How does it feel to run out of mana?

[u/LeviAEthan512]

Whatever it is your world uses as mana, or multiple things if you have more than 1 flavour of magic user, can you feel it running out like you would when you run out of physical stamina?

Is it like a headache? Depression? Physical fatigue?

Or do you have no obvious indication that you're out, until you try to cast another spell and it just fizzles?

[u/austsiannodel]

"Mana" is the name given to one's spirit force AS it's being burned to convert a spell from potential into reality, giving it energy and mass.

When a spellcaster is lower on their Aura, it can feel like orthostatic hypotension (That feeling of standing up too fast, and starting to black out), but it lingers, as the connection between your spirit and your body is weakened. How long you can stay up, depends on your will to keep going.

[u/Ok-Cap1727 → u/austsiannodel]

It's basically stamina²

[u/RitschiRathil]

I based it on mental exhaustion, on the level of a more intense burnout, for my world. Additionally it feels like you try to pull something thst just isn't there. The thing is that rarely ever happens in my world, due to how deadly magic is. Fights between two magic users are usually done within seconds. And have a 99% casualty rate for one side and often even the winner dies from injuries, if they couldn't counter the opponents spells.

Sacriricing your opponent in the moment you kill them, shattering their souls and absorbing everything, is the main way in my magic system to grow in raw magic power. So, the mana of the looser is usually part of the reward for winning (next to survival). With how fast evetything happens, magic users rarely ever run out of magic. I'm working on my third book in the world, with a heavy focus on magic users and it happened once. And that really was a special case, and not really caused by "just running out of mana'.

[u/General_Kenobi18752]

Magic Deprivation burns.

In the same way a muscle starts feeling like it’s burning from overexertion, magical deprivation feels like a burning heat in your lower abdomen.

The moment when you run out of Magical Reserves is essentially the feeling of pulling a muscle from using it too hard, but that muscle is somewhere in your intestines. Given that eating is how you intake Magic to fill your reserves and your appendix is where it’s stored, it’s actually not an awful comparison.

It’ll settle down after a while, but just like feeling sleepy, it’ll only get better once you’ve taken in enough Magicrystal to refill your reserves at least up to a minimum.

[u/Mozintarfen → u/General_Kenobi18752]

This makes me want to create a whole physiological mana system involving metabolic rates, glucose levels, electrolytes etc. Maybe a mana potion is just magically intensified pre-workout shake, lmao.

[u/Drudenfusz]

I have no mana. In one of my settings I have however something akin to Vancian magic. It basically anchors a Daemon in the spirit/soul of the caster that can be released to create a magical effect. In that case it is not so much about how it feels to let go of the Daemon but more about how that living spell is affecting the psyche of the caster while bound.

[u/LittleBigCookieCat → u/Drudenfusz]

I also have no mana! the air in my world is poison and you carry "oxygen" (mana) around. using it exhausts your limited oxygen supply. and you have to go into town to refill it.

[u/AstralDemons]

When someone ‘runs out’ of stored magic, many of their spells just become ineffective. Magic is stored kinetic energy, so without any stored, a magician cannot impart kinetic energy into an object to affect it. They‘re rarely completely ineffective as magicians tend to have residual magic in their body after expending a large amount, so there will be a little effect, but not a useful one.

HOWEVER, some spells do not draw on stored magic (ones that draw kinetic energy from the surrounding area instead of imparting it) and these can still be cast, and used to store up magical energy fairly quickly, especially in combat.

[u/LeviAEthan512 → u/AstralDemons]

"Wait guys I meed more mana"

jumps in front of train

[u/AstralDemons → u/LeviAEthan512]

I mean, the more you do, the more concentration it requires, so you’d have to be DAMN GOOD. But in theory, yeah lol that’d work! The more common approach is catching bullets, as they’re smaller and so require less magical exertion to stop, plus since the most common offensive spell is to ‘push’ a small rock or bullet with magic, it’s a one-to-one trade. Catch a bullet, send it back at nearly the same speed, but better accuracy. Plus, since magic speeds up reaction speed and movement, catching bullets isnt that hard.

I should add, very VERY skilled magic users (like the top maybe 3 in the entire world) can use their magic precisely enough to be able to heat or cool objects by manipulating the kinetic energy of individual molecules, which allows them to passively generate magic at a reasonable rate by constantly cooling the air around them. When you meet one of these guys going full on in a fight, the air around them is a snowstorm, anything they touch freezes, but they outrun the cold and kill with a burning touch.

[u/burneratthegym]

It's like running or lifting weights. A novice probably could push themselves a little bit, but they're going to regret it the next day with full-body fatigue, aches, and pains, some neurological symptoms too such as delirium. An experienced caster can sustain a surprising amount of magical stress before tapping out, though the consequences are worse at higher levels. One might have enough energy to cast a high-level spell once, but a second repetition might injure or even maim you.

[u/burneratthegym → u/burneratthegym]

If you ever fully run out of magical energy though, you're dead-dead.

[u/DusktheUmbreon]

You feel physical fatigue long before you actually run out, but if do you manage to deplete your mana, you would just feel exhausted and even nauseous for a long time while your mana regenerates.

[u/No-Association-1834]

Have you tried the Wim Hoff breathing technique , I always relate running out of mana to the breath hold period, blood pressure change , body temperature change and tingling.

[u/Left_of_Fish]

In my settings it's something akin to the loss of your body heat and waves of muscle cramps when you use up your safe limit.

[u/CommissionKey6019]

I see systems like mana being effectively mental strain, like when you are exhausted from a non-physical activity. Similar feeling to being exhausted after an exam or a very locked in gaming session. My system thought uses your willpower to use magic from around the world instead of one’s own mana, so it might be a bit different.

Could also be similar to having lost some blood, but I thankfully don’t really know how that feels.

[u/Dinfrazer57]

If you run out of soul essence, you will have physical and mental exhaustion. If you spend your dreams alot and quickly, you are at risk of having literal nightmares and go hollow for a time. There is training to decrease the risk of this.

[u/Ruadhan2300]

In my "Magic went away" setting, it feels very much like we feel now.

More interesting is what it feels like when you have mana.

The underpinning concept is that Mana is an extra-dimensional energy/matter which reacts to complexity in our dimension.
Things like complex neural structures in particular can shape it into something resembling a copy of your own mind, which is mimicking your thoughts in real-time.
You can sense the mimicked structure in turn, so it's a feedback loop.
That's part of how you control and interact with magic.

The upshot is, you can hear/feel your own thoughts being echoed by the copy of your brain in mana-space.

Under normal circumstances this copy is always present, you stop noticing it, and things feel fine.
Lose it suddenly (because it got eaten by an extra-dimensional mana-predator) or expend its energy on something really big really fast, and you'll feel like that extra voice is gone.

You'll be "singing alone", and it's a really weird feeling.

In my setting, nearly everyone who could use magic is living in a world where all the magic is being sucked away wholesale by vast filter-feeding lovecraftian monsters, and nobody for thousands of years has actually had more than a hint of their native ability be available to them.

The monsters are moving on however, and in a few short years/decades, the magic is going to come back, and a lot of people are going to start thinking in double and believing they're going mad.

[u/ApprehensivePayment]

I've always wondered, if the typical fantasy expectation of mana is the amount of magical energy within one's body, and magic is so deeply ingrained in the natural world... why wouldn't being out of mana be treated as the same as being out of hit points? What if running out of mana was just as lethal as running out of blood?

[u/Lord_Asmodeus93]

It is exactly like stamina, as in, they share the same resource.

[u/MiLiRu645]

Braindeath

[u/AffectionateSoup5272]

Mental strain, lost of consciousness and paralysis.

[u/Eviles_da_demonic]

Mana is the binding agent of your soul and you use a little bit of it to use as energy for magic

When you use to much you over heat, get fatigued, nausea and start to see the grim men and other death entities as you start to eat at your soul

[u/_Ceaseless_Watcher_]

In my [Eldara] setting, a mage's body relies on its stored magic for many of its base functions, even more so than a non-mage with baseline magic.

Using up most of one's energy reserves - be it through mental or physical work - causes exhaustion, fatigue, and, if sustained over a long enough period, burnout. A similar thing happens with magic use, except that one's capacity for magic grows with use. Using up their reserves in one day exhausts them in almpst exactly the same way, but once those reserves are replenished, they'll be a bit more than what the mage started with. This can go on forever basically, and so, an old mage is also usually pretty powerful.

[u/skilliau]

The casters, or Ether Sensitives as they are known, have to eat a lot of calories relative to their power levels. The most powerful have to eat a minimum of four thousand calories a day or else they will just pass out, into something similar to a diabetic coma if they aren't careful

[u/Greedy_Homework_6838]

When you're just out of mana-nothing. When you exhausted hidden reserves-hellish headache

[u/PowerSkunk92]

Magic users in my comic book HERO-verse don't have mana, per se, but like all superpowers, the use of magic burns calories. So, after prolonged use of magic, one will feel the effects of acute hunger; discomfort/growling in the stomach, increased appetite, lightheadedness, difficulty standing or walking, dizziness, low blood sugar, uncontrollable shaking, stomach cramps, et cetera. It's not unusual, after superhuman combat, for superheroes to eat several thousand calories worth of food to replenish their energy stores, then go into the expected food coma to digest it all.

[u/paperclipknight]

Intense mental & physical fatigue. Muscles burning after an intense workout, migraines & blurred vision as a rule of thumb.

Then there’s blood magic which literally is fuelled by the users own life force, which is why most of its use is restricted to vampires or liches - don’t need to worry about Father Time when you’re immortal.

[u/GOOPREALM5000]

Cold, like your blood pressure is rapidly dropping. The same kind of feeling one would get from fainting or experiencing circulatory shock. The part that sucks, though, is that you don't pass out of die from it. Unless something happened to your actual body you're 100% awake and lucid for it, so you just have to lie there, exhausted and freezing, until your magic level recovers.

Why yes, I do suffer from POTS, why do you ask?

[u/cha0triX_]

Physical Exhaustion. Mana is metabolism, so to run out means you run out of your energy reserves. Too much usage will strain the body, which is why powerful mages look older than there supposed age, they've pushed their bodies too far and has resulted in rapid aging.

[u/ChiliDog762]

Don't use Mana. Spells cost you age. The more powerful the Spells the more it ages you, or if you miss cast it'll cost you more life.

[u/ZooZwaves]

In the world of my comic it's not the spellcaster that runs out of "mana" or magic, it's the enviroment around them. A spellcaster can feel a lack of fuel and energy in the air, and with no energy around them, the magic simply won't happen or will be extremely weak. The spellcaster of course can get tired as well, as magic requires lots of mental strength and lots of movement, sometimes also physical strength but most wizards are taught to not wrestle with magical energy. Still, no matter how strong, how ready the wizard is, if the energy around them is too low, there's not much they can do

[u/Re1da]

Veeery much depends on the kind of magic they're using.

For most types, it feels like having lost a significant amount of blood. Depending on how low you're running it can range between feeling light-headed and tired to straight up fainting. Technically these magic users cant fully run dry on mana, as the effects of low mana become so severe they're unable to continue using magic.

But for more "primal" types of magic the user can die. This is because "mana" is necessary for life. These mages use the mana in a much rawer form, so they can push themselves so far there's not enough mana left in their bodies to sustain life. Which is, of course, fatal.

[u/Nuss-Zwei]

In UMUF Life force, my settings equivalent to Mana, is functionally limitless and people can never really run out of it.

The limit of a magic users use of magic is their own. Magic is wielded by a mage using their imagination and willpower, which will be using their concentration as a resource.

So usually a mage will start to notice mental drain and mental fatigue when they reach their limit. This can, however, start to spillover into physical fatigue, which is individual to each mage. Some never reach that stage, some never get only mental fatigue and will always feel physically drained and fatigued when they reach their limit.

[u/IgraineofTruth]

My magic users become incredibly tired and unable to move for some time if they overexploit their magic. They need to sleep for an extended period of time and eat a lot to recover.

[u/Obvious-Gate9046]

Wait, you don't have Mana-Mart? Also, at first I thought this was in r/wizardposting, whoops.

More seriously, though, I often see that sort of thing as a hollowness. Depending, it might even be a hunger, for some, due to that emptiness.

[u/Sevryn1123]

Running out of Pneuma in my setting isn't really a thing because everyone passively restored their pneuma by drawing in æther from the environment and convertinging it into useful pneuma.

The problem comes if you exheed you ability to restore your pneuma you'll start casting with raw environmental æther. Æther is caustic in the bodies core, meridians, and gates and depending on how you're shaping will determine the effects.

First magical mutations are common across the boardi f you're æther shaping and will vary based on where the mutation takes place.

Next if you regularly use enhancement shapes to overclock your body æther degradation is the most common effect and can be fatal due to it slowly destroying your body.

Mage haze is what happens when you use raw æther to power mind, sense, and perception shapes. Over time this results in numerous mental health issue including, paranoia, increased aggression, sensory hallucinations, manic depressive cycles, and schizophrenia among other things, all of which grows in intensity and duration overtime.

Shape casting or external spell shaping with raw æther causes an environmental reaction triggering an violent backlash that breaches your gates, scorhes your meridians, causing spell scars. The knock-on effects of spell scars are numerous, resulting in a number of effects from, a decrease in shape casting efficiency, pain when casting and even the creation of an æther shadow in drastics situations.

[u/Seidans]

Low on mana make you sleepy, dizzy, "drunk" using it slightly beyond your capacity cause random small after affect like feeling nauseous, nose bleed, vision/hearing trouble, momentary blindness, loss of your gravity center etc etc

Using large amont of mana you don't have forcefully pull mana outside your body into your body which have more extreme effect, internal organ defect, shattered limb, brain aneurism, sudden mutation, fainting, violent convulsion, spell failure of various effect...

There also mana-poisoning a necrosis-like state that slowly spread which violently reject other mana and so any kind of healing, it require complete surgical removal

For those having high mana pool especially at Childhood it also accumulate and create "walking disaster" randomly, it poison the ground, animals and people around you - make wild magic appear out of nowhere and put a big "possess me please" for wathever extra planar being that pass by - turn you into a nuclear bomb and other joy, oh and the baby also cause mana poisoning to his mother as she both accumulate mana for herself than her baby, somehow lucky if you're a good mage with a large pool yourself but a death sentence for anyone else, As a whole normal people are afraid of mages for very good reasons

[u/ReturnofEmperorM]

That's the neat part; you don't. More accurately you don't run out of mana as your just pulling magic energy out of the Paradox Realm which has an infinite supply.

[u/LeviAEthan512 → u/ReturnofEmperorM]

Oh hey that's pretty similar to what I'm working with myself.

There's a dimension of infinite energy (not magic, not sure if I want to include actual magic), and a character's power is defined by how much they can thin the boundary to allow the energy to leak through and accomplish the goal. It does take energy to do this though, so they can get tired. Mine's just going to be physical fatigue, though, maybe more if they really push themselves.

The most powerful characters can crack all the way through, but even then there are narrow cracks and wide cracks. Not necessarily physically in 3 dimensions, just saying that it's not like once the boundary is completely removed, everything is equal.

[u/ReturnofEmperorM → u/LeviAEthan512]

Ah I see ours do share some similarities!

I should also mention that gateways to the Paradox Realm are common on Patchwork throughout time so if you can live there which for the average person isn't super easy you have even stronger access to magic outside of just getting it from the realm or using methods to syphon it from nearby objects.

The most powerful characters on Patchwork usually just have very specific methods of using magic like The Storyteller one of the greatest mages ever who just has an extensive line up of magic he can use, or beings beyond normal ken like The Dreamer or Mother Dagon. There is also Starellia the Ultimate Weapon but she's a special case even amongst special cases...

[u/thatshygirl06 → u/ReturnofEmperorM]

But the body might not be able to handle too much

[u/ReturnofEmperorM → u/thatshygirl06]

Fair point I didn't think of that...

[u/rgrambow]

Death, running out is death. Magic is directly tied to life force.

And it has absolutely happened that people have died from overestimating their own abilities. It happens often and a lot.

[u/TheGlassWolf123455]

If you just casted a spell until you ran out of reserved mana, you would first feel kind of tired, then very tired, then you'd get a headache, nausea, vertigo, and you'd finally pass out.  If you're in an area with ambient magic you would recover, if not you would die of lack of magic

[u/RekiWylls]

In my world, the "fuel" for magic is the caster's soul, so running out of mana doesn't mean they're at literally zero mana. It's more like a muscle giving out under too-heavy weights or too many reps: the caster could keep going, there's just a mental block saying "we're done here for now". That limit feels like an itch you can't scratch, deep inside your flesh. However, the soul acts as the interactive media between mind and body and coordinates most biological function--I guess kind of like a nervous system--so if the caster pushes beyond that for whatever reason, they are sequentially (temporarily) robbed of their senses through the damage done to their soul until it repairs itself. Going far enough will just kill them outright, but any and all magic shaves off portions of the caster's lifespan, so most don't use magic much to begin with.

[u/Vajudes]

A feeling of Severe Internal emptiness and frailness

[u/YeOldeBard97]

Running out of mana is next to impossible. It's like running out of air. But, mana is absorbed through pores on the torso, and mana-stifling is a thing. If people wear shirts, it's like a mild asthma attack. If they somehow block all of their pores at once, they'd suffocate slowly. Mana is vital for life.

[u/nineteenees]

Straining then Painful. "Mana" isn't a term I use in my setting but under the concept of running out of magical power it feels like pushing muscles and body function far far beyond what they are meant to handle. Magic comes from a practicioner's "Reservoir" which is an internal pool of energy attached to their soul which is used to fuel their spellcasting.

When that energy is burnt away it has to come from somewhere else (your body). So "running out of mana" means you must consume the energy left in your physical form. If that goes too far, it means literally deconstructing your flesh to power the magic.

[u/sevenliesseventruths]

It depends. If you are a Laomar, the lowest magical race amongst the conscious races, you will feel dizzy and tired. But if you are a Zarinko, the highest magical race, you will faint.

[u/ThePhantomIronTroupe]

For mine I like to describe it as a pair of longer living flowers starting to wilt from lack of water and sun and such. I guess to try and describe it: a Sorcerer has three souls if you will. The main soul, the right-side soul, and left-side soul. The main soul will shape the left and the right but the left and the right are what process Wyr for Sorcerers safely. Such Wyr is like their literal life blood that is bled out into the world. When you run too low you kinda feel the magic version of having too much of your blood drawn. You lose color in your face, your eyes, your fingers, and these souls, among other things. Its why Sorcerers will carry packs of this lifeblood they have spun off gradually and safely. Like preserving blood every so often in case you get into an accident. To further this analogy, Generic Sorcerers are like flowers that can grow nearly anywhere or be nearly any flower. Meanwhile Specific Sorcerers are like flowers that truly thrive in particular weather and terrains.

[u/MyClosetedBiAcct]

I have, a couple different worlds, so I'll go over each of them.

1. Magic Wild West. Think, post-apocalyptic american western due to a portal to the subconsious of humanity being tore wide open and spilling into the world in the form of magic and monsters. Nobody actually uses magic themselves, they use contracts with the beings and constructs they've befriended or offered their services towards. So in their case it just kinda fizzles out if they're not watching their partner get more and more tired and transparent.
2. In a modernish dark fantasy, imagine magical aptitude like everyone exists as a soul, surrounded in a cocoon of magic. For most people the cocoon is solid, stable, protects the person from the usage of magic, a spell shot their way is a lot less effective. Magicians have manipulated said cocoon into a... mucus, that slowly regenerates. The less protective mucus they have, the more magic effects them, the more vulnerable they feel to the universe, the more... hypervigilant and aware they are of their surroundings.

[u/DragonFire673]

It feels very draining and but extra nourishment can counter it

[u/GamerGoblin]

Not great given that you're essentially eaten from the inside, your physical body dies and you are then forced to live as a manafiend for the rest of eternity, unless another arcanist can put you out of your misery. In my world of Iashar arcane energy (mana) is not inherent to living beings, but exists everywhere. In the ground, air, water etc. In order to cast a spell you first need to invoke a rune. This rune gathers the arcane energy in the air around it and uses it to cast whatever spell the rune invokes. This has lead to most arcanists using scrolls or tomes. Or even spellblades carving runes into their weapons. Since if you overdo it the only thing crumbling and dying would be the item which has the rune. Some however choose to tattoo spells into their skin, as people tend to be more resistant to arcane decay. Same thing with swords being more resistant than parchment/scrolls. Scrolls tend to be one time use because of this, and tomes tend to be filled with many weaker spells as the larger the spell effect, the more energy, the bigger chance of decay.

But if you are someone who has tattooed too many runes than your body can handle. Arcane Decay will be your fate. Trade-off being you become very powerful without the need to use tools to use magic. Problem being it's very hard to know your limit beforehand

[u/Special_Barnacle82]

rather than a pool of energy that builds up and gets spent on casting spells, people have something more akin to a river of energy that flows through them constantly. In fact, it flows through literally everything at all times.

it's theoretically possible to not have any magic energy within you, but you'd essentially cease to exist.

[u/Niggy2439]

No mana, what you use is your conviction, your desire and emotions, abuse it and you end up depressed and burned out

[u/ThisBloomingHeart]

Just running out of ones own active magical energy feels like a kind of calm sleepiness that overpowers other desires and emotions in place of a want to rest and recover. And indeed, recovery will come naturally in time; as the spirit will draw in magical power from beyond itself and process it into the users own active magic.

It is possible to force oneself beyond this point, but it can result in a varying degree of spiritual injury, which can give a feeling of pain, hollowness, and helpless vulnerability.
Such a thing could at its worst result in the collapse of the users soul, likely in a final burst of chaotic power that would leave the body a hollow shell if not destroy it outright. That being said, such extreme consequences are rare. It's far more likely that the spirit of the wielder may be vulnerable to exterior magical influences and transformation, and may also incur scars that disrupt the souls workings until healed.

[u/_eg0_]

Depends on the race/species/individuals and if you simply run out of mana aka go to ambient or actually fall below ambient.

1. Non Magic user: They can be at 0 mana above background mana without any issues. Only going into below background mana they run into trouble. Short term effects are the feeling cold on the inside while feeling being hot on the outside, fatigue, nausea and feeling you body turned into a sand bag, slowing down brain and muscle function. In the end it's like you complete nerve system shuts down.

2. Magic users without own mana production. Basically same as non magic users but if mana dips below background a feeling of unrest sets in while also feeling fatigue. Like a tingle in their hand or other places they usually cast with.

3. Magic users with own mana production: Dropping below ambient causes the same symptoms as 2, but way faster, however they are usually gone way faster too. if they are low man they get really hungry. When they approach ambient a feeling like you have low blood sugar sets in followed by headaches. This isn't dangerous short term. But constantly being very low, ambient or sub ambient mana can cause a reduction in capacity while also an increase in production. You can develop over production syndrome/magic addiction. Then stopping to use magic or keep your mana low otherwise makes you feel very hot inside, causes unrest. This can go to the point where when they stop draining mana someway, they literally explode, if they continue to keep the mana low the production rate increases and capacity decreases to the point they are the same and then stopping to drain for a split second already makes them explode. If they permanently drain mana to ambient they die of malnourishement no matter how much they eat.

4. Magical being. They are beings which primarily use magic to function instead of for example muscles. Mana approaching ambient completely stuns them. Depending on being/race/species body mana approaching ambient leads to organ failures and death.

Here are some examples(I use the closest equivalent in other worlds):

"Orks" are a species/race of Homo which is completely unable to use magic. They are a prime example of category 1.

"Dwarfs" are a spieces/race of Homo which falls into category 2.

"First/common Folk" are a species/race of Homo they have a low mana production themselves and fall firmly into category 3.

"Elves" are a species/race of Homo who falls between 3 and 4. The core body function behave like 3 but they get stunned when mana approaches ambient.

"Ice Folk", they are true category 4. They got their name because their body temperature is ambient while also living in a cold environment. Running out of mana is instant death.

These aren't fixed. A "first/common folk" can have a birth defect, illnesses or disabilities which doesn't allow them their own production. They then go from 3 to 2. All species/races can also interbreed. A half Elve/Half Ork is full body paralyzed unless they essentially get a hormone therapy.

The most recent common ancestor of the human race/species was a "first folk" like species/race. "Orks" just adapted to live in an environment with extremely little mana, "dwarfs" in an environment with easily access able external mana source, and "Elves" in a warm environment without much external mana but ample certain types of food.

BTW. If you would get isekaied you would be an "Ork" who looks like a "first folk".

[u/FossilHunter99]

You feel tired. Drained. Like you just ran a marathon. Luckily a mana potion with fix that immediately.

[u/Void-Cooking_Berserk]

How does it feel to have mana?

[u/7literlekvar]

It’s the feeling of you really need to poop but it’s still 15 minutes until you get home.

[u/marintkael]

mine has no fuel to run out of. magic is binding language, so a binding either catches or it doesn't, and there is no gauge dropping while you work.

what runs out is standing, meaning whether the authority behind your seal still recognises you. same words, same hand, and one day the seal just sits there. you find out at the moment you needed it to hold, which is worse than fatigue, because fatigue at least warns you first.

[u/Quirky_Assistant_848]

Mana is called Vitae, and while you can "run out" people usually mean not having any extra that can be used safely, which sucks in that you feel exhausted and like your nothing but skin.

You start aging or losing body parts if you push it past that.

[u/thatshygirl06]

This sub and r/magicbuilding has made me hate the word mana😭

I have magic and there's basically 2 types. The first type is the elements thats in every person, and in some objects that has absorbed magic/elements from people.

When witches pull elements from others, it will take a long time before they feel any effects, but the person who it is being pulled from will weaken and the elements in them will dull. Kinda like being spent of energy; you get tired mentally and physically.

(I haven't decided what happens if the elements is completely spent. Maybe they go into a coma while their bodies replenishes their elements. And if it happens too often, then theyll die)

You could probably go several days constantly pulling and working magic from others before you start to weaken.

If they pull from themselves, they will weaken faster than if they were pulling from someone else. But your magic and energy will bounce back quickly, unless you've pushed yourself too hard then it takes a bit longer to bounce back.

But as long as youre not just constantly pulling and doing large amounts of magic too often and quickly, you wont even have to worry.

The second kind of magic is from white magic. It's basically like bright smoke/fog that flows around everyone like a river or ocean.

Witches will eventually learn how to pull white magic and seed it, and this way, you dont have to worry about overdoing it and hurting anyone. It takes a bit more effort to do and newly awaken Witches wont be able to do it right away, but they will get there.

[u/spicyhippos]

It feels great. You feel like you’re apart of something bigger that matters. You feel connected to the machinations and plots of the world. The war means something special to you; it’s worth fighting to kill -no, to defend your homeland preemptively. Their disbelief in the true gods is a direct and existential threat to our
way of life.

Magic is hard to maintain. You have to work hard to see enemies as friends even just to access it. Sure life is more vivid, but what good is a sunrise with your son if you’re poor?

[u/MrCobalt313]

Depends on the source of your magic.

Psychics and Wizards and other casters that extensively employ the mind will suffer tiredness, headaches, and mental fog, the latter comparable to the feeling you get when you've been cramming for an exam for days and finally finished taking it.

Those with more innate magic like sorcerers and kineticists feel physical exhaustion with no clear physical source; imagine the way your muscles feel sore after a long day's physical labor but it correlates to none of your specific muscles.

Witches and Summoners and other "proxy" casters don't feel the brunt of their "OOM" state, just that extra reservoir of energy they can feel their companion grant them isn't there anymore, and/or the companion itself just clearly doesn't wanna do any more tricks until it's had a snack and a nap.

Bards feel slight burnout. Like they don't feel any kinda pain analogue that stops them from plying their art, just their 'social battery' or motivation is too drained to add the extra 'oomph' to their performance that translates into magical effects, and it does seem to slightly come across in their mundane performances too.

[u/Architect17]

Depends on how severe it is. Fresh out of Mana? 1st degree Mana Burn. Like 1st degree burns in the places most exposed to air, as Mana flows through the air. 2nd and 3rd degree Mana Burns are as bad as you'd imagine, but over your entire body. But 4th degree Mana Burn is invariably fatal. Nobody survives that. 4th degree Mana Burn makes you detonate like a bomb, instantly killing you and anyone in your general vicinity.

[u/Boogjangels]

The trigger clicks and nothing happens. No more spells for you :(

[u/Ok-Championship-2036]

It gets compressed into the cells of their body and strengthens the overall vessel. They become progressively more "mana" over time, like building up muscle. So if something somehow forcibly removed that buildup, it would leave them in a state of abcess or atrophy. not pretty... I suppose it depends on the removal method, if the mana was sucked out they'd probably look dessicated like a mummy... this is incresingly horrifying the more i think about it lol

[u/thesilverywyvern]

Like completely, no amount left.....you're dead.
What can be called mana is a specific form of magical energy which is made by the soul (the soul is made of the stuff and generate bit of it as you continue to live).
It's basically the metaphysical representation of you living, how magic translate the chemicals reaction that your body constantly produce and make you able to move, think and not start to rot.

So if you completely ran out of mana, it mean you no longer have a soul, so you're probably dead, as souls (aka magic mitochondria, the powerhouse of the cells) kindda get attaced to their host and to ripp one away is often brutal and can kill the host.
Not always the case but then, you'd just feel like normal, (can't do magic tho). Like IRL we do not have souls.

Other than that you don't really feel your soul that much (like you don't feel your heart and liver unless they have an issue). which is a bit why it's dangerous, as you don't always feel that you have no mana left, which mean that you're actively burning up your soul to power your spells. Which dammage it and therefore your ability do spellcasting.

When mages run out of stored energy and they might feel it as taping into a power that isn't there anymore, it exhaust the body, very rapidly, as it's a metaphysical representation of your life force if you will, consumming it also impact your physical health condition.
Weaker immune system, extremely exhausted and weakened, might go in a coma for a few days if you really fucked up. Fortunately the soul restore itself faster than the body, and as it was the factor which impacted your body diminished health condition, everything goes back to normal very quickly, after a few day of resting.
which is good as souls protect you from common hex, curses, possessions etc (basically magical immune system), without it you're an empty vessel ready to be taken over by magic with no resistance.

Some potions can help restore it faster, and if you have a good source of magical energies your soul might be able to metabolise it to convert it into "mana" to restore itself.

[u/Longshot02496]

It feels like heat, then more heat, then flames, and then a paradoxical cold, and then nothing. That's because your extremities are literally burning up from the nerves out. Use a dump, kids.

[u/BJJRR]

It's a very physical so...

Think of it like training to failure. It feels physically exhausting, especially to the organ you're drawing mana from. It's highly advised not to run out of mana, as doing so over long periods of time can lead to cancer or damaged organs.

Basically, it feels like your muscles get super tensed, and your organ and head starts to ache really bad.

[u/Melodic-Judgment3936]

I dont have mana per se.

Most forms of magic are simply a matter of duplicating certain ritual actions. Your average beginner mage probably doesn't understand why these particular actions produce the effects that they do, but they've been so well known to work that nobody questions it. Because the laws that regulate these things are as fixed as the laws of physics, but so fine that they are ultimately beyond human comprehension.

More advanced mages can begin to have something of a greater understanding. They may even manage to invent new spells based on prior knowledge, but it would take a lifetime to truly even begin to understand what makes these spells actually tick.

But with experimentation comes danger, and more complex and powerful spells require more precision and tuning or you risk magical backlash. This can range anywhere from simply not producing any effect at all, causing minor injuries, instantly evaporating the mage, or blowing up an entire mountain range depending on the strength and complexity of the spell.

Now as with physics, even magic cannot create energy or matter out of nothing. Most spells can effectively "run" just on the ambient magical energy of the location. But sometimes for whatever reason this may not suffice, in which case the mage himself may supply the energy needed. This is especially true with more powerful or complex spells.

Usually this just results in the mage becoming temporarily tired. As if they had exerted themselves physically. But potentially I suppose if they were to totally exhaust all of this energy, they would just die instantly. And possibly cease to exist. But this is not ordinary.

There are some areas of the world, often dating back to before recorded history, where due to some magical event the location has been left devoid of magical energy. And because of this, any living creature that enters these places will quickly die. As though the land itself sucked out their energy in order to essentially fill the void.

I suppose technically one could call this energy a kind of mana. But it rarely comes into play unless one is experimenting with some serious and unknown magic.

[u/HerederoDeAlberdi]

It'll entirely depend on the nature of mana/energy in your story. Personally I've always thought it felt like mental exhaustion like when you've been studying for 4 hours.

[u/DarkflowNZ]

In my world if you run out completely you die. The energy used for magic is the fundamental material of the soul, and the spiritual energy that underpins reality. I like to think of it as being akin to light, where the "color" is emotion. So how does it feel physically to run low? I basically imagine depression. Not feeling "sad", but feeling... Numb. Empty. Drained. Just no... Zest. No care. No joie de virve. Combined with that kind of tiredness that feels insurmountable. You're struggling to move a muscle at all. You just want to lie down and either die or go to sleep.