Pond Hockey

Pond Hockey is an abstract, highly tactical game for 2 players that simulates an informal hockey match played by two teams of 6 players on a frozen pond.

Each player acts as a coach for one of the two hockey teams. Both coaches have a draw deck of 10 cards. A card drawn from the top of the deck at the beginning of a turn, determines the number of movements points the coach will have available to move one or more players and/or to move the puck (be it by passing or by shooting the puck on goal). After the draw deck has been exhausted, the drawn cards are shuffled to form a new one. The match ends after the draw deck has been exhausted for the third time; so, after 30 "minutes" or 3 "periods" of play. The coach whose team has scored the most goals wins the game. If the scores are tied, the game can go into "sudden death" overtime, where the first team to score a goal will win the game.

The game's movement system was inspired by Corné van Moorsel's StreetSoccer but adapted to handle the difference in how a soccer ball can travel versus how a hockey puck can travel: more than one player can be moved on a turn; players can move with and retain possession of the puck; the puck travels in a straight line and it may only change direction if it comes into possession of another player who moves with it or passes it again or if it is deflected off the boards bordering the ice surface. The game also adds rules to permit poke-checking, body-checking, and assessing penalties.