Setting information

Novus Ordo Conservatorum largely follows in the footsteps of In memoriam perpetuam, which itself was an adaptation of IllFlower’s original Magical Burst campaign. Although the changes between games are by now arguably too significant to reasonably consider them all part of the same continuity, many of the characters and events carry over from incarnation to incarnation.

The world of magic

Our protagonists are Conservators of the Magical Order, initiates in an esoteric occult tradition that dates back to at least the Carolingian Empire and was transmitted to Japan around the time of St. Francis Xavier in the 16th century. The Order claims an ambiguously God-given responsibility to protect humanity from spiritual corruption that manifests as shadowy entities called witches or demons. It is by far the largest organization of magically-endowed beings in the world, though by no means does it have a monopoly on the practice.

The Conservators are selected and nominally overseen by magical entities called familiars, whose authority rests mostly in the ability to freely grant and revoke powers. (Some humans, however, display an innate “baseline” affinity for magic that familiars cannot affect.) In practice, familiars are largely removed from their charges’ exercise of magic, except when particularly heinous abuses come into the picture. Most Conservators are recruited into magic during their teenage years, and generally retire by their mid-twenties. The vast majority of initiates, something like eighty percent, are female, and thus even those who should know better often use the term “magical girls” to refer to them.

Officially, the familiars in turn report to a special council of human Prophets, who sit at the Order’s highest echelons, but are rarely acknowledged in day-to-day practice.

The hierarchy, TL;DR version

Here are our revised gross divisions of the characters’ magical world:

• Civilians are now a mix of Faithful and Mountain People, the flock that the Conservators are responsible for shepherding but who are generally unaware of their guardians. Their civic institutions are the equivalent of Dogs’ Territorial Authority.
• Outsider magicians take various stripes. Some see their abilities as merely a curiosity, others as a burden, and yet others as a sword. Most are unaware of the Order’s existence, and the Order is generally happy to oblige except in cases of particularly powerful or volatile wielders. The flip side of this hands-off approach is that it can be hard for Conservators to assert the Order’s primacy except through force.
• Conservators, like the Dogs, preserve social harmony by fighting corruption using their magic.
• Familiars continue to be Stewards with authority over the Conservators’ magical duties.
• The Prophets, as always, form the Order’s ultimate leadership. They are essentially invisible to Conservators, and some quietly doubt their existence.

And here’s how they map to the Stewardship charts on pp. 98–99:

• Magic overall: Civilians and outsiders → Conservators → Familiars → Prophets
• Families: Conservators’ families → Conservators
• Local and regional officials: Generally handled by a single familiar
• Conservators: Conservators → Conservators’ familiars → Prophets
• Individuals: Non-magical life, day-to-day tasks, social mores, etc. → Individual

Running the numbers

This hasn’t changed much from In memoriam perpetuam, except that magic doesn’t replace guns so much as become a second factor equivalent in power to them.

The Dogs manual isn’t clear about some aspects of healing conflicts. We use the following rules:

• Healing conflicts are follow-ups, so players can bring in kept dice from the last conflict if applicable.
• Any fallout taken by the healer is generally at d6, physical non-combat level.
• Healers that roll a fallout sum of 12 don’t need a follow-up medical conflict of their own. However, they still take two long-term fallout items.