I find it hard to consider the difference merely "fluff." It certainly has more gameplay implications than, for instance, which pseudo-science explanation we choose for how starlane travel works.Geoff the Medio wrote:There is no proposed change in how money / influence is used in-game. (This isn't saying much, since it currently isn't used in-game). In a story / fluff sense, everything an empire would otherwise have done with "money" would instead be done by expending "influence" over populations.
The rules may be not yet written, but circumstances where it makes sense to pay money to achieve X, won't necessarily make sense to expend influence for the same end. For instance what in the world would be happening if i gave another empire 100 influence units to encourage him to sign a treaty? "Influence" generated by an obviously purely economic tech tree would not make much sense, so that much will have to be revised
"Influence" is definitely a more abstract concept than "money", one which the player's intuition about how it works and what it can be used for is less likely to be right. This in itself is not good, though it might give license to make game rules function better, since the player has fewer expectations.
It's hard to guess weather the change is for better or for worse, with the limited information on what you intend, but don't believe it simply won't matter.