Only the topmost Rating of a target's Influence may be acquired.  To Acquire an Influence Rating from a target, the character must spend twice the number of unopposed Actions as the target could have made with the Influence.  Upon success, the target's Influence Rating drops by one and the character has the level Acquired times 3 in Actions Banked that can be used only for Growth.

EX:  Serena Setite wants Billy Brujah's Street Influence.  From a previous Trace Action, Serena knows that Billy has a Rating of 3.  Over the course of a few weeks, she Banks a total of 12 Acquire Actions.  Billy, being rather full of himself, does not Protect his Influence, leaving Serena's 12 Acquire Actions unopposed.  At the start of the next game session, Billy will find that he now has a Street Rating of 2 rather than 3 and Serena will have 9 Growth Actions Banked.

Analyze Actions are used to find out details regarding a character's own Influence, such as if someone is Tracing you or trying to Acquire, or even Destroy, your Influences.  You must beat the total amount of any Conceal Actions with your Analysis to notice these Actions.  You may specify your Analyze to narrow down what you wish to know in order to increase your chances for success.

EX:  Billy Brujah wants to know who the hell is taking his damn Influence.  He spends 1 Action to Analyze his Influence loss.  Serena forgot to Conceal her Action so he immediately finds out where his Influence is going and makes plans to layeth the smackethdown on Serena.

Block Actions prevent everyone from taking Specific Actions.  They reduce all Actions of the type specified by the number of Actions invested in Block.  If more than one character Blocks the same Action, the effects are cumulative.  Block is very powerful, but it is also very specific.   Block can also be used to block the Growth and Investigate Standard Actions.

EX:  Talia Tremere spends 3 Health Influence Actions to Block characters from obtaining Blood Traits (a Specific Health Action).  Anyone who attempts to get blood that week starts the attempt 3 Actions down.  They must spend more than 3 to succeed.

Boost puts extra effort into a Specific Action.  It is done to make damn sure an Action succeeds.  It may also be used to achieve an Action outside your local sphere of control.

Combine is used when two or more characters use their Influences together in order to achieve a common goal.  One character declares the primary Action and the other characters declare how much of their Influence is applied to that Action.  For each character beyond the first two, there is a five Action penalty.

Conceal Actions prevent Actions like Trace and Analyze.  The minimum cost is that of the action being concealed.  Conceal beats Trace and Analyze if it is of a value equal or greater than the Trace or Analyze.

Only the topmost Rating of a character's Influence may be Destroyed.  To Destroy in Influence Rating, a character must spend an equivalent number of unopposed Actions as the target's Influence Rating would allow the target to take.  So, Destroying a Legal 4 Influence Rating would require 10 (1+2+3+4) unopposed Actions.  Destroy Actions cannot be Banked.  Under appropriate circumstances, a target that has barely fended off a Destroy attempt may be penalized in the coming week.  Note it is easier to Acquire or Grow than it is to Destroy.  A successful Destroy Action will free up Influence in the Influence Pool if none is available.

To create a new Influence Rating, a character must spend three times as many unopposed Growth Actions as the new Rating of Influence would allow.  So, if a character with a High Society Rating of 3 were trying to Grow to 4, she would have to spend (1+2+3+4) X 3 = 30 Actions to Grow to the new Rating.  Obviously, this will take more than one week and will require Banking.  If there are no Influences left in the Pool for the specific area, the Action will fail on the first attempt.

Investigate is, quite possibly, the most important Standard Action.  It is here that each character finds information in the form of rumors.  There will be certain pieces of information that your character will not find out until she has poked and prodded enough.  Your character can target specific topics or provide no target at all, indicating she is just keeping an ear to the ground for rumors.

Loan splits your Influence.  When you Loan another character your Influences, only half the normal amount of Actions are available to the temporary owner.  Also, the loaner receives an automatically successful Trace Action on the recipient's Influence, however, she must still declare the Action in a debriefing.

EX:  Vladimir Ventrue loans his Finance 4 (10 Actions) to Trudy Toreador.  Trudy will only be able to use 5 additional Finance Actions (10/2).  Vladimir also now has an automatically successful Trace on all of Trudy's Finance Actions, should he wish to use it.

Protect Actions maintain your assets.  It prevents other characters from Destroying or Acquiring your Influences.  A Destroy or Acquire Action against one of your Protected Influences faces opposing Actions equal to twice the number of Actions spent to Protect your assets.

Characters possessing a Rating of 1 in an area are automatically Protected by three free Protect Actions.  This is because they are so small time, no one really notices them.

Trace Actions are for the sole purpose of hunting down another character's Influence.  You must Trace a character's Influence before you can Acquire or Destroy it.  The character must spend the number of unopposed Actions as the target could have made with the Influence.  So, if you were Tracing a character with Media 5, it would take 15 unopposed Actions to map their little empire.  Targets can be as specific as a particular character or as general as finding out who's stopping you from getting the latest in automatic weaponry.