Drawing on Mana

Mana is used pretty frequently not only in video games, but also in Magic: The Gathering. I’ve previously talked about running an M:tG campaign, and I still think it could work. But how would Mana work?

Quite easily, actually.

Mana is the elemental nature of the universe. Forests, mountains, oceans, plains and swamplands all use mana to help life grow. Practitioners of magic often draw from these sources in order to tap into the power of the universe.

This would apply to all Arcane and Primal characters in the campaign you’d be using. It doesn’t have to be an M:tG campaign; it could work for any.

At the beginning of your turn, as a minor action, roll a d6. Add that many Mana to your pool. This is called Channeling, where you begin to draw the energy into yourself. Use tokens of some sort to represent the energy.

At three Mana, you may use an Arcane or Primal At-Will power. At six, you may use an Encounter power. At nine, you can use a Daily power. Encounter powers and Daily powers would still only be able to be used once per encounter and once per day, but they wouldn’t be able to be accessed until the right amount of mana was raised.

Now, this would be consistent with all spellcasters throughout the campaign, so the PC would not be the only one doing this. Would it require a little more time? Yes. Would it make it flavorful, as the Wizard or Shaman attempts to draw in enough to fire off a powerful Daily spell? Absolutely.

You could even, if you were doing an M:tG campaign, provide bonuses to the PC if they were in an environment similar to the power they were using. Perhaps give a +2 to attack rolls or damage.

This would seriously unbalance the game, in many ways, so this could only be used in groups that were much more interested in the story than the crunch. I know I wouldn’t mind having to wait to use my powers, if I was drawing mana from the land.

What do you think? Could this work?