Consider this a branch of my last inquiry regarding this subject here, but can anyone explain why Mana Points are an inherently bad idea, or offer other insight as to why they are seldom utilized?

They're not a bad idea; Tunnels and Trolls used stats to power spells, so essentially mana points in a way. I have heard APA-L introduced the idea less than year after D&D was released, then Gygax excoriated it in Dragon sometime later. Runequest had(has) POW, so similar to T&T. Palladium FRP has spells castable per day, but you can cat any spell of any level you want. All the subsequent Palladium games use PPE which is essentially mana.

Basically, the idea of non-Vancian magic has been around since RPGs were created, and D&D is firmly in the notion that it's Bad. Since D&D was, is, and probably will always be the market leader, that's really the only reason people don't like them, I think.

I will say that Vancian magic has a certain feel, and mana points have a certain feel. I think if you pick mana points it will be a much different style of play than Vancian. Mana points in D&D is sorta what the 3rd edition sorcerers could do, almost. So there's that.

Mana points are not a bad idea.  Mana points kludged onto D&D with no other changes are a bad idea.

That's because spells slots for different level spells put sources of magical power into silos, which limits the amount of mechanical stupid tricks that a player can pull.  You can have a simple set of mana points replace slots, and it will have power problems.  Or you can do a more complex form of mana points that more accurately represents the power scaling in D&D spells, in which case it will be not very friendly to use at the table.  Or you can try to split the baby with something in between, so that it only halfway works right.

Or you could just play some other game with mana points that was designed with them in mind, and thus works just fine the way it is.

What makes it even trickier is that in most versions, in most campaigns, D&D spells are not even consistent within a given spell level, let alone across spell levels.  What is the proper ratio of hold portal to fireball in power?  What about sleep versus fireball?  Let's consider invisibility. 

Now, if you wanted to collapse D&D slots into multiple mana point banks, but less than the number of spell levels, you could probably make it work.  Let's say 3 banks, minor, major, and greater.  In AD&D, you could do 3 levels per, and it wouldn't be far off.  Then key the amount of points based off the average power of a 2nd, 5th, and 8th level spell, tweak a little to account for edge cases in the spells a level lower or higher in each range, and you could make something OK.  Or in BECMI, do it in banks of spell levels 1-2, 3-4, and 5-7.  Sure, there's still the issue of formulas that allow too many casting of sleep or scraping an extra casting of fireball or hold person or whatever, but at least it's not a ratio where you cash in a 5th or 6th level slot for many more castings of those.  That would even kind of fit with the Vancian source material, where there was a distinction between lesser and greater spell and then some that were too powerful for most casters to handle.

Considering the vast majority of gamers play either D&D or some offshoot/remake of D&D, it isn't surprising that all magic system other than vancian are uncommon. (Except in video games where mana or other point-based systems reign supreme).

I grew up playing Runequest and my current game uses mana dice, so, for me, it is what I'm used to. There are two main issues I've found with any point based magic system:

1- It's another number to keep track of. Players hate counting.

2- Because spells cost points, it is much more difficult to balance spells against each other. In D&D there's a bit of an expansional growth in spell power. But in a point-based system, a spell that cost 10 mana but does 10 damage sets the bar for all damage spells at 1 damage per mana. A "higher level" spell that does 2 damage per mana will make all previous spells obsolete. With Vancian magic, there are still lower level slots and uses for lesser or more utility spells. This kinda goes away when you are using points.

The only way to have exponential magic-user power growth with a point based system is to have exponential growth in point which makes the first issue that much worse.

IMO mana points are vastly superior to vancian magic.  The one big issue to worry about is the nova effect, where a caster uses all his mana to win a battle with one spell, then the party rests a day before the next encounter, repeat, repeat.  I don't know that there's an objective problem, but subjectively it's a lame way to play.  The issue can be dealt with.  My preferred solution is to give casters enough of a reservoir to get through the whole adventure, then recovery is slow enough that it mostly happens during downtime. You can still nova, but then you're useless for the rest of the game.  Most players won't think it worth the cost

Quote from: Mishihari on January 20, 2025, 06:32:21 PMIMO mana points are vastly superior to vancian magic.  The one big issue to worry about is the nova effect, where a caster uses all his mana to win a battle with one spell, the the party rests a day before the next encounter, repeat, repeat.  I don't know that there's an objective problem, but subjectively it's a lame way to play.  The issue can be dealt with.  My preferred solution is to give casters enough of a reservoir to get through the whole adventure, then recovery is slow enough that it mostly happens during downtime. You can still nova, but then you're useless for the rest of the game.  Most players won't think it worth the cost

Another approach that I've elsewhere and used in my own system is that a caster has a small pool, but by performing certain actions specific to their magical path they can build up points to then cast their spells.

So it might take three mana to launch a fireball. A fire bolt (single target) is just one mana to cast. You start with a point of mana. Each turn you make an arcana check to gather 0-2 mana from the environment.

So you could, on average launch a fire bolt every round since you'll gather, on average, 1 mana per turn. Or you could start saving up for three points to unleash a fireball. Maybe you'll get lucky on turn one and build +2 mana, but do you risk having no mana at all next turn if you roll poorly (and it's not like fireball and bolt are your only spells, do you want to keep one in reserve for an emergency shield spell)?

Any gathered mana fades after a minute and gathering is a strenuous task so even a few minutes can be tiring. You also can't gather mana if you're unable to act and initiative is rerolled every turn, so sometimes you might get to gather twice before an enemy acts, other times it can go twice before you get another turn.

Its not Vancian and only semi "mana point" in the sense that it doesn't really have a stored up reliable battery to cast from, but it does use points for casting and, for me, its a unique version of limited and risky casting without the ability to plan an alpha strike and without leveled spell slots as the limiting factor.

Magic points are fine, but I can verify from experience the potential for magicians to "mag-dump" all their spell power if they don't expect any more conflict that day. Vancian systems do have the same issue to lesser a degree, though. It's more a function of magic replenishing on a per-day basis than exactly how it's portioned out. I quite like the per-adventure system that Tales of Argosa uses for some things. I also like Shadow of the Demon Lord's system where instead of slots-by-level, you get a set number of casts for each individual spell you know.

The problem of "alpha strike" is being able to put all of your mana into just a few spells.

In the point systems that I think of offhand, magical characters don't have the equivalent of high-level D&D spells. Instead, they cast a more steady output of the equivalent of lower-level spells. I think of Call of Cthulhu or GURPS Magic. There isn't an option (or not a good option) to alpha strike.

D&D is balanced on making higher-level spells more valuable - i.e. a third-level spell is worth more than 3 first-level spells. The higher-level spells are balanced by having more limited slots.

It might be helpful for people to cite which systems they're thinking of.

Nothing wrong with mana points. Like many things in D&D, the vancian system worked well enough, and tweaking it to a slots per day instead of memorizing X spells was a sufficient house rule if you didn't like strict vancian.

So there is no real problem with mana or spell points its a different way of doing things.
Part of the reason dnd does things it does is the borrowing from vance as well as the habit borrowed from war games to track ammunition only in the largest amount possible.

Now I will say bluntly I see legitimate reasons for both to exist but what needs to be understood from both the designers perspective and the game master prospective is that it does change the way magic is engaged with. There are several reasons for this but the simpleist to point out off the top is that there is an extra metric for spell cost and balancing that D&D lacks by default.
When spells have a point based mana cost several spells of the same spell level can have different mana costs and be tuned around the idea that they take up a much greater or lesser amount of a casters resources then a spell slot of a given level would. A mana point system will also tend to have a harder time with spells of exponential increases in power given the spell will tend to need a mana cost to match. If your average level 1 spell costs 3 or 4 mana with exponentially increasing power as you go up spell levels you can quickly end up with things like level 4 or 5 spells haveing costs of something in the relm or 50-80. Now these costs can be deceptive because its harder to see exactly how meany spells you get over the coarse of a day. You will see times where someone forgets that there acid arrow habit is eating in to there fireballs and lightning bolts and vice versa.

Now this also plays to an extent to the biggest advantage a mana system has which is versatility of options over the whole of a day. In most mana systems if you kind of start feeling for how much of your spell casting you are playing with and when to start saveing back if you want to try and squeeze in an extra fire ball vs your magic missles that day.

Also the idea that players will blow all there mana and rest is a bit of a falicy not because it can not happen but because that is a possibility with any refeshable resource in a situation where players expect to get that refresh. It doesnt need to be mana or spells per day it could be potions or paladin smites. If players have a refreshable resource they will choose to go ham every so offten when they expect to be able to refresh even if that resource is hp.

Palladium Books uses magic points in all of their 2nd edition stuff.  It works fine, other than maybe the name of Potential Psychic Energy (P.P.E.) while actual psychics also use points called Inner Strength Points, I.S.P.

Those two terms could be reversed.

Unearthed Arcana and various 3pp tried introducing "spell points" without making an impact. In one instance, I recall an AEG(?) book that introduced a mechanic to reduce the nova effect. I don't remember the exact rule, spell static or something, but it applied a cumulative penalty to repeatedly casting the same spell.

The 3.5 psionics handled the issue a lot better by introducing psi points and power augmentation, but I don't recall any 3pp that adapted that to spells.

I like mana points, but in practice they became overpowered. My fault; should have given fewer. In my defense, I find MUs and clerics too powerful to begin with.

Here is my recent experience:

https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2024/10/spell-points-revisited.html

Quote from: Eric Diaz on January 22, 2025, 02:16:46 PMI like mana points, but in practice they became overpowered. My fault; should have given fewer. In my defense, I find MUs and clerics too powerful to begin with.

Here is my recent experience:

https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2024/10/spell-points-revisited.html

Thanks, that's interesting. I mentioned earlier that usually (though not always) a third-level spell is worth more than 3 first-level spells, so I think the 1SP per spell level rule is suspect.

D&D isn't designed for this sort of trade-off, magic-users will get a big boost by doing more fireballs as you mention. On the other hand, clerics will get a minor boost by doing more Cure Light Wounds.

It might be better to review costs of individual spells, and adjust some higher or lower.

Quote from: jhkim on January 22, 2025, 03:16:36 PM

Quote from: Eric Diaz on January 22, 2025, 02:16:46 PMI like mana points, but in practice they became overpowered. My fault; should have given fewer. In my defense, I find MUs and clerics too powerful to begin with.

Here is my recent experience:

https://methodsetmadness.blogspot.com/2024/10/spell-points-revisited.html

Thanks, that's interesting. I mentioned earlier that usually (though not always) a third-level spell is worth more than 3 first-level spells, so I think the 1SP per spell level rule is suspect.

D&D isn't designed for this sort of trade-off, magic-users will get a big boost by doing more fireballs as you mention. On the other hand, clerics will get a minor boost by doing more Cure Light Wounds.

It might be better to review costs of individual spells, and adjust some higher or lower.

Yes, good point.

Ideally, one would revise every spell rather than simply converting.

Spells like fireball that automatically get better with caster level add another layer of complexity. My initial guess was making fireball cost 1 SP for each 2d6 damage, so a 10d6 fireball is possible at level 10 but costs 5 SP. Still better than Cloudkill (lvl 5) for many circumstances.