Tired of "Mana"

[Odhanan]

Whats the plural?

Vises?
Visae?
Viss?
Vis?

As in I've got 50 vises left .. or are those vis points?

Vis, Vis - pl. Vires (irregular)

Vis/Vis/Vim/-/-/Vi
Vires/Vires/Vires/Virium/Viribus/Viribus

As for mana, I think its use is just fine.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mana

 

[MaxKaladin]

Actually, I like the "name-after" idea as well, though I'd shorten "Gandalf" to "Gan" so you'd have a 9 gan meteor swarm, a magical item that took 21 kilogans of magical energy to make and a cantrip that only costs 500 miligans to cast. Seems short and simple to me.

 

[Drew]

I like Jiggawatts.

As in "1.21 jiggawatts? The only spell that could generate that kind of magical power is Lightning Bolt!"

 

[Talmun]

Another one for the list...

Tolkien refers to magical energy as the "Unseen" at several points, differing from the "Seen" or the physical world. Of course, he wasn't referring to it being a metaphysical gas tank or a quantified number of spells that can be memorized and/or cast in an arbitrary period of time...

Personally I'm fine with 'mana' and it's current use.

 

[Staffan]

I think the term "mana" in itself isn't bad and it is an easy term to describe "magical energy" but anyone who has played Magic the Gathering for any length of time might be a bit burned out at the term.

Mana-burned, even.

 

[Staffan]

Whats the plural?

Vises?
Visae?
Viss?
Vis?

As in I've got 50 vises left .. or are those vis points?

In-game, magi measure vis in "pawns" (e.g. "To enchant this staff with that effect, I need four pawns of Ignem vis.") If you got a lot of it, you could call it a "rook" or maybe a "knight" - I'm not sure about the higher levels, except they're named after chess pieces.

However, in Ars Magica, magi don't have internal reservoirs of magic. Vis is used to refer to physical objects that contain some amount of magic power that can be used either to boost the spells the wizard casts, or for various purposes in laboratories. Casting magic is limited by the mage's endurance - if you do not succeed well enough when casting a spell, you will get one step more tired (on a seven-step scale).

 

[mythusmage]

Didn't the original Mythus/Dangerous Journeys list a whole bunch at one point?

Heka and baraka. Unhallowed and Changeling use vril as well.

Heka, from the ancient Egpytian, "Hekau" or "words of power". The Mythus word for magical energy. The system used magic points, called heka. A character could range from a few points to over a thousand depending on skills, attributes (etc.).

Baraka is the word in Mythus used for magical energy gained from natural locations with a higher than normal concentration of such. Waterfalls, glens presided over by old, majestic oaks. Places where supernatural phenomena occur on a regular basis. Sites of great miracles, and similar sites. Niagara falls and Half Dome in Yosemite would be examples of sites with baraka.

 

[mythusmage]

I use leï (ley).

So if somebody cast a spell on you would you be getting leyed?

 

[NewLifeForm]

Wow, no one mentioned the Japanese renpo, which can refer to magic power or to the use of it (a spell or rote). It is used in the Japanese RPG Wares Blade amoung others.

NewLifeForm
I am the new word for me

 

[Klaus]

Oh, I forgot:

Tunnels & Trolls uses the word kremm.