“Do me a favor, would ya?”

A lock of lank, dirty-brown hair falls forward into the face of the street-tough wannabe who leans against a faded brick wall as he looks down at the holes in his shoes. He scratches the side of his nose, considering. “I don’t know, babe. The last time I did you a favor I almost got myself shot.”

“Yeah,” the woman looks up at him hopefully, eyes wide, “I know. You and your boys really came through for me.” She pauses and draws away, the orange from the street lamp tinting close-cropped blond hair. “But my friend in the morgue ‘lost’ that guy’s file for you. And now he can’t follow me around,” she fails to hide her grimace, “calling me at all hours of the night and taking pictures.” She shudders and turns away. “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

Without moving his head, he watches her with resignation. She’s playing him for his pull, his absolutely certain information. He knows that. Not a corner in a three mile radius but doesn’t have one of his kids with their ear to the ground or their hand in someone’s wallet. But she’s always repaid him, one way or the other, so he doesn’t care.

Silently he ponders who she wants to know about this time.

When he says nothing, she smiles at him over her shoulder, taking his lack of comment for assent. “There’s this guy…”

***

Before you read this article, go re-read the influence section in White Wolf’s Mind’s Eye Theatre: Laws of the Night (starts on pg. 96 of the most recent release of Laws).

Done that? Good. Now you’ve glanced through the influence tables and you know that you can’t have any more total influence traits than you have total Attribute traits. Great.

Now what, you ask, do mortal institutions have to do with your unlife?

In a word, plenty. Don’t have the money to buy a car? Make friends with some local cabbies and you can ride practically for free. Need to know where those sneaky Tremere got their hands on that shiny gem-crusted stick you saw one of the apprentices carrying? Start meeting for coffee with the owner of the local occult bookstore. Your bondmate frenzied at a summer concert and his fangs were caught on tape? Then you better hope you know _all_ the who’s who in the local media.

Some of the things you can do with influence are more efficiently done as backgrounds (which are detailed in the book, starting on pg. 93). If you only want a regular income, you want the Resources background, not three levels of High Society Influence. If you only want information, Allies or Contacts are much much more useful.

However, influence is more versatile. This week you can use your Street x3 to make $170, next week you can use it to find out who’s put a bounty on your head or to replace the pistol you ditched after shooting the Keeper’s favorite ghoul.

This article is not an end-all and be-all of Influence Use and Abuse in Flames Rising. Rather, I’m going to try to give an idea of how influence is used, how it is gained, and what we do with it in both mechanics terms and in story terms. Any questions that remain after you’ve read the article can be directed to me at crys@dragonrosecastle.net. If I get the same question a couple of times, I will edit the answer into this article, with examples to clarify, so check back periodically.

Mechanics

Let me start by getting the mechanics out of the way. You don’t use experience to buy influence. Only influence can create more influence (with the exception of your first level of influence, which requires roleplaying or someone else’s influence instead). All other things being equal, it takes roughly twice the amount of traits you’re aiming for (If you want a lvl 2 Transportation, it takes 4 traits of Transportation used solely toward increasing your influence).

All things are never equal, however. That means this general rule of thumb is complicated by several factors.

There is a finite amount of influence in a given city. There really are only so many police, only so many newspapers, only so many socialites in any city, and you’re not the only one out there trying to sway their opinions. It doesn’t take long before you have to start plotting how to bump your rivals out of your chosen field of influence.

The other thing to remember is that, though we may joke about them being cattle or food or even sheep, the mortals as individuals all have a mind of their own. They don’t take kindly to outright demands. You have to be subtle, to convince them – one way or another – that they wanted to do that task for you even before you asked them. And then you have to make it worth their while so they’ll do you a favor next time too.

To represent this second aspect, each influence increase comes with a built-in challenge that must be resolved before the next level is reached, regardless of trait expenditure. That can make it take far far longer than a simple “I use these four traits to reach level 2”. The amount of time required is also longer when very little of that influence is left open in the city.

As far as use of influences is concerned, I generally stick by the tables in Laws of the Night. You want a fake ID, you need at least a level 2 Bureaucracy and you have to spend at least two traits toward it. Each influence trait spent confers one influence action. When it comes to blocking other people’s influence (which isn’t detailed in the book but I allow anyway) or otherwise working directly at odds with another character via influence, I consider it on a one for one basis: Whoever spent more traits is 99% certain to win. That’s not as easy as it sounds. If Stephen the Tremere spends all his occult influence trying to keep Amenhotep from finding out about him, he has nothing left to defend against that omnipresent Nosferatu neonate looking to poach some mystical knowledge and influence.

Why only 99% certain? That leads us to…

Story

Yes, story. The mechanics are the brittle skeleton of Influence. Story is the muscle that makes it move, the skin and hair that makes it seductive. Mechanics mean nothing to me without the story to back them up. Every influence use, every influence-based npc, every rumor and active background has a story attached to it. Those stories have as much depth, as much detail, as the players are willing to draw from them–and many of those stories are interconnected, directly influencing each other’s resolution.

Any of our players could tell you that I always favor story over mechanics. If it makes a better story for things to go one way even though mechanics say it should go a different way, there’s a chance that I will write the better story. Usually in such a case I will talk to the another Narrator or the Storyteller first, to be sure that I really am writing the most cohesive, most engrossing story I could be. If they agree that it makes for a better story, you get your other 1%.

Ultimately, though, my stories feature the player characters as their centerpieces, so you will usually only see that one percent happen between a player character and the npcs, with the player character on the winning side.

I will create more intense stories for people who go into detail about what they’re doing and how they do it. Influence traits do not represent individual people generally, but I like to represent the traits through interaction with individual npcs. Those npcs should be thought of as characters in their own right, as they often are, rather than simple backdrop. We’re all in this to create stories, and any good story needs a stellar supporting cast to make the main character look phenomenal.

Now what?

Well, now you know how to gain traits and how to spend them. But what do you do with them?

Pretty much, anything you can think of. Information, services, gaining income, covering breaches of the Masquerade, messing with other characters, you name it, and you can probably do it with enough influence. Like the “real” world, it’s all about who you know and what you can convince them to do for you. If you played pool with the Police Chief every Friday night, you too might get a pesky murder weapon brushed under the rug.

Unfortunately, your elders have probably beaten you to the Police Chief. But you might nab yourself a lieutenant. (You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to realize that your lieutenant is a lower level of influence, say perhaps a lvl 2, than the Chief, who is most likely a lvl 4 or 5). Just remember, don’t ever let your elders know you’re trying to edge them out. There will be plenty of time to tell their ashes after you’ve staked them out for the sun. A little advice from someone who learned the hard way.

And don’t forget to maintain your influences. They’re people just like you. You have to keep up your contact with them rather than simply calling them when you need a favor… and don’t be surprised when they ask for something in return. Influence traits are just that: influence over other people. They are not servants and they are not guaranteed.

In short, influence is a measure of your pull with the mortals and your ability to get things done. They are the primary way of accomplishing the things you can’t do personally. With enough of the right kinds of influence, you can do anything you can imagine.