Condition Capacity adjustment
Vampire ....................................+1
Discipline*
1st - 4th...................................+1
5th and beyond.........................+.5
+1 Vote**..................................+.5
Special Benefit
constant ..................................+1
conditional ..............................+.5
Special Restriction
constant ..................................-1
conditional ...............................-.5
The magic capacity is 4. Round fractions up if less than, down if more than. Older vampires get a little bit of a break.
Common sense should prevail, of course.
*Think of this as discipline slots. Basic takes up one slot. Upgrading to superior takes another one. After a vampire has filled up four slots, the cost goes down.
**The Priscus title is worth +1.5 capacity
A constant benefit or restriction is one that modifies the default values of the game. i.e. +1 Bleed, +1 Strength, -1 Intercept.
A conditional effect is one that only applies in certain instances. i.e. +1 Bleed if you control the edge, +1 Strength in combat with Malkavians, -1 Intercept vs non-directed actions.
Special Abilities are a place where you will have to judge how significant the effect is, and what it's cost should be. Cards you make will likely only be used in your local games, so if all the players agree and have access to the cards you make, all should be well. Still, adding cards to your game that unbalance it will lessen everyone's fun.
A note on converting RPG characters to V:tES - One dot in a discipline is ignored. 5 dots or more is Superior. Specials are derived from Abilities or Merits and Flaws, if at all possible. Gaming experience can also be an inspiration. For example, Kasiel Saboon's special could read: In combat, Kasiel will manage to catch on fire, frenzy, slaughter a family of four, and lose a humanity point. +1 strength.
Integrating home made cards
Save the files as jpegs at 150 dpi. You can get away with 100 dpi, but at 72 your text will be fuzzy. Most pics you snag off the net will be 72 dpi and too small, so be sure to change the dpi before you re-size. Most card builder resources come properly sized, but check to make sure your card is 2.5" by 3.5" (actual cards are 2 3/8" by 3 3/8"). Leave yourself some trim room. I find I can fit 9 cards on a page in Word if I shrink all the margins. I recommend using a heavier and smoother paper than standard, as you will get less dot spread and a 'crisper' look - I used to work as a commercial printer, so I might be too picky. For crypt cards, you can buy sleeves and put your custom card in front of any vampire you have extra copies of. For my Chicago game, everybody donated extra vamps and I used a 3M spray adhesive. These cards can disguise themeselves in a stack of official cards, though close examination of the crypt stack might reveal them. For Library cards, you pretty much have to glue them unless you want to put all of your cards in sleeves (and some people do - these people are hardcore gamers, and would probably be horrified by the idea of playing with non-official cards). With spray glue, be sure you hit the back of the new card, not the face of the one you are covering up. Your new card should be smaller than the actual card, and if there is glue on the exposed border, the first time you stack that card in a deck, you will have ruined not one, but two cards. The only positive will be that at least one of them was a Gird Minions.