incorruptible, etc, likely means that the Custodes look at GK with less contempt or suspicion than most other forces. They still look at them with suspicion, as they'd be terrible bodyguards if they didn't, but less/
I'm not sure what you mean by your last line. Primarchs were Primarchs, but the Grey Knights were chosen and made to be pure, with the express purpose of purity, and in 10,000 years, only the GK and the AC have yet to have a member fall to Chaos or betray the Imperium. Both have equally rigorous selection and training. That counts for something.
pm713 wrote: I meant a source for GK being made from the Emperor in a way other Marines aren't..
NUMEROUS GK codices?
Okay. I'm not going to go out and buy a GK codex just to check things someone on the Internet said. That's why I was asking for something to back up what you claimed.
pm713 wrote: I meant a source for GK being made from the Emperor in a way other Marines aren't..
NUMEROUS GK codices?
Okay. I'm not going to go out and buy a GK codex just to check things someone on the Internet said. That's why I was asking for something to back up what you claimed.
This has been the fact since the 3rd ed demon hunter codex I think, though in the earlier editions GW only hinted at the fact that the grey knights were made from the emperors genes.
Emperors genes or not, the creation of both custodes and grey knights is still vastly different. As has been said many times before the custodes are very much superior in terms of physical combat prowess, but the grey knights are still much more suited to combat demons. This fact is the source of tension between custodes and grey knights. The custodes knew that the emperors original plan for humanity has failed and that the imperium would have to face more widespread demon incursions throughout the imperium after the heresy, hence the creation of the ordo malleus and its militant chapter the grey knights. The custodes just can't stomach the possibility well that they grey knights might be better suited than them to protect the imperium against the great enemy.
Custodians are/wereatthetime(?) sworn to defend the Emperor. All other matters were unimportant. It wasn't until Bobby G ordered them into action that they did anything else. I mean, they have zero tact when it comes to even basic communication. I don't think you'd want them in charge of leading a political takeover of Terra.
FezzikDaBullgryn wrote: Custodians are/wereatthetime(?) sworn to defend the Emperor. All other matters were unimportant. It wasn't until Bobby G ordered them into action that they did anything else. I mean, they have zero tact when it comes to even basic communication. I don't think you'd want them in charge of leading a political takeover of Terra.
That is not quite correct. Yes, the most important duty is to guard the emperor and the palace, but the custodes were meant to guide and protect humanity after the emperor would complete his webway project. This ultimately failed as we all know, but the custodes were still expected to be well versed in matters such as politics, diplomacy, philosophy etc. because the emperor expected from them to give him councel and provide him with interesting conversation. This fact is referenced in their codex, watchers of the throne and multiple heresy books.
This, for me, is also a big part of what makes the custodes lore interesting.They are not just those larger than life perfect warrior bodyguards to the emperor, but individuals who can think for themselves in an imperium where that is rarely the case. They also miserably failed their most paramount duty and then basically abandonded humanity and their purpose as guardians/advisers for them. They had the chance to do something (not immediately after the heresy as we've already established, but some time after) but because of a combination of arrogance and self pity they failed to do so until girlyman told them to get off their asses, like you said.
pm713 wrote: Define not that good. I can easily just say Custodes aren't all that.
Dozens dying almost entirely to their body rapidly mutating then exploding seems reasonable to me.
Looking at their stats, their weapons, other lore descriptions of how both parties generally handle themselves. Harlies of all flavors generally are good, but not carve through Dozens good. Dozens implies more than 24.
pm713 wrote: Define not that good. I can easily just say Custodes aren't all that.
Dozens dying almost entirely to their body rapidly mutating then exploding seems reasonable to me.
Looking at their stats, their weapons, other lore descriptions of how both parties generally handle themselves. Harlies of all flavors generally are good, but not carve through Dozens good. Dozens implies more than 24.
A rapid firing cannon that kills with a single shot in the hands of an expert marksman isn't fair?
pm713 wrote: Define not that good. I can easily just say Custodes aren't all that.
Dozens dying almost entirely to their body rapidly mutating then exploding seems reasonable to me.
Looking at their stats, their weapons, other lore descriptions of how both parties generally handle themselves. Harlies of all flavors generally are good, but not carve through Dozens good. Dozens implies more than 24.
A rapid firing cannon that kills with a single shot in the hands of an expert marksman isn't fair?
pm713 wrote: Define not that good. I can easily just say Custodes aren't all that.
Dozens dying almost entirely to their body rapidly mutating then exploding seems reasonable to me.
Looking at their stats, their weapons, other lore descriptions of how both parties generally handle themselves. Harlies of all flavors generally are good, but not carve through Dozens good. Dozens implies more than 24.
A rapid firing cannon that kills with a single shot in the hands of an expert marksman isn't fair?
you just described the bog standard bolt gun.
I didn't. A bolter is both far less dangerous to be hit by for a Custodes and is barely an automatic weapon by comparison to a shrieker cannon.
pm713 wrote: Define not that good. I can easily just say Custodes aren't all that.
Dozens dying almost entirely to their body rapidly mutating then exploding seems reasonable to me.
Looking at their stats, their weapons, other lore descriptions of how both parties generally handle themselves. Harlies of all flavors generally are good, but not carve through Dozens good. Dozens implies more than 24.
A rapid firing cannon that kills with a single shot in the hands of an expert marksman isn't fair?
you just described the bog standard bolt gun.
I didn't. A bolter is both far less dangerous to be hit by for a Custodes and is barely an automatic weapon by comparison to a shrieker cannon.
except you said "a rapid firing cannon that kills with a single shot in the hands of an expert marksman" That describes bolt guns as well as nearly every second weapon in 40k.
pm713 wrote: Define not that good. I can easily just say Custodes aren't all that.
Dozens dying almost entirely to their body rapidly mutating then exploding seems reasonable to me.
Looking at their stats, their weapons, other lore descriptions of how both parties generally handle themselves. Harlies of all flavors generally are good, but not carve through Dozens good. Dozens implies more than 24.
A rapid firing cannon that kills with a single shot in the hands of an expert marksman isn't fair?
you just described the bog standard bolt gun.
I didn't. A bolter is both far less dangerous to be hit by for a Custodes and is barely an automatic weapon by comparison to a shrieker cannon.
except you said "a rapid firing cannon that kills with a single shot in the hands of an expert marksman" That describes bolt guns as well as nearly every second weapon in 40k.
I wouldn't call a bolter a cannon. Considering I already mentioned it I thought it was obvious I meant the shrieker cannon.
pm713 wrote: Define not that good. I can easily just say Custodes aren't all that.
Dozens dying almost entirely to their body rapidly mutating then exploding seems reasonable to me.
Looking at their stats, their weapons, other lore descriptions of how both parties generally handle themselves. Harlies of all flavors generally are good, but not carve through Dozens good. Dozens implies more than 24.
A rapid firing cannon that kills with a single shot in the hands of an expert marksman isn't fair?
The gun that is only 1 damage? That kills in a single shot?
pm713 wrote: Define not that good. I can easily just say Custodes aren't all that.
Dozens dying almost entirely to their body rapidly mutating then exploding seems reasonable to me.
Looking at their stats, their weapons, other lore descriptions of how both parties generally handle themselves. Harlies of all flavors generally are good, but not carve through Dozens good. Dozens implies more than 24.
A rapid firing cannon that kills with a single shot in the hands of an expert marksman isn't fair?
The gun that is only 1 damage? That kills in a single shot?
A gun that rapidly mutates your body and causes you to explode. IIRC the book specifically mentions a Custodes actually lasts longer than most victims do.
BrianDavion wrote: yet again every gun in 40k is pretty much a massivly powerful canon used as a pistol.
Exactly, hard to quantify which is stronger, .75 caliber fully automatic rocket propelled grenade launcher, or fully automatic mono-molecular needle guns filled with toxins that make you explode. Pretty much one shot from either kills you dead.
BrianDavion wrote: there's actually a lot of evidance custodes hold the astartes in partiuclar contempt
They hold the GK and primarchs in contempt, or some other negative emotion. I don't think they have any more contempt towards normal Astartes than they do towards normal humans. In MoM a Custodian was able to have a conversation with a BA, for a while. That's better than the interaction he had with some children, almost killing them.
I don't understand why the GK? The GK are closer to Custodes than any other force, being made from the Emperor's genes, being utterly pure, sanctioned by the Emperor himself and fighting the good fight against Daemons for 10k years.
Space Marines on the other hand, they actively distrust. 9 traitor legions fethed everything up and any given astartes could try the same now.
Source for that?
The Primarchs were made like that and most of them went traitor in some way. Considering Custodes are fanatics they're not going to say "hold up, maybe the reason everyone goes traitor, fails or somehow sucks is because the Emperor does not everyone except up."
Source for what? That the GK are closer to Custodes because they're made out of Emperor geneseed? Well, the truth of Emperor geneseed is debated long and hard on these forums even though its been explicitly stated in multiple GK codices, but if you take it to be true, then yes, the GK are closer to the Custodes who are also rumoured to use some of the Emperor's genes in their making (although not Geneseed), and at the very least, each GK is therefore at least 1% Emperor so therefore, closer to the Custodes.
The other parts, being sanctioned by the Emperor as his dying wish, being incorruptible, etc, likely means that the Custodes look at GK with less contempt or suspicion than most other forces. They still look at them with suspicion, as they'd be terrible bodyguards if they didn't, but less/
I'm not sure what you mean by your last line. Primarchs were Primarchs, but the Grey Knights were chosen and made to be pure, with the express purpose of purity, and in 10,000 years, only the GK and the AC have yet to have a member fall to Chaos or betray the Imperium. Both have equally rigorous selection and training. That counts for something.
Exactly, the GK are closer to the Custodes than any other factions, so the Custodes fear the GK are their replacement. The GK got the emperor's last blessing, but the Custodes were supposed to get that; they're his favorite, right? It's basically Jacob and Esau.
Spoiler:
The Grey Knights, whom we had always had uneasy relations with,
answered our summons. I do not know if it was my request that prompted the
order, or if Valoris had been petitioned by others. In any case, we were not so
proud that we could not ask for help when it was needed.
There is a profound distinction to be made here. We could both – Custodian and
Grey Knight – slay daemons. We were both to all intents and purposes immune
to their temptations, and we were both effective against their many strategems.
There are two great repositories of lore against the daemonic in the Sol System,
our own archives in the Tower of Hegemon and the far greater librarium lodged
on Titan itself. We are, as orders, steeped to our very cores in the fight against
the Great Enemy. Perhaps, you might say, Chaos is the reason for both of our
existences.
And yet we are different. Remember I told you that we were never warriors, not
exclusively. We are certainly not an army, and we were intended, in the original
scheme, for service in an empire that never came to be. Our cousins in the
Chamber Militant of the Ordo Malleus, by contrast, were forged exclusively for
this singular war against our most powerful and enduring foe. They have no
other purpose. Just like the Space Marines from whose template they were
drawn, they are an army, complete and self-sufficient.
We always knew of their existence. There are records, held privately in the
depths of our archives, which chronicle their creation. We watched, ten thousand
years ago, as He embarked on His last gambit. As the Great Enemy drew close
to Terra, we observed the darkening of Saturn’s moon, and knew that one day it
would return, its purpose fulfilled.
Consider what this history means. We know that they came after us, the more
junior creation, and yet they were as closely associated with Him as we were.
We both of us look to Him and Him alone as our progenitor, and share the same
sense, cultivated over the wearing aeons, that we enact His designs when all
others falter.
There are some among my brothers who do not see the sons of Titan as much
more than specialised Space Marines, to be regarded with suspicion as part of
that schismatic breed that caused us so much anguish in the past. A Space
Marine may always fail, they believe, given enough time and enough reason, and
thus they are all part of the same potentially aberrant strain.
Some think that. Others, and I myself have often speculated in such a vein,
cultivate a different misgiving. We know well enough that they were designed as
His last great weapon, fitted to an age that He foresaw near the end of His
earthly embodiment. What if it were they, not us, who most faithfully embodied
His final legacy? You will never hear one of us say as much out loud, but that
does not mean the suspicion does not exist. It skulks around the corridors of
Hegemon like a foul odour, faint but hard to eradicate.
From the speculum certus we know we were the finest and the most faithful. In
the speculum obscurus there is, as always, more doubt.
But I don't know if we can compare GK recruitment to Custodes recruitment since there is so little we know. Nor do we know if they a really incorruptible (A "golden giant" guided Abaddon to Drach'nyen, and the last person to hold it was a Custodian who ran into the webway).
Also, I'm not sure what you're getting at with the quote @pm713.
Eipi10 wrote: But I don't know if we can compare GK recruitment to Custodes recruitment since there is so little we know. Nor do we know if they a really incorruptible (A "golden giant" guided Abaddon to Drach'nyen, and the last person to hold it was a Custodian who ran into the webway).
I thought said "golden giant" was meant to be the Deceiver?
Nurglitch wrote: It could also be Lorgar. I think in Master of Mankind it's remarked that Drach'nyen would need millions of years to overcome a Custodes' defenses.
I guess there's at least a short story to be told at some stage about how Drach'nyuk'nyuk'nyuk got away from the Custodes who was meant to be its guardian, if GW/BL feels like telling it,
w1zard wrote: What about Vangorich? Why didn't the custodes step in when he had all the other highlords assassinated and basically took control of Terra? The space marines had to do the dirty work.
I may be very wrong on this, but the Custodes don't have hundred of thousands of guys, they are in the tens of thousands, I think? They don't want to divert resources for defending Big E, to settling political issues.
Furthermore, the Marines at the time, numbered in the millions. Again, this was pre-codex astartes correct? They were somewhat more capable of putting down this sort of uprising.
In the past, The Big E has used Custodes in this way, the only difference being he was personally with them when it started. When Big E put down the Techno Barbarian hordes, he arrived at the front of a number of "Golden Warriors" which he called his Custodians. I think it was like, 1k Custodes/The Emperor vs. 100k of everyone else?
w1zard wrote: What about Vangorich? Why didn't the custodes step in when he had all the other highlords assassinated and basically took control of Terra? The space marines had to do the dirty work.
I may be very wrong on this, but the Custodes don't have hundred of thousands of guys, they are in the tens of thousands, I think? They don't want to divert resources for defending Big E, to settling political issues.
Furthermore, the Marines at the time, numbered in the millions. Again, this was pre-codex astartes correct? They were somewhat more capable of putting down this sort of uprising.
In the past, The Big E has used Custodes in this way, the only difference being he was personally with them when it started. When Big E put down the Techno Barbarian hordes, he arrived at the front of a number of "Golden Warriors" which he called his Custodians. I think it was like, 1k Custodes/The Emperor vs. 100k of everyone else?
A couple of small things: Vangorich was active quite some time after the heresy, so the codex astartes was very much a thing. Also your numbers are a bit exaggerated I think. Yes the Custodes rank at about 10000 man strong, but the Astartes did not rank in the millions I think.
The last thing about diverting resources: we know from the custodes codex that they actively eliminated threats to the throne and the sol system in the last 10000 years, they just did more or less in secred. Or they protected people they deemed important for the defence of the imperium. So according to that lore they should have been able to divert resources to deal with vangorich. Basically if the custodes really, really want to deal with any threat directly on terra or the inner sol system, there is no one who could stop them. Outside the sol system not so much, that is more the space marines or inquisitions turf, but you get my point.
It's basically just lore discrepancies between the new codex custodes lore and rather old, long standing lore.
In my opinion there could have been an elegant way to explain the inactivity of the custodes during the times of vangorich or the age of apostasy when goge vandire screwed the imperium over: if in that time the custodes again had to divert many of their forces to fight demons in the webway, because the webway gate beneath the golden throne opened up just a little bit periodically because of malfunctions it would have been rather believable that they had no time to deal with anything else. We also know that they most likely would not have asked for help from the grey knights in that case, because the custodes are rather proud as we know and would never admit that they need the help of those upstart demon hunter kids, who might just be better than them at killing demons.
Now we know of course that this did not happen. The webway gate remained closed after the emperor was placed on the golden throne in perpetuity, but like I said it would have explained the inactivity of the custodes through key events in the last 10000 years a bit better.
I'm sorry, I was looking at the first page of this thread when I responded, thinking I was on the last page. I did not mean to necro an already pointed out argument.
I think their hypocrisy is part of the charm of the IoM. The government of the IoM is a crushing burden on mankind because anything else would fail mankind. Imperial Guardsmen are used as cannon fodder because advanced military technology is sparse. Trillions of xenos are genuinely out to devour humanity mind, body and soul. Therefore the rulers of humanity must use draconian measures to fight them.
The Custodes have the luxury to flaunt their disdain, spoiled as they are.
Red Marine wrote: I think their hypocrisy is part of the charm of the IoM. The government of the IoM is a crushing burden on mankind because anything else would fail mankind. Imperial Guardsmen are used as cannon fodder because advanced military technology is sparse. Trillions of xenos are genuinely out to devour humanity mind, body and soul. Therefore the rulers of humanity must use draconian measures to fight them.
The Custodes have the luxury to flaunt their disdain, spoiled as they are.
Thats actually quite a nice summary. Really makes you wonder what the imperium could have looked like if the emperor had been able to complete his webway project.
Dysartes wrote:I thought said "golden giant" was meant to be the Deceiver?
Nurglitch wrote:It could also be Lorgar. I think in Master of Mankind it's remarked that Drach'nyen would need millions of years to overcome a Custodes' defenses.
Dysartes wrote:
Nurglitch wrote: It could also be Lorgar. I think in Master of Mankind it's remarked that Drach'nyen would need millions of years to overcome a Custodes' defenses.
I guess there's at least a short story to be told at some stage about how Drach'nyuk'nyuk'nyuk got away from the Custodes who was meant to be its guardian, if GW/BL feels like telling it,
I would pre-order whatever book has that story in. But you all definitely think it's wasn't a custodian? I don't see how the deceiver, even a shard, could have escaped the necrons and why it would then guide Abaddon to the sword. And I would think Abby would recognize Lorgar.
Dysartes wrote:I thought said "golden giant" was meant to be the Deceiver?
Nurglitch wrote:It could also be Lorgar. I think in Master of Mankind it's remarked that Drach'nyen would need millions of years to overcome a Custodes' defenses.
Dysartes wrote:
Nurglitch wrote: It could also be Lorgar. I think in Master of Mankind it's remarked that Drach'nyen would need millions of years to overcome a Custodes' defenses.
I guess there's at least a short story to be told at some stage about how Drach'nyuk'nyuk'nyuk got away from the Custodes who was meant to be its guardian, if GW/BL feels like telling it,
I would pre-order whatever book has that story in. But you all definitely think it's wasn't a custodian? I don't see how the deceiver, even a shard, could have escaped the necrons and why it would then guide Abaddon to the sword. And I would think Abby would recognize Lorgar.
I'm not claiming it's Lorgar, just pointing out that 'golden giant' is super generic.
Ketara wrote: It might even have been a piece of Magnus.
they're all accounted for as I understand it
Now their all accounted for, but not then. Still, I think abby would have recognized a primarch, or part of a primarch. I could have been the Emperor/Imperious for all I know.
Eipi10 wrote: I don't see how the deceiver, even a shard, could have escaped the necrons and why it would then guide Abaddon to the sword.
Deceiver shows Adaddon to the sword. Abaddon becomes super powerful. Abaddon has the influence to invade the Gothic Sector (encouraged by the Deceiver). Four of the six Blackstone Fortresses are destroyed. Deciever scores a win.
There are C'tan shards which aren't under Necron control. We've seen plenty of them.
Ketara wrote: It might even have been a piece of Magnus.
they're all accounted for as I understand it
As of the static timeline, yes. Remember however, that the warp exists outside of time. It could have been one of his shards reaching forwards through the warp.
Eipi10 wrote: I don't see how the deceiver, even a shard, could have escaped the necrons and why it would then guide Abaddon to the sword.
Deceiver shows Adaddon to the sword. Abaddon becomes super powerful. Abaddon has the influence to invade the Gothic Sector (encouraged by the Deceiver). Four of the six Blackstone Fortresses are destroyed. Deciever scores a win.
There are C'tan shards which aren't under Necron control. We've seen plenty of them.
Why does the Deceiver want Blackstone fortresses destroyed?
My memory wants to say somewhere in the War of Heaven? Check some of the Eldar lore, maybe. Take it with a grain of salt.
I thought their name as the Talismans of Vaul was something which was canon, but the only reference on Lexicanum seems to be the latest Codex: Harlequins. Even that reference doesn't call them out specifically as designed to kill C'Tan.
Yes i know i go hide behind Kant again.....
