Influence

They've breached the walls, we –bzzt– hold out much longer. The garrison –bzzt– heavily depleted. Our forces are –bzzt– overpowered. There's no –bzzt– for the farms and factories. We have to evacuate –bzzt– on the shuttles. If we don't make it, then –bzzt– been an honour, sir.

— The last known transmission from an outpost in the Kallimari Civil War.

Influence is a measurement of a character’s or group of characters’ ability to affect change in the known galaxy. This may be by controlling powerful military assets, directing major research projects, being a prominent economic power, or simply by possessing important information that other characters want to get their hands on. It is a fully optional system, allowing those who want to play the game on a larger scale the chance to do so.

While large mega-corporations that control space stations, fleets, and intellectual property across the known galaxy can clearly benefit from Influence, It can also be useful to individuals. A lone explorer might hire a group of mercenaries to protect their craft from pirates. A researcher might discover a major breakthrough in hydroponics that would be worth a lot if they sold it to a planetary government.

While different players might use it for different things, it exists to help make clear the impact that your character can have on the world.

The system revolves around acquiring Assets. Some Assets have specific purposes, whereas other Assets can be used more generally. There is no one way to get into the system: while some Assets work well together and some are required for others, most of them work perfectly fine on their own!

Assets include:

• Companies, groups of soldiers, workers, or space-crew who staff Squadrons and Installations
• Installations, The planetary and spacefaring Installations that you own
• Squadrons, groups of ships including a carrier capable of FTL travel, which can be used for military, industrial, or exploration purposes
• Agents, skilled NPC individuals hired by your organisation
• Works, The collection of intellectual property and trade secrets you have collected

Additional Assets are acquired with Expansion Points (EP). By default, players start out with 0 EP, although this can be increased with the Established Presence Quirk. 2 EP can be earned by spending a Major Action or a Goal Action to Expand Presence. Expansion Points can also be earned passively through certain Installations. Once acquired, they can either be spent in the same turn as part of the Influence section of your turnsheet, or be saved to be spent in later turns.

There are a few ways to get discounts on Assets (certain Academic Disciplines, and various Traits that you can apply). Unless specified otherwise, the minimum cost of any Asset cannot be reduced below 1 EP.

Influence is designed to be possible to play co-operatively. When building Installations, gathering Works, or building up forces, you can choose to specify a particular Faction that have access to the particular Asset. This can be an existing Faction, or your own! Within a Faction, different Academic Disciplines can enable people to fill specialised roles. You should be careful however, as you never know when a co-operative enterprise will turn cutthroat…

Factions can be created between player characters at character creation, or written into the Influence section of your turnsheet if established during the game.

While Assets will normally show on your own private user page, each Faction will also have their own page where Assets shared between members of that Faction are displayed. For anything that you create for the Faction, you can specify that you have primary ownership over it (meaning that, when given conflicting actions by different members of the Faction, your one is chosen), but this does not guarantee it will always be under your control. People from inside and outside your faction may have differing views about how it should be controlled.

By default, Faction pages are not public and are restricted only to Faction members. Other people might be able to find out about your Assets though, through directly travelling to the system, or through word of mouth.

Companies are small groups of people responsible for the day-to-day running of your various Installations and Squadrons. They are assigned to a particular Squadron or Installation, which is the place where they work.

A Company can move from their assigned Installation. For example, Soldiers assigned to a Barracks may be sent on a military mission elsewhere in the galaxy, or workers from an Extractor might leave to help clear debris elsewhere after a natural disaster. They also have memory of prior events: a company might need to be replaced or moved if subjected to consistently poor working conditions, and may be unwilling to work if not properly cared for.

Installations are static buildings that generally have a set purpose. They could include factories, massive farms, small research facilities, or hidden fortresses dug into a moon, and are able to be built terrestrially or in space. Installations are mostly used to generate resources or provide benefits to other Assets.

Each Installation has a Productivity. Installations require people to operate them: by default the Productivity is 0 (you're not doing anything if there's no one there to do it), and is increased by 1 for every Company stationed there (up to a total of the Maximum Productivity). This can be increased beyond the normal maximum by an Agent stationed at the Base.

For example, an Installation with a Maximum Productivity of 3, 3 Companies staffing it, and an Agent that increases the Productivity by 50% respectively would have an overall Productivity of 4 (rounded down from 4.5).

If the Maximum Productivity is listed as N/A, then only 1 Company is required for the Installation to operate fully.

All Ground and Space Installations must be constructed at a Base. A Base might represent a collection of Faction-owned buildings in a given location, a single skyscraper of corporate offices, a newly-established colony, or a space station housing a number of modular facilities. Transportation of resources between Installations in the same Base can happen automatically, whereas transportation in-system or between systems requires a Squadron, and carries increased risks.

The first step when getting started with Influence Installations is to get an Extractor. This produces Raw Resources (RAW), which are used to operate many of the other Installations.

A Base must have a Standard of Labour, which defines the conditions under which the workforce labours. This affects the Productivity, but also the people. Bases under a poor Standard of Labour are more likely to be face issues with groups concerned with workers' rights and liberties. Unless the Base is hidden well, a certain Standard of Labour may be enforced by local authorities.

The possible Standards of Labour are described below:

Individual Installations do not possess distinguishing Traits. Instead, these Traits are applied to the Base at which these Installations are located. Unless specified otherwise, each Trait can only be taken once.

For the Installations that provide a benefit to PC actions (Research Station, Long-range Telescope), one person can only benefit from 1 of each.

A Squadron generally consists of one larger ship, equipped with the apparatus to enable FTL travel, and a number of smaller ships that can dock within it as well as travel individually. A Squadron requires 1 Company to be assigned as a crew in order to operate.

FTL-capable ships can be used for a number of purposes within the galaxy: transporting Raw Resources, fleet combat, and transporting Companies or Agents. By default, a Squadron can only carry 1 Company (the crew) and 4 RAW, as well as an unlimited number of Agents.

The primary limitation in FTL travel is not travel time or is it fuel. Instead, the normal limiting factor is the time taken to calculate a path to the requisite degree of precision across such vast distances. As a result, FTL ships can Jump to any system in the galaxy, but may only perform two Jumps per turn by default. When a Squadron passes through a system with a Relay, the number of Jumps can be refilled.

Squadrons can be specialised or multi-purpose. By default, a Squadron may contain two Modules, and any number of Traits. Each Trait can only be taken once, whereas the same Module may be taken multiple times: You could equip a Squadron with Arms and Armour three times in order to create a powerful warship, or Additional Crew Bays three times in order to create a transport for people.

A Squadron can be refitted with new Modules after it is constructed, if the required EP is spent.

An Agent is a highly proficient Non-Player Character who works for your organisation. This may be as an employee, as an independent contractor, or even as a member of a different organisation who's struck a deal to give you a particular service. Agents are likely not to be available to interact with during uptime, but may be in some circumstances. Agents will always be available to interact with in emails – both to your organisation, and to any others who seek to poach them. Agents are significantly more proficient than general members of a Company: they are hired for high levels of expertise in a field. Typically an Agent is assigned to a specific task or location, being deployed where they are most useful.

An Agent may be skilled or lack skill in a range of Fields, listed below:

When recruiting an Agent, you may modify their skills according to the costs below:

Since Agents are special NPCs and to limit the amount that can be created, you cannot reduce the cost below 4 EP by giving them Weaknesses. The cost can still be reduced below 4 with a relevant Academic Discipline. After recruitment, they can be trained to a Good level by spending the required EP (4 if starting from Poor, 3 if starting from Adequate).

Agents are individuals, and have their own personalities and histories. They might be a dedicated researcher but unwilling to go anywhere near a barracks. They might be an expert with finance, but perhaps a little too cutthroat. They might be a trained soldier, willing to follow your orders until the end. When recruiting an Agent, you will be informed of some their traits, but they may be unwilling to give you the full picture (in which case, it is possible to investigate further IC).

For Agents created with the Established Presence Quirk you can suggest their traits and backstory, but this will be subject to GM approval.

Influence Works are things such as intellectual property, sensitive secrets, or private research data. These can be acquired over the course of gameplay, but cannot be directly purchased for Expansion Points.

Throughout the game, new technologies may be invented, and new ways of doing things discovered. NPCs and PCs alike may have secrets that would radically alter industry if they were made public. Many of these may present significant upgrades to Assets and for an enterprising company they could be an excellent way of accelerating growth. More Assets may become available over the course of the game.

Informally, PCs can agree to barter their intellectual property for other things: Equipment, RAW, or potentially even entire Assets, if the information is valuable enough. If done in this way, you can note exchanges in the Influence section of your turnsheet.