Okay, while I feel it may assist my D&D design process, I also just am curious. From all lore (Uncharted Realms, interviews with Creative, flavor text, etc) What are the qualities that different planes' mana possess, either via their "feel" or their magical features?
From what I can recall:
Shandalar's mana is easily drawn upon, so magic is particularly commonplace.
Yes, but it's also quasi-sentient and can make itself inaccessible to people it doesn't like (which is what happened to Leshrac and Tevesh Szat in the comic when they came to Shandalar and tried to conquer it. That's... handy). I think it also says somewhere that the mana has a strong tendency to create elementals (which would make sense if it's quasi-sentient and so rich it practicaly oozes out of the land), but I can't for the life of me remember where exactly I read that.
Innistrad's mana is... eerie.
According to Liliana, it's also particularly well suited for necromancy (which shouldn't surprise anyone). The "eerie" part is probably true but might also be in the eye of the beholder (and thus a classical case of "Shut up, Nissa!").
Zendikar's mana is volatile and has its own vitality
Yup.
Ir's mana is potent in some way for the summoning of powerful creatures
That's actually just Turri Island, not Ir in general.
Iquatana's mana is similar to Ir's? Or was that something else.
The plane is full of aether, which is probably what makes summoning easier.
Alara's mana is complicated after the Conflux
Probably, but it might have recovered over time.
Is there anything I'm missing?
Lorwyn's mana is excellent for casting glamers. Drawing mana on modern day Kamigawa attracts the attention of the kami that live inside the land, which means tapping the land there without first appeasing the spirits is a really bad idea (isn't it, Jace?). Snow mana on Dominaria during the Ice Age was kinda slow and syrupy (and probably pretty cold IIRC), which is funny because Jeff Grubb basically described Snow mana in
The Eternal Ice before it was really a thing in the card game! And of course the Rimewind mages developed their own branch of magic from its special icy qualities.
The source for at least some of this stuff can be found here:
http://magic.wizards.com/en/articles/ar ... 2009-12-30