Animal ghouls may hold a maximum of 10 blood points in their systems. While a human-sized (or larger) ghoul can hold 10 blood points, smaller animals contain considerably less. In general, the amount of blood an animal contains in its body is based on its size.

It can be safely assumed that a large dog could hold six blood points, a cat-sized creature holds four, and a rat-sized critter holds two. These estimates assume that the vampire has gone through the trouble of “bleeding” the ghoul to replace its natural blood with vitae. However, draining a creature of its blood can be risky, for if a domitor accidentally bleeds an animal too quickly before he’s had the chance to replace it with her own, that animal would die.

Should a vampire simply let the animal feed on vampiric blood, the maximum Blood Pools are halved to reflect the fact that its blood has not been drained. Thus, an alligator that could hold five blood points when its body has been drained, would only be able to hold two and a half blood points if it hasn’t been.

The rules for the blood bond, which were covered in Chapter 2 on page 35, apply to animal ghouls as they would to humans.