Warhammer 40K Wiki Lore Changed, Discord Telling Longtime Fans to Leave

Video Games

Warhammer 40K is gaslighting its longtime fans. A few days ago, the popular tabletop game – or, more specifically, the company that owns it, Games Workshop – introduced female Custodes into the game, something that longtime players pointed out broke with the game’s intricate lore. Games Workshop then told anyone who complained that there had always been female Custodes, which former Blizzard producer Mark Kern disputed in a detailed X thread. Now, Games Workshop is going even further in its gaslighting campaign, changing the Custodes wiki page to say that female Custodes have always existed in Warhammer:

BREAKING: Warhammer Fandom for 40k wiki ERASES lore, edits Costodes wiki to say there were always female Custodes.

This type of political gaslighting is absolutely disgusting.

It's not enough to change the lore, they have to lie about the past. pic.twitter.com/CPoHiXBZFO

— Grummz (@Grummz) April 19, 2024

The 40k fandom wiki even changed the quoted lore…

This is levels of gaslighting that could detonate a small city.

This has to stop. https://t.co/mrrBFmAcC4 pic.twitter.com/SEZx26j31X

— Grummz (@Grummz) April 19, 2024

As Kern points out, this was done today, April 19, 2024; they hadn’t even thought to change the wiki when the female Custodes were announced. It’s disturbing that they’re trying to change the past like this. They’re not even admitting it was changed; they’re pretending it was always like this. As the Critical Drinker pointed out in a video he made on the subject, you can’t do this to something that has as detailed and involved a lore as Warhammer has. Part of the appeal is the complex universe the game inhabits; you can’t lie about it to fans who’ve studied it for years.

But it gets complicated when you look at the largest Warhammer Discord server, where the person who runs it announced that people who don’t like the changes are “monsters” who are no longer welcome:

Largest Warhammer Discord CENSORS speech on Custodes. If you disagree with the change you are a "monster" and subject to hate speech bans.

Custodes being "undefined" is a lie, the lore was VERY well defined as I outlined in my former tweets, with receipts! pic.twitter.com/Pa7KP3PeQ7

— Grummz (@Grummz) April 19, 2024

The contradictions are amusing. There have always been female Custodes, but also, female Custodes were just added because Warhammer “has to change to reflect modern day sentiments.” Games Workshop isn’t making both of these statements, but the incongruity it creates reinforces how radical the change is and that even sections of the fandom who are on board with the change know that it is, in fact, a change. And while, again, this Discord isn’t run by Games Workshop, it can’t look good for them to have fan groups like this pushing out anyone who cares too much for their taste.  Then again, this policy is based on the message Games Workshop made for fans a few years ago, so maybe they’re fine with it. Considering all the noise over this, it appears a large contingent of the fandom doesn’t like this change and probably dislikes the responses to their arguments even less. If Games Workshop and community leaders want to push them out, they could be losing a lot of customers/members. I don’t know how much this will hurt their profits, and to a degree, they probably care more about trying to affect social change than making money. But the backlash to seeing these initiatives in gaming has been palpable, so Games Worshop may find that they made a big mistake.