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I often read Custodes are the best. I don't understand why.

I don't want to troll (tyranids would eat me), but i have some knowledge in war history, and the Custodes seem to fail at a precise point that make real "royal guards" good : They don't fight.
I know training is of first importance, but i don't see how it can replace a life long of real fight against real and so diverse enemies, with all the different tactics, coup-fourrés, lessons, tricks you learn by fighting.

Nearly all the "royal guard" know as goods have been fighting. Even the Praetorian fought, and a lot. But we never read of fightings by the Custodes...

Their genenome isof a different more refined breed.

They are developed to fight as individual bastions instead of having the brotherhood feel that the Astartes have.

Unfortunately so many writers make the Custodes bad by having them torn to pieces by "normal" or "champion" marines. (which wouldn't be so bad if it didnt happen in nearly every HH novel and with such gruesome finality)

Because they are not Astartes. Custodes are created through different means than Astartes, they are vat-grown similar to how the primarchs were. They fall somewhere between Astartes and primarchs in that regard.

The Custodes fought a lot during the Great Crusade. Even after the Emperor :retired" to build the Golden Throne and rebuild/harness the webway he sent out his Custodes to keep an eye on some of his less trustworthy sons, generals, adepts etc to insure his rule was enforced.

But in "current" 40k lore i.e. the current time the 41st millenium the Custodes are supposedly just Royal Guards. Which honestly makes me agree with you, they don't seem all that great except they are supposed to be genetically superior to Space Marines not just militarily.

In the older fluff, even as far up as HH:CV, custodes were supposed to be superior to astartes in every way. As Orblivion stated, they straddle the line between Primarch and Marine, superior but fewer in number.

In the new HH books, however, especially First Heretic, the custodes are not presented as inherently superior. They fight differently, individually, and with great skill, but even one on one there doesn't seem to be an indication it would be an auto-win for the custodes. That's a pretty big ret-conn.

As for what they would be like in 40k, well that depends on which version of the heresy fluff is more cannon. There are only supposed to be 300 custodes and they don't leave the palace for any reason. Indeed, the older fluff indicates that after the emperor was put on the golden throne the custodes abandoned even their armor and took a reclusive life of protecting the now zombie emperor so they represent a negligible fighting force in all probability. Now if more could be made again, well that's a different issue.

buddha wrote:As for what they would be like in 40k, well that depends on which version of the heresy fluff is more cannon.

There is no canon - hence, Custodes can be weaker, as strong as, or better as a Space Marine. It all depends on who is writing whatever you're looking at, which is why I think people should consciously choose a specific interpretation of the setting they want to roll with. Trying to blend it all will just create a huge mess like in the Lexicanum wiki.

buddha wrote:There are only supposed to be 300 custodes and they don't leave the palace for any reason.

Actually, if we go by the Codex Imperialis, there are more than that. The 300 is just the inner guard, called "Companions", which serve the Emperor as a personal bodyguard. The rest is responsible for overall defence of the Imperial Palace - which truly is friggin' huge and a big city all by itself.

The Custodes are strong and they do fight a in the great crusade and the heresy. But, as far as post heresy goes they don't really have much of a role. Their sole purpose in 40k is to protect the Emperor. While they did do and preform the will or Rogal Dorn and Malcador. They really have no independent leader among st their own ranks. They are purely tools. This doesn't mean that they're weak. On the contrary they are quite strong, possess skill, and are comparable to nearly anything in the 40k universe. But, as their sole duty is to the Emperor. After the heresy its only natural that they take up the duty to protect the Emperor in his deathless state. They are above a regular Astartes, and just below that of a Primarch. Of the best warriors in the imperium though. Its without a doubt. Grey Knights. They are closer to the Emperors gene then any Astartes and comparable strength of the custodes without being tools.

It is mentioned in the HH books that the Astartes are in awe of the individual combat prowess of the Custodes, however, it is also mentioned in nearly the same breath that this is their greatest flaw as the Marines see it.

The Astartes excel at fighting in groups centered around the squad and virtually no single Custodes can match that power. This ability to "divine the thoughts and actions" of their bretheren because of that genetic similarity and intimate knowledge of each other gained over many, many years amplifies their combat ability. When broadened to a Company, a Chapter or an entire Legion, the fighting quality of the Astartes is nearly unmatched man for man.

Little is mentioned of the Custodes post-Heresy mostly because they were the Emperors body guards. Since the Emperor is "Throne-ridden" (sorry) there doesn't seem to be much for them to do... except, well, walk around shirtless wearing a helmet.

Mm, in first heretic they take out possessed space marines with a ratio of about 3 to 1. They also take down a Cataphract, which is something that supposedly was a very difficult for infantry to do. Lastly, the Custodes that fought during the Great Crusade are quite likely still living. They're immortal like the Emperor and the Primarchs barring death in Battle. So they would still have hundreds of years of fighting experience.

 Ratbarf wrote:
Mm, in first heretic they take out possessed space marines with a ratio of about 3 to 1. They also take down a Cataphract, which is something that supposedly was a very difficult for infantry to do. Lastly, the Custodes that fought during the Great Crusade are quite likely still living. They're immortal like the Emperor and the Primarchs barring death in Battle. So they would still have hundreds of years of fighting experience.

I don't think there is any proof what-so-ever whether a Primarch is immortal let alone a Custodes, is there?!

The Custodes train against each other constantly...
They also specialise in more than just warfare.

Uhlan wrote:I don't think there is any proof what-so-ever whether a Primarch is immortal let alone a Custodes, is there?!

If there is, I've never heard of it.
Probably the same "urban legend" stuff like normal Space Marines being immortal, too, and at least 8 feet in height!

 Lynata wrote:

Uhlan wrote:I don't think there is any proof what-so-ever whether a Primarch is immortal let alone a Custodes, is there?!

If there is, I've never heard of it.
Probably the same "urban legend" stuff like normal Space Marines being immortal, too, and at least 8 feet in height!

I feel that the fact that the "creation" of the Custodes is a long and tedious process (like say a custom, hand built Shelby Cobra) whereas your average Astarte's creation is more akin to something that came off an assembly line (Ford Mustang) would imply that - at the least - each individual Custodian is a long term investment. So perhaps not immortal, but long-lived indeed.

I believe that no Custode has died of natural causes, just like no marine has yet died of natural causes(though most go crazy or are slain after a few hundred years)

Are they Immortal? Maybe, not sure. Can't really ever answer that question.

Grey Templar wrote:I believe that no Custode has died of natural causes, just like no marine has yet died of natural causes(though most go crazy or are slain after a few hundred years)

Correction: You may not have read of a Custodes dying of natural causes. Much like with a lot of other character types. For some reason, we only tend to hear about people being killed on the battlefield, and the Custodes are probably one of the most undeveloped groups of the whole fluff, right next to the Frateris Templar or the Artemis cult of Xenan VII.

The average Space Marines has a natural lifespan 2-3 times that of a normal human, as per the 6E rulebook. Blood Angels are the odd exception in that they can reach ~1.000 years as a side-effect of their flaw, with their current Commander even being 1.100 years old.
I see no reason to believe that Custodes can live longer than a Space Marine. Maybe they can, but that's pure speculation and just as good a theory as if I'd say that they can only live for 20 years because their bodies are so souped up that they expire soon after being born, with the Adeptus requiring a constant supply of fresh recruits to take the place of their predecessors to serve only for a handful of years before they collapse. How grimdark would that be?

 Lynata wrote:
There is no canon - hence, Custodes can be weaker, as strong as, or better as a Space Marine. It all depends on who is writing whatever you're looking at, which is why I think people should consciously choose a specific interpretation of the setting they want to roll with.

While I get what you are saying, never has a Custodian been portrayed as weaker than a Marine, discounting A Thousand Sons, which had powerful Thousand Sons Sorcerers killing multiple Marines left and right, but that was less due to them being better due to being Marines, and more to do with being better because they're very powerful sorcerers.

 Kiryu Mk 3 wrote:
The Custodes are strong and they do fight a in the great crusade and the heresy. But, as far as post heresy goes they don't really have much of a role. Their sole purpose in 40k is to protect the Emperor. While they did do and preform the will or Rogal Dorn and Malcador. They really have no independent leader among st their own ranks. They are purely tools. This doesn't mean that they're weak. On the contrary they are quite strong, possess skill, and are comparable to nearly anything in the 40k universe. But, as their sole duty is to the Emperor. After the heresy its only natural that they take up the duty to protect the Emperor in his deathless state. They are above a regular Astartes, and just below that of a Primarch. Of the best warriors in the imperium though. Its without a doubt. Grey Knights. They are closer to the Emperors gene then any Astartes and comparable strength of the custodes without being tools.

A Custodian isn't anywhere near a Primarch in power.

But yeah, in terms of physical stats, they are slightly larger and stronger than Marines, and above that endure rigorous training to make them incredibly impressive duelists, compared to Marines, who are soldiers. In hand to hand combat, not many Marines could take a Custodian.

 Lynata wrote:
]If there is, I've never heard of it.
Probably the same "urban legend" stuff like normal Space Marines being immortal, too, and at least 8 feet in height!

I've never heard of Custodians being immortal, but Primarchs were designed to last, and were built to be as immortal as the God Emperor himself IIRC.

Also, marines can die of natural causes, there is precedent for this. Some Grey Knight Librarians get so old and decrepit they can no longer enter the field of battle, and take to maintaining their library, acting as brokers of knowledge and guardians of lore, or something.

 Kiryu Mk 3 wrote:
They are above a regular Astartes, and just below that of a Primarch. Of the best warriors in the imperium though. Its without a doubt. Grey Knights. They are closer to the Emperors gene then any Astartes and comparable strength of the custodes without being tools.

There is no real difference in capability as warriors between Grey Knights and "regular" Astartes beyond their varying access to technology and arcane lore. It would always depend on the individual combatants. Custodians would likely be better as individual combatants, but even then if a "hero" level Space Marine is involved, there's no real telling.

Thunder Warriors on the other hand... those guys were outright beasts.

I like the way the difference was outlined in "First Heretic"

Custodes are superb individual warriors, but Astartes are perfect soldiers. A Custode's fighting style is very individualistic, they don't fight as a unit. A group of Custodes will fight individually, they arn't a cohesive force. A group of Space Marines is a well oiled machine that is much greater then the sum of its parts. The Custodes are only the sum of their parts, they basically only compete with the Astartes because they are just that good.



On a side note, Thunder Warriors were indeed beasts. More like muscle bound gorillas in body armor then true soldiers though. Excellent shock troops for sure, but lacking the surgical precision the Space Marines ended up with. They were basically the Emperor's guinea pigs for the Space Marine's physical attributes, that we later merged with the more refined abilities of the primarchs to give the perfect super soldier.

 Grey Templar wrote:


On a side note, Thunder Warriors were indeed beasts. More like muscle bound gorillas in body armor then true soldiers though. Excellent shock troops for sure, but lacking the surgical precision the Space Marines ended up with. They were basically the Emperor's guinea pigs for the Space Marine's physical attributes, that we later merged with the more refined abilities of the primarchs to give the perfect super soldier.

I refer you to Outcast Dead, when one punks half a dozen Astartes.

Well all through the HH novels they continually call the Astartes, Custodes, and Primarchs Immortals, and frequently explain that barring a death in battle, they will live forever.

The Custodes fight each other to gain experiance. IIRC these training exercises aren't with dummy weapons either.

They aren't Astartes at all, IIRC.

The average Space Marines has a natural lifespan 2-3 times that of a normal human

That might be what 6E says, but that doesn't even make sense in-universe.

What you're telling me is, a Space Marine might naturally live to be 80 to 120 years old? Life is short and death by starvation, disease and industrial accident frighteningly common in the Imperium... and so these genetic super-freaks get to see two or three times that?

Even if we look at it from a 21st century perspective, that puts the average lifespan of a Space Marine at 160-240 years.... there are *far* too many Marine Sergeants with 2, 3 or 5 service studs in their skulls for this to be accurate.

They arn't even considered human by many people. The Astartes in particular have disdain for the Custodes because they arn't human.

Its because they're grown in vats. Space Marines were human once.

Psienesis wrote:Even if we look at it from a 21st century perspective, that puts the average lifespan of a Space Marine at 160-240 years.... there are *far* too many Marine Sergeants with 2, 3 or 5 service studs in their skulls for this to be accurate.

In Black Library novels maybe. I've not seen any Sergeant with 5 studs in GW material - though the Blood Angels should have some, ofc.

Looking at the official miniature, I spot the following:
Unnamed Marine Captain - 1 stud
Captain Lysander - 3 studs
Captain Kor'sarro Khan - 2 studs
Captain Stern - 2 studs

Make of that what you will.

Well, using Lysander as an example... we first see him as a Sergeant in 567.M40, defeating heretics at the Battle of Colonial Bridge on Iduno, and defeated Warsmith Shon'tu of the Iron Warriors in 998.M41.

Even setting apart the 1000 years he spent in the Warp, which we're not provided a specific year for, there's 400+ years of time between Iduno and the defeat of Shon'tu (~1400, but again, discounting 1000) to be added on top of however old he was at Colonial Bridge as a Sergeant. Fifty? A hundred? Thirty-five? We don't know... but this one guy (yes, an exceptional Marine, to be sure) is already beating the odds on the life-span limit, and shows no signs of slowing down.

So unless they die like Replicants, and just sort of shut down when their expiration date is reached, I'm thinking that the 6E statement about double/triple the lifespan of normal humans is another example of GW not really understanding the scale of their own established timelines.

And I wouldn't go by the model to see what Service studs are canon. I mean, they made the Lysander model before his fuff was fully fleshed out. I don't think him being lost in the Warp had happened yet at that point.

Psienesis wrote:Even setting apart the 1000 years he spent in the Warp, which we're not provided a specific year for [...]

Exactly, we are not provided specific dates for this. You are assuming a full and even 1.000 years where the source material, if you read it carefully, never stated this, leaving the details open to interpretation. We've been over this in another thread just days ago.

Psienesis wrote:So unless they die like Replicants, and just sort of shut down when their expiration date is reached, I'm thinking that the 6E statement about double/triple the lifespan of normal humans is another example of GW not really understanding the scale of their own established timelines.

I think it's more that fans are used to an "idealised" depiction of Space Marine abilities propagated in various licensed products such as the occasional Black Library novel.

Grey Templar wrote:And I wouldn't go by the model to see what Service studs are canon.

That's true, miniatures are bad evidence. I just thought it interesting how it lines up. Can anyone show me a mini with 5 studs? Can anyone even show me this supposed 5-stud-Sergeant in the fluff, or is this just from memory like the supposed 1.000 years?

Grey Templar wrote:I mean, they made the Lysander model before his fuff was fully fleshed out.

Isn't that story already from around 2E?
Either way, the "1 stud = 100 years" has been around for a while, and I think (hope) GW would keep it in mind when designing their minis.

 Psienesis wrote:

The average Space Marines has a natural lifespan 2-3 times that of a normal human

That might be what 6E says, but that doesn't even make sense in-universe.

What you're telling me is, a Space Marine might naturally live to be 80 to 120 years old? Life is short and death by starvation, disease and industrial accident frighteningly common in the Imperium... and so these genetic super-freaks get to see two or three times that?

Even if we look at it from a 21st century perspective, that puts the average lifespan of a Space Marine at 160-240 years.... there are *far* too many Marine Sergeants with 2, 3 or 5 service studs in their skulls for this to be accurate.

iirc in the first Soul Drinkers omnibus Lord General Xarius (third "book") was 110 years old and running around leading the assault. Now in 40k terms this suggests the people at the top of the tree probably have greater than modernday life spans. Maybe going up to 130-150. not the 40-50 of hive gangers but it give a more sensible output of 300-500 years for a boggo spacemarine

I don't believe Marines are immortal; the old SW Codex mentions specifically that the Wolves are slightly longer lived than normal marines, albeit not to the level of Blood Angels.
Conversely, 2-3 times a normal human lifespan is too short, even for regular marines.

Logan Grimnar, for instance, is currently some 700 years of age, and although he's gotten grey hairs, he can still kick butt with the best of them.
Ulrik the Slayer must be even older, as he was already a Wolf Priest when Logan was still a pup of a Blood Claw.

Wasn't there also an Ultramarine Chaplain who's around 600 years old?