"Retconned this for a political reason": Asmongold claims Games Workshop should have launched female Custodes into Warhammer 40K in a better way

Popular Twitch streamer Zack "Asmongold" criticized the way Games Workshop has handled retconning the lore about female Adeptus Custodes in Warhammer 40K. The Custodes, or just Custodians, in the fantasy table-top storyline, are some of the most elite units in the human faction and a recent controversy has rocked the community after the newly launched 10th edition of the Codex: Adeptus Custodes mentioned a female Custodian for the first time.

A sizeable fraction of the fan community is in uproar after a recent post on X by the official Warhammer account about there being women Custodes went viral garnering millions of views. Asmongold, known for his hot takes, gave his opinion on the matter while speaking on his Twitch stream, and claimed that the retconning was likely "political" in nature:

"Pretty obvious that Games Workshop just retconned this probably for a political reason, like, 'Oh there's men and women that are a part of this.'"

The streamer went on to say that Games Workshop should have done something else and owned up to changing Warhammer 40K lore instead of saying there were female Custodes from the beginning:

"I think that if they had said, 'Yeah, this wasn't the case originally but now we are going to add them in because we feel like women should be included in this.' I think that people, they would take it a lot better than this."

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"They insulted their audience": Asmongold talks about Games Workshop's "revisionist" retconning of women Custodes

Asmongold claimed that blatantly revising the lore and not owning up to the mere fact that they were adding women as Custodians is insulting to the fans who love the Warhammer franchise:

"Because I think what people really don't like about a post like this is the fact that it's an insult to the intelligence of the people that are buying the products. And you have to keep in mind that people that play Warhammer are really smart because if you are not, you're probably not going to have a job that can give you money to buy Warhammer."

He specifically addressed the post on X by the Warhammer account that has angered many fans by stating "there have always been female Custodians" and claimed that it was insulting:

"And so, it's not really the fact that they made female Custodians, it's the fact that they insulted their audience into telling them that they were always there."

Asmongold further stated that "woke people" cheering this move by Games Workshop are pathetic because they are being "farmed", insinuating that they are being taken advantage of:

"I see these woke people that get, 'Oh wow, we're winning, we're winning!' No you are not, you are being farmed, and that's pathetic! It's pathetic by Games Workshop for doing this, and it's pathetic for these people for eating it up."

The Twitch streamer went on to say that Games Workshop's treatment of retconning female Custodes into the lore is one of the "best examples" of "the word woke":

"I think that in general whenever people say the word woke it's usually whenever it's something that is shoehorned into a product or an IP or a fantasy that doesn't really seem to need to be there but is only there for a perceived political reason. I think this is probably one of the best examples of that."

He continued saying that it was revisionist and that Games Workshop should have been open about it:

"To be fair it's obviously revisionist, and if they would just come out and take accountability for that, I think people would be annoyed but they would... you know, it would be honest at least."

Asmongold is known for criticizing "woke" media on his stream, and recently was called out by fellow Twitch streamer Squeex who claimed content creators such as Asmongold need woke culture to make content about.