Each turn, every player may issue a total of three (3) Orders, which can encompass virtually anything that your frankly staggering degree of political and military power could reasonably accomplish. Each Order must be self-contained, take place within a single territory and be focused on a common goal, but is otherwise fairly flexible - you could put in an order to reinforce the defences of Terra, for example, which could include constructing new defensive works, reassigning Segmentum forces and arranging for a series of speeches and parades to bolster the defender’s morale. Alternately, you could issue an order to glorify your own deeds and legend, which could involve hiring remembrancers to produce artistic works, formalising [Primarch Name] Day celebrations across the Imperium and having ten-mile-high statues constructed at every planetary capital in your local area.

By default, all Orders are successful. You want to schmooze, you schmooze. You want to build a bunch of new academies, they’re already signing the charters. The only time that success is in doubt is when you are going up against a fellow Primarch or an Institution. When that happens, we turn to the conflict rules.

In mechanical terms, all conflicts occur in one or more Arenas:

• Prowess; personal combat, martial valour and all acts dependent upon their transhuman biology.
• War; campaign planning, battlefield leadership and all the myriad logistical and strategic tasks necessary to wage war at the head of a Legion.
• Politics; forming coalitions, reforming organisations and pulling the levers of state to sway the course of nations.
• Glory; gaining allies, dissuading foes and manipulating public perception through charisma, oratory and leveraged reputation.
• Mystic; the supernatural realm, concerning ill-favoured mysticism and the arcane sciences of psychic influence.
• Covert; subtle action of all kinds, from suborned agents and infiltrators to strategic sabotage and assassination.

It is possible for a conflict to encompass more than one Arena, such as a sabotage campaign made to undermine an ongoing war, or attempts to bypass political institutions with raw popular appeal.

All Primarchs have a rating of 1-9 in each Arena, representing their broad foundational capability - these scores are referred to as their "Traits". Taken in isolation, a Primarch with a higher trait will reliably win a conflict against a Primarch with a lower trait.

Every Primarch also has three Qualities, representing their unique quirks, specialisations and capabilities. These qualities may modify their traits in certain circumstances, allow them to accomplish things that other Primarchs could not, or compel certain outcomes to particular circumstances.

Finally, all Primarchs have a personal pool of five Effort that refreshes each turn. Points of effort may be spent to raise a trait on a 1-to-1 basis, to a maximum of 10, for the purposes of a single order. Effort expenditures are only declared when conflicts occur.

When two Primarchs or Institutions come into conflict, be it in a battlefield duel or by advancing opposing agendas in the Senatorum Imperialis, the following process is followed:

1. The GM identifies where two or more sets of Orders are going to come into conflict and identifies the appropriate Arena/s. The relevant players are informed.

2. Especially complicated clashes may be split into multiple smaller sub-conflicts, which otherwise use the same rules.

3. One player is designated the Attacker, and the other the Defender; this is usually apparent based on the circumstances, but if it is not, then the higher base trait gets to choose.

4. This is mostly relevant for certain qualities, such as Rogal Dorn’s "Master of Defence" quality.

5. If there are more than two Primarchs or Institutions involved, then the Attacker and Defender will instead be a specific ‘side’ of a conflict, which players may then choose between.

6. Each player privately considers their qualities and effort pools and may choose to modify their relevant trait appropriately. They may also communicate with other Primarchs who are involved in the same conflict to negotiate or roleplay.

7. At this point either player may choose to yield, retreating from the field and suffering a minor consequence of their choice (as opposed to fighting it out, where the GM chooses).

8. Yielding means you do not achieve your goals, while the opponent achieves their goals in full. It is therefore not advised to yield in the face of someone seeking your destruction.

9. If both sides of a conflict yield, they may agree on a mutually acceptable outcome with regards to their individual goals. In this circumstance, no consequences are suffered.

10. If neither Primarch concedes, then the Defender’s modified trait is subtracted from the Attacker’s modified trait, with the final total determining the outcome:

11. 6 or more = Attacker Crushing Victory. The Attacker achieves their goals in their entirety and also gains a Major Boon, the Defender achieves nothing and also suffers a Major Consequence.

12. 4+ Attacker Major Victory. The attacker achieves their goals, while the Defender achieves those which do not directly conflict with the Attacker. The Attacker receives a Major Boon, the Defender receives a Minor Consequence.

13. 2+ Attacker Minor Victory. The attacker achieves their core goals, the defender achieves whatever goals do not conflict with this. The attacker receives a Minor Boon, the defender receives a Minor Consequence.

14. -1 to +1 = Stalemate. Each side achieves only those goals which are not contested by the opposition.

15. -2 or less = Defender Minor Victory

16. -4 or less = Defender Major Victory

17. -6 or less = Defender Crushing Victory

Boons and Consequences take the form of a numerical bonus or penalty applied to future actions, typically focused around a subset of a given arena; being injured would impose a penalty on most Prowess checks, while having your reputation smeared by Iterators would impose a penalty to Politics or Glory checks made against the broader civilian populace.

A Minor boon or consequence lasts for one turn, while a Major one lasts until specifically undone by an order (this order can come from any player, though generally trying to remove a boon from an enemy is going to be opposed).

Design Note - Short of a Crushing Victory, the defeated player always achieves the goals that are not directly contested by the victor. This is most relevant in conflicts with multiple Arenas. For example, using Prowess to win a major victory against someone’s War order may allow you to inflict significant casualties and brutalise the enemy commander, but as Angron learned this does not necessarily prevent them from achieving their strategic goals.

When two or more Primarchs or Institutions work together on the same side in a conflict, the resolution rules are modified as follows:

• Each side of the conflict will total up and compare a single, combined score.

• The Primarch with the highest relevant trait is designated the Primary Attacker/Defender. Their trait is added to the combined score in full.

• In certain circumstances, this may be altered - an order aimed at defeating a specific primarch on the battlefield is likely to set them as the Primary Defender, for example, even if there is a stronger ally getting involved.

• The Primarch or Institution with the next highest trait halves their trait, rounding down, and adds that to the combined score.

• All other Primarchs or Institutions supporting a side increase their combined score by one point.

• The primary combatant may spend effort to increase their trait as normal, to a maximum of 10. All other Primarchs involved may spend a maximum of one effort point each, which is added to the combined total directly. However, any modifiers arising from qualities, boons or consequences are applied in full.

• Teamwork is explicitly allowed to raise a combined total above 10.

Generally speaking, only the primary attacker or defender can receive a Major Boon or Consequence. All combatants may receive a minor boon or consequence.

If a Primarch is being attacked or otherwise directly opposed, then they do not require an order to defend themselves - it simply happens. However, it may come to pass that a conflict erupts that a nearby Primarch feels they really should get involved in, even if they did not see it coming. In that case, we follow the following process.

• When a conflict occurs, all Primarchs operating in the same Segmentum will be informed and given the opportunity to get involved. A Primarch can only react this way once per turn.

• In order to react, a Primarch must surrender one of their existing orders, representing plans abandoned or disrupted midway through. The order fails, and they suffer an appropriate minor consequence.

• A Primarch may choose to leave one of their order slots empty when submitting orders, in order to allow themselves additional flexibility. If they do so, they may react to other conflicts without penalty.

• A reacting primarch is then added to the relevant conflict. They suffer a -2 penalty to their relevant trait, much as they would for any action taken in a territory they are not currently present within.

Every Primarch has three Qualities. Generally, each will have two positive qualities, and one that is either negative or constrains their actions in some way.