Areas of Influence
Bureaucracy
Example Specialities: business, power supply,
Church
Example Specialities: Buddhism, Christian, Jewish, Islamic or specific doctrines.
Education
Example Specialities: research, school, university
Finance
Example Specialities: bank, investment firm, stock
Health
Example Specialities: blood banks, doctor, hospital, nurses, nursing home
High Society
Example Specialities: culture, fashion, music, subculture,
Industry
Example Specialities: construction, manufacturing, mining, unions
Legal
Example Specialities: courts, judges, lawyers,
Media
Example Specialities: newspaper, television, radio,
Occult
Example Specialities: secret society (specific)
Police
Example Specialities: police, prison,
Politics
Example Specialities: local government, mayor, party representative,
Postal
Example Specialities: couriers, import/export, postal service,
Street
Example Specialities: street gangs, homeless, unorganised crime,
Telecommunications
Example Specialities: phone, internet,
Transportation
Example Specialities: airport, busses, freeways, shipping, taxis, trains,
Underworld
Example Specialities: arms, gambling, fraud, prostitution,
Deviations from oWoD:
- University changed to Education.
- Inclusion of Postal and Telecommunications.
REFERENCE MATERIAL
http://wodindex.wikispaces.com/Specialties
Allies
The Allies Background may be expended to perform extra influence abilities on your behalf. These abilities do not get pooled with your own, but they are not restricted to one specific type of influence. Allies cannot perform influence actions on your behalf.
Example: A particularly competent Ally worth two traits can be directed to obtain five blood traits for you (a level two Health influence ability) for the next game. While he is doing this he cannot be used to tail someone or use his specialized ability traits to your advantage.
Contacts
The Contacts Background may be used to simulate an influence for purposes of gathering information. These actions MAY NOT make use of the influence action STEALTH. You may stack influence and Contacts for this purpose. Contacts does give you access to loremasters, experts and other important individual information sources. Thus, information gathered from Contacts may be of lower quality than information gathered purely from influences.
You may also perform a WATCH action with Contacts or simulate an influence for the purpose of getting rumors. Stacking your Contacts with Influence for these purposes is also permissible.
Mentor
If you successfully appeal to your Mentor as per Laws of the Night: Revised p. 104, you can add the borrowed influence levels to your own for one category and only for one game.
Retainers
Traits of the Retainers background allow you to exceed your influence limits as prescribed above. This does not gift you with additional levels of influence, abilities or actions. This use of the Retainers background effectively ties them up and they are unable to watch over locations, perform menial functions, etc.
Influence abilities are the innate function of each influence Category, the tricks it can do for your character. Listed below are abilities you will automatically have access to due to your level of involvement in that influence category. These are guidelines; players are not restricted to the printed word.
Abilities allow you access to individuals who are capable of tutoring you in abilities appropriate to the category. All influence abilities are based on how many total levels you have going to it, though they can be from separate sources.
BUREAUCRACY
Governmental and business offices, including utilities; the creation and cutting of red tape. Carefully drawn lines exist between Bureaucracy and Legal, Police, Finance, and University.
Level 1: Alter/trace utility bills, expedite minor processes that take time, take advantage of minor bureaucratic loopholes, make files on peoples' traceable activity.
Level 2: Alter birth certificates/driver's license; temporarily close a small road or park, get inspectors sent to locations, cause delays in applications, acquire public aid ($250).
Level 3: Create false ID's, death certificates, marriage licenses, passports; close a public school for a day; shut down a small business on a violation; connect/disconnect utilities on a block.
Level 4: Create false land deeds and titles; initiate phone taps; initiate an NEA/BIA/IRS/DOI investigation, get untraceable utility service, bog down a lawsuit or investigation in red tape.
Level 5: Start, stop, or alter a city-wide program or policy; shut down a big business on a violation; rezone areas; destroy records of a person at the city level, stop a federal investigation.
Level 6: Arrange a secret audit of a person or business, destroy all identification records on a single person, get entire departments fired or transferred, gain technical immunity from something.
Level 7: Shut down utilities for one day citywide except for your haven, bulldoze all the blue houses in the county, rezone something as foreign territory, ship truckloads of nuclear waste to friends.
CHURCH
The non-secular world, all faiths.
Level 1: Identify secular members of a given faith in local area, peruse public church records, use a church as a meeting place, find an AA meeting, get a priest's phone number.
Level 2: Identify higher church members, track congregation members; suspend lay members, get coffee/bibles/Mass for 100 people on short notice, meet with a rabbi/imam/priest wherever you want.
Level 3: Open or close a single church/temple/mosque, access private archives of the church, meet with the Bishop, get a house ritually sanctified, manipulate a church-owned charity, steal from the collection plate or dip into church funds ($250).
Level 4: Discredit or suspend higher-level members, find an average church-associated hunter or exorcist, manipulate a fanatic splinter group, start a heresy/witchcraft investigation.
Level 5: Organize major protests/boycotts, manipulate regional branches, access ancient church lore, identify someone with True Faith or a church-associated hunter group without meeting them.
Level 6: Borrow or access church relics or sacred items, give a church-associated hunter false orders or information, get a graveyard desanctified, live safely as a Kindred priest
Level 7: Give cardinals orders, cause a local religious war, get a room at the Vatican, get serious relics shipped to you, acquire a list of all the hunters in the area affiliated with any church.
FINANCE
All things monetary; banks, investment firms, brokers, etc. All loans are amortized over one year to be paid back incrementally every month.
Level 1: Receive a loan ($100,000 - payback $120,000), learn about economic trends, get a dozen accounts all over town, run a credit check on someone, identify whether a bill is counterfeit, get up to $1,000 in cash.
Level 2: Receive a loan ($500,000 - payback $600,000), trace unsecured bank accounts, identify a person's collateral properties, get an insider stock tip.
Level 3: Receive a loan ($2,000,000 - payback $2,400,000), create a secure bank account, access ATM camera tapes, get copies of someone's signature.
Level 4: Receive a loan ($10,000,000 - payback $12,000,000), delay deposits; credit alterations, interfere with specific stock transactions, cause an IRS/SEC audit or investigation.
Level 5: Receive a loan ($50,000,000 - payback $60,000,000), control an aspect of city-wide banking, stop an IRS/SEC audit or investigation, foreclose on a small business.
Level 6: Receive a loan ($100,000,000 - payback $120,000,000), manipulate local banking, stop loans, seize accounts, shut down medium-size businesses, send out repo men.
Level 7: Receive a loan ($500,000,000 - payback $600,000,000), shut down major banks, buy any famous thing, have anything imported or built, take over any corporation in the Domain
HEALTH
Hospitals, blood banks, doctors. No bioweapons without the OK from all STs.
Level 1: Gain 2 blood traits, fake vaccination records, get medical supplies (latex gloves, biohazard stickers, syringes), be first in line at the ER, get a wheelchair van delivered.
Level 2: Gain 5 blood traits, access to minor medical records, get a copy of a coroner's report, get an ambulance to make a run with no record, get a doctor to make a house call.
Level 3: Gain 10 blood traits, corrupt results of tests or inspections, alter medical records, get a gunshot wound treated quietly, schedule patients for surgeries without their permission.
Level 4: Gain 20 blood traits, instigate a minor quarantine, acquire a cadaver, destroy medical records, have people institutionalized or released, start a CDC/AMA investigation, abuse grants for personal use ($250).
Level 5: Gain 50 blood traits, have a special research project performed, shut down a business for health code violations, stop a CDC/AMA investigation, close a doctor's office or two.
Level 6: Gain 100 blood traits, instigate a major quarantine, shut down a hospital, have mass blood samples taken, have a covert autopsy of a paranormal being performed.
Level 7: Gain 200 blood traits, shut down all area medical facilities, institutionalize VIP's, quarantine the domain, have everyone in the Congressional district named Smith lobotomized.
HIGH SOCIETY
Culture and subculture, fame, fashion, trendsetting.
Level 1: Obtain hard-to-get tickets for shows, get the lowdown on obscure subcultural trends, be the first to get that CD/DVD, hear about parties, learn about who's who.
Level 2: Track celebrities and luminaries, be a local voice in the entertainment field, get invited to the right parties, sit in the front row, get the sneak preview.
Level 3: Crush promising careers, get backstage passes to anything, have rich people ask you for trend advice, be well-known in a subculture or social scene.
Level 4: Achieve temporary minor celebrity status (Fame x1), skip lines, get VIP treatment everywhere, get hit on by beautiful people, know who is doing what with who, set minor trends.
Level 5: Appear on a talk show, ruin a new club/gallery/festival/other high society gathering, have an annual must-attend party with everybody there, meet visiting celebrities in their hotel rooms.
Level 6: Give temporary minor celebrity status to others (+1 level of Fame), have visiting celebrities visit you at home, be the #1 person to sleep with to get ahead.
Level 7: Gain blackmail material on everyone, summon anyone you've heard of to your home, remove celebrity status from people (minimum 1 Fame, static Social tests for more).
INDUSTRY
The business of making things, unions. All union thugs are mortals with 6 physical, 3 social, 4 mental, 1 willpower, a craft skill, and 2 brawls.
Level 1: Learn about industrial projects and movements, union membership, borrow portable tools, learn a trade, get a night job, get your car fixed cheap.
Level 2: Have minor projects performed by small crews, arrange small 'accidents' on the job site, get an expert welder to do a job for you, be known as a good member to a single union, dip into union funds or embezzle petty cash ($500)
Level 3: Get a union thug to break something, organize minor strikes, appropriate a blast furnace for a short time, get some silver bullets/vehicle armor/torture devices made.
Level 4: Get a pair of union thugs to burn something down, close or revitalize a small plant, take over a small plant for two weeks, get anyone booted out of any union, initiate an OSHA/EPA inspection.
Level 5: Get half a dozen masked union thugs to kidnap/terrorize someone, manipulate a large local industry, organize a major area strike, manufacture a hundred of anything, stop OSHA/EPA inquiries.
Level 6: Get a dozen union thugs with diesel equipment to demolish a building, cut off production of a single manufactured resource in the Domain, build a preposterous custom haven.
Level 7: Have every plant in the county switch to arms manufacturing, turn the day into night with smoke emissions, kick a multinational corporation out of the Domain.
LEGAL
Judges, lawyers, law firms, courtrooms, etc.
Level 1: Get free representation for small cases, have a lawyer who answers his phone, sue people for messing with you, learn about someone's holdings/legal status.
Level 2: Avoid bail for some charges, have minor charges dropped, get a quiet settlement when being sued, get a lawyer to build a complete file on someone, create a screen to slow investigations, acess public or court funds ($250).
Level 3: Get good representation, manipulate legal procedures (wills, contracts, etc), start a state investigation, have a lawyer with assistants drown someone in legal briefs.
Level 4: Issue subpoenas, tie up court cases, have most charges dropped, cancel or arrange parole, start a federal investigation of some sort, stop a state investigation.
Level 5: Close down a federal investigation, have deportation proceedings held against someone, get warrants revoked, hide ownership of anything, find a legal weakness to exploit.
Level 6: Close down any investigation, arrange for a court case to be decided however you please, get attorneys disbarred, get judges investigated, seriously threaten anyone with a custom lawsuit.
Level 7: Handpick area federal judges, arbitrarily decide all cases in the Domain, sue anyone and win, get any law declared unconstitutional, manufacture custom legal loopholes.
MEDIA
Newspapers, television, radio; local to the Domain.
Level 1: Learn about breaking stories early; submit small articles, know a few reporters to tip, be on college radio, get a letter to the editor published in an underground free press.
Level 2: Suppress small articles or reports, get investigative reporting information, get a photographer to show up, have a reporter in your pocket, get research done on a subject, trace personal ads.
Level 3: Initiate news investigations and reports, access media production resources, start a major investigative story, get a TV news crew to show up with satellite feed, make an independent film.
Level 4: Initiate a fake story with local attention, influence story selection, get an editor to kill a story, get a TV series to do a local episode, get radio personalities fired, kill an underground 'zine.
Level 5: Initiate a fake story with statewide attention, get newspaper people fired, affect the storyline of a TV show, change a radio station's format, own an unaffiliated local TV station, stop any one story.
Level 6: Initiate a fake story with nationwide attention, get TV personalities fired, control a local newspaper or TV affiliate, create a television show, create a major Hollywood picture locally, cancel local coverage of a sporting event, obtain and squander public funding ($250).
Level 7: Create a massive and pervasive ad campaign, make someone a celebrity against their will, give your major Hollywood picture a very good shot at an academy award, destroy a newspaper or affiliate TV station (except New York Times and Wall Street Journal).
OCCULT
Secret and fringe groups, libraries, experts and shops specializing in the paranormal.
Note: Rituals are generally easier to learn through negotiation with other PCs or NPCs, rather than via Occult Influence. Blood Magic Rituals are also easier to learn when you have the applicable Lores (Lore: Thaumaturgy and ) pertinent to the Blood Magic tradition in question.
Should you have the applicable Lore to learn a ritual, the difficulty in researching it with Occult Influence will be handled as per the chart below, depending on your number of ranks in the Ability:
Lore Level Effects Blood Magic Lore x2 - 1 for Very Common Rituals Blood Magic Lore x3 - 1 for Common Rituals Blood Magic Lore x4 - 1 for Uncommon Rituals Blood Magic Lore x5 - 1 for Rare Rituals Occult Ability Effects Occult x3 - 1 for Very Common Rituals Occult x4 - 1 for Common Rituals Occult x5 - 1 for Uncommon Rituals Example: If a character wanted to learn the Uncommon Thaumaturgical Ritual, Rebirth of Mortal Vanity via Occult Influence, and only possessed three levels of Influence, they would not be able to according to the chart below. However, should they possess Lore: Thaumaturgy x4, this difficult would be lowered, and the Ritual could be studied as a Level 3 Occult Influence Ability. Should the character in question also possess the Ability Occult x5, this difficulty would be reduced as such that the required influence level would be reduced to a Level 2 Occult Influence Ability.
Level 1: Contact common occult groups and practices, join a fringe religion, learn about new trends or dangers to the occult subculture, acquire candles, bones, crystals, etc. of decent quality, acquire common ritual components (galangal oil, tamarisk, feathers, shiny stones, etc...), research up to the second level of an inaccurate "outsider" Lore (Lore: Vampire, Lore: Cathayan, Lore: Fairy, Lore: Lycanthrope, Lore: Willworker).
Level 2: Acquire uncommon ritual components (alchemicaly pure metals, specifically prepared woods, century old finger bones etc...), research up to the third level of an inaccurate "outsider" Lore, research up to the first level of a common "insider" Lore (Demonology, Lore: Kindred, Lore: Numinae, Lore: Spirit, Lore: Wraith)
Level 3: Acquire uncommon ritual components (objects gotten under very specific astrological/magical conditions, a "true" mandrake, etc...), occult tomes, and writings, research up to the fourth level of an inaccurate "outsider" Lore, research up to the second level of a common "insider" Lore, research a Common Ritual relating to your particular brand of Blood Magic when you have NO IDEA what you're doing (Lore: Thaumaturgy, Lore: Necromancy and the Occult ability can make this easier - see notes above), manipulate a local cult, get a loremaster to answer a question
Level 4: Know where to find certain supernatural entities, research up to the fifth level of an inaccurate "outsider" Lore, research up to the third level of a common "insider" Lore, research up to the first level of a rare lore (Lore: Kuei-Jin, Lore: Mage, Lore: Fae, Lore: Werewolf), research an Uncommon Ritual relating to your particular brand of Blood Magic when you have NO IDEA what you're doing
Level 5: Access minor magic items, research up to the fourth level of a common "insider" Lore, research up to the second level of a rare lore, research up to the first level of a ridiculously rare lore (Lore: Bygone, Lore: Deep Umbra, Lore: Things STs Haven't Even Bothered To Put on the Lores Page - will require you to already have a lot of appropriate broader lores a very good action. Higher levels require mini/mega-quests and a lot of work), research a Rare Ritual relating to your particular brand of Blood Magic when you have NO IDEA what you're doing, meet with a demon/mage/spectre.
Level 6: Research and unearth new or unheard of rituals or rites from tomes or writings, research up to the fifth level of a common "insider" Lore (with appropriate research, justification and time - such as might occur within a summer action), research up to the second level of a ridiculously rare lore, research a very Rare Ritual relating to your particular brand of Blood Magic when you have NO IDEA what you're doing, get local occult practitioners to do Domain-wide rituals, acquire minor magic items.
Level 7: Get occult experts to come from afar to trade secrets, research up to the third level of a ridiculously rare lore, acquire any occult tome not actually in the Vatican, acquire powerful magical items.
POLICE
Law enforcement personnel, jails, prisons, and police stations.
Level 1: Gather police information and rumors, avoid traffic tickets, understand a scanner, find incarcerated people, ask a patrolman what he's noticed on his beat.
Level 2: Have license plates checked, avoid minor violations, get a cop to keep an eye on your haven, know a desk sergeant at a precinct house, get rap sheets, learn about current investigations.
Level 3: Find bureau secrets, get copies of an investigation report, have police hassle, harass, book, or detain someone, initiate a local or state criminal investigation, call in a major helicopter search.
Level 4: Access confiscated weapons or contraband; start an FBI/ATF/DEA investigation; have serious charges dropped, frame someone for a felony, call in a SWAT team, make a police station your haven, obtain money, either from the evidence room or as an appropriation ($1,000)
Level 5: Institute major multi-branch investigations, arrange setups/stings, have officers fired, stop a local FBI/ATF/DEA investigation, frame someone for a series of felonies.
Level 6: Paralyze departments for a short time, close down any investigation, get someone put on or taken off the FBI's Ten Most Wanted list, create a secret illegal task force.
Level 7: Call in EVERYONE, paralyze a precinct for a short time, move precincts around, write departmental policies, make someone Public Enemy Number One, make someone immune to arrest.
POLITICS
Elected officials; judges, sheriffs, mayors, state and congressional representatives and senators, county commissioners, and City Councils.
Level 1: Minor lobbying, identify real platforms of politicians, find out about major donors to campaigns, get campaign signage, buttons, stickers, etc.
Level 2: Meet small time politicians, have forewarning of laws forthcoming, get appointments with your representatives, get demographic information, use a slush fund or fund-raiser to get funds ($1,000)
Level 3: Sway or alter political projects, manipulate local committees, lunch with a suburban mayor or judge, get a quick passport or permit, identify agendas of any elected or appointed official.
Level 4: Enact minor legislation, dash careers of minor politicians, be a major player in a suburb, run a local party PAC, be a City Councilor, start a federal bar inquiry.
Level 5: Get your candidate in minor office, enact more encompassing legislation countywide, control a block of votes on City Council, be a major obstacle to any candidate in the Domain.
Level 6: Block the passage of major bills, suspend a major law temporarily, use state bureaus or subcommittees, write a new state law.
Level 7: Get a state of emergency declared, get a major federal project built in the Domain, handpick officials throughout the Domain, hand out tax deferments.
STREET
Homeless people, street gangs, unorganized crime.
Level 1: Have an ear open for the word on the street, identify most gangs and their turfs and habits, know your way around homeless shelters, read graffiti and understand it.
Level 2: Live mostly without fear on the underside of society, access small time contraband/drugs, identify any illicit substance, know the Survival obstacles of any given neighborhood.
Level 3: Arrange some services from street people or gangs, get pistols or melee weapons, get a building staked out by homeless watchers, put a rumor out on the street.
Level 4: Mobilize groups of homeless, have a word in almost all gang operations, get shotguns or rifles, get a gang to protect someone, plant drugs on someone with a pickpocket.
Level 5: Initiate drive-by shootings, identify regular police informants, start a small two-gang shootout, use the homeless as couriers/information networks/infiltrators.
Level 6: Instigate large scale gang riots, organize homeless demonstrations, target businesses for looting, identify someone as an enemy of the poor, boycott a homeless shelter.
Level 7: Redraw gang turf boundaries, create a street martyr, script a citywide riot, make someone constantly watched, create custom-named gangs, create the drug-of-the-month.
TRANSPORTATION
By land, lake, or air. Cabs, buses, freeways, trains, shipping, airports.
Level 1: Know what goes where and why, know a cabbie/subway conductor/airport employee/chauffeur, recognize shipments that are unusual or unscheduled, get tickets for sold-out rides.
Level 2: Track a target who's using public transportation, arrange passage within the Domain safe from mundane threats, get specific information from transportation companies, have a limo available.
Level 3: Seriously hamper a single individual's ability to travel for a few days, travel inconspicuously, smuggle one package every two weeks, have an armored lightproof limousine available.
Level 4: Shut down one form of mass transit for a few hours, have an entourage with chase cars available, arrange trucker/pilot/shipping strikes, smuggle one shipping crate every two weeks.
Level 5: Smuggle with impunity, keep a helicopter on station, make someone fitting a description unable to catch a cab for one day, route money your way ($500)
Level 6: Extend control to nearby areas (one county at a time), have a private Learjet at every area airport, permanently close an airport/train station/dock/truck yard.
Level 7: Keep anyone fitting a description out of the Domain for two weeks, open every container bound for a destination (in sunlight), have half a dozen alternate routes prepared for any personal travel.
UNDERWORLD
Organized crime; prostitution, arms, gambling, fraud, extortion, auto theft, Mafia.
Note: Does not include smuggling or street gangs (Transportation and Street respectively). All thugs are mortals with 6 Physical Traits, 4 Mental Traits, 3 Social Traits, 2 Willpower, Brawl x2 and Firearms.
Level 1 Locate minor contraband, find an illegal card game, know a hooker that's not a cop, get someone's car stolen and chopped, know what to do with a stolen credit card, fence loot and skim from illegal dealings to get cash ($1,000)
Level 2 Obtain pistols on short notice, go and get serious drugs, go and get stolen cars, know a wiseguy, send someone a free prostitute, go and get a few stolen credit cards.
Level 3 Get 2 amateur local thugs to rough someone up for you, obtain a rifle, shotgun, or submachine gun, know where a fence/chop shop/whorehouse/illegal casino is.
Level 4 Get 4 amateur local thugs to shoot a place up for you, have white-collar crime connections, control a single crime ring for 2 weeks, get a place immunized from organized crime.
Level 5 Get 8 amateur local thugs to make someone disappear, arrange gangland assassinations of non-made guys, get a professional firebug to burn something down, get someone's car wired to blow up.
Level 6 Get teams of local amateur thugs to tear 4 places apart at the same time, get extensive organized crime connections, be the local Don, call in a world-class professional hit man from Europe.
Level 7 Get all the Japanese cars in the county stolen and chopped, control the crime statistics in the Domain, make false front businesses pop up and then disappear, steal anything.
UNIVERSITY
Higher education, research, administration of colleges.
Level 1: Access to low level university resources; obtain copies of school records, get students' social security numbers, identify experts in various fields.
Level 2: Know a contact or two with useful knowledge or skills, get keys to some buildings, fake a registered class schedule, identify the dorm rooms of any type of student.
Level 3: Faculty favors, fix grades, discredit a student, get a term paper written, get an expert to spend time researching for you, 24 hour library access.
Level 4: Organize student protests and rallies, discredit faculty members, get tenure, have a team of grad students attempt your strange project, send in the campus cops.
Level 5: Falsify an undergraduate degree, run of facilities, get a fraternity banned from a campus, change campus policy, access rare books, call it a snow day.
Level 6: Arrange major projects, alter curriculum institution wide, rearrange facilities, fire tenured people, eliminate programs, have buildings built.
Level 7: Hand out honorary doctorates, access relics/rarest books, permanently close campuses, direct the research of prominent professors in directions you like.