Background (for those who've wandered in from searches, mistakenly looking for billiards)

We're talking about a different type of pool here.  This page describes a two- or three- player variant of the White Wolf's Vampire:The Eternal Struggle, a collectible card game of deckbuilding, resource management, strategy, and trickery, ideally suited for 4-5 players.  The object of the standard game is to remove other players from the game in a clockwise order, by helping them spend all their pool of influence (as tracked with counters).

If you've played this variant, please let me know.

The Concept

I wanted a two-player variant that, to varying extents:

• requires little in the way of rules translation from the base game.
• adds a metagame flavor complementary to that of the base game.
• requires a different strategy than those of the base game.

In the regular three- to five- player game, I'm generally worried about multiple pools (my prey's, grand-prey's, predator's, and/or grand-predator's).  In a two-player game, I'm only worried about one--my prey's.  Since I'm only worried about one pool, there only really needs to be one pool in the game.  And on the flipside of the coin: If there's only one pool, it doesn't really matter how many players there are, as long as the pool is proportionately large. Hence, common pool.

• The COMMON POOL

  1. Players' individual pools are replaced with a common pool of 40 counters per player.
  2. The winner is the player who removes the last counter from the pool. If time expires (or if the players agree), the match is a draw.
  3. The common pool is afffected by all players' gains and losses.
  4. The pool's starting amount is also its maximum.
  5. Pool cannot be voluntarily spent or burned, if doing so would reduce the pool below ten.
  6. Gaining pool for the Edge is mandatory.
  7. Pool loss resulting from an action or reaction is credited to the acting/reacting player.
  8. Immediate (aka "Direct") pool loss from the playing of a card is credited to the card's player.
  9. "Environmental" (aka "Residual") pool loss from from a card remaining in play is credited to the acting player.
  10. Effects that would change a bleed's target, instead reduce a bleed by two.
  11. Base pool costs for Equipment and Ally cards are half (rounded up) of their normal values.
  12. Cards that require an indefinite/Unlimited pool cost, instead require such costs to be paid with blood or life from one ready minion.
  13. Time limit is 45 minutes.




• Banned Cards

  The following cards are not allowed in this format:

  1. All cards on the standard V:EKN Ban List
  2. Brainwash (2-player game only)



• Multi-(3+) player rules

  Just because there's a common pool doesn't mean that you can't play this variant with more than two people...

  1. (D) actions that would target another player's pool in the standard game (Bleeding, Enticement, etc.) are treated as undirected.
  2. Time limit is 25 minutes per player, two hours maximum.
  3. Brainwash is legal in a 3+ player game.



Card Examples

• Permanent effects, whose pool losses are credited to the acting Methuselah: Anarch Revolt, Antediluvian Awakening, Sylvester Sims, Fame, Tension in the Ranks, vampire/ally Special Abilities.
• Played cards, whose pool losses are credited to their owner: Poison Pill, Political Backlash, bleed cards and modifiers, Burnt Offerings.
• Voluntary pool loss effects: Leandro, Arika, the Infernal trait, Smiling Jack (non-controlling players).
• Involuntary pool loss effects: Anarch Revolt, Famous vamp in torpor, Army of Rats.
• Unlimited Pool costs: Business Pressure, Life Boon, Extremis Boon, Secret Horde

Notes

• The time limit is arbitrary; I think a "normal-pace" game should complete in under 30 minutes.
• The "no-spend" limit is also arbitrary, and has varied between eight and twelve pool.
• Cards that require a VP (Gambit Accepted, etc.) are wallpaper here. So are cards that "steal" pool, such as Kindred Spirits and Legal Manipulation.
• Note that Life boon functions under these rules as an out-of-turn Minion Tap.