Sign Magick

Asset. Hand

Ritual. Talent.

Cost: 3. XP: 3.

Mystic

Fast.

You have 1 additional arcane slot, which can only be used to hold a Spell or Ritual asset.

After you activate an ability on a Spell or Ritual asset, exhaust Sign Magick: Activate an ability on a different Spell or Ritual asset you control (without paying its cost).

John Pacer
Return to the Circle Undone #8.
Sign Magick

FAQs

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Reviews

TL;DR: Interesting update for sure! A must-have for a Spell heavy and orientated Mystics. It brings more value to Wither + Shrivelling combo / Sixth Sense + Rite of Seeking combo / Attack + Investigate + Evade Spells builds.

When level 0 of Sign Magick was often clunky and had a hard time finding a real value in decks, it was with Familiar Spirit the only way to open up your Arcane slot. The question was then: should I sacrifice an Ally slot, or a Hand slot?

And now, we have this upgrade and the The Hierophant • V in the same box that both offer an extra Arcane slot.

Let's look closer at these 2 cards:

The Hierophant • V:

• Free AND Fast when in your starting hand. It will most likely not be your first mulligan target as you will focus on your key spells.

• 3 resources, 1 card and 1 action to play - 6 actions. As with every other 'extra slot card', it becomes less and less relevant the later you draw it, knowing that you will need 1 action to play this card AND 1 action to play the extra Spell/Accessory. This makes this card useless in the late game when actions become really scarce.

• Doesn't bring any icons for skill test unless you bought Moon Pendant as your extra Accessory.

• Brings flexibility between your Accessory slot and your Arcane slot. Bring 3 Arcane spells and 2 Necklaces and play down the first 4 cards that come to your hand.

• Takes the slot of Four of Cups that is a commonly used Tarot card.

Sign Magick:

• 3 resources AND Fast. Even in the late game, if you have your other spell in hand, it is worth playing it if you have extra resources as long as you have 1 action to play your spell. Uncage the Soul can also make it free!

• Brings one extra action PER TURN (2 when you have the 2 cards down), on one of your spells (!!!)

•• Always use Wither or Sixth Sense before you use your Shrivelling/Armageddon/Azure Flame or Rite of Seeking/Clairvoyance/Eye of Chaos to benefit from the Symbol token effect on your second spell.

•• As it is a , you can use Rite of Seeking right after your attack with Shrivelling without provoking Attacks of Opportunity (!!!)

•• This is extremely interesting as Sword Cane was starting to make Wither (0) a bit useless. Not anymore.

•• Use Wither with Jacqueline Fine and bring an Icon token. This attack does 1 damage and -1 health. Use Sign Magick's to trigger Shrivelling for a nice potential 5 damages turn.

•• Use Sixth Sense with Jacqueline Fine and bring an Icon token. You are now investigating at a different location and find 1 clue. Use Sign Magick's to trigger Rite of Seeking to grab a nice amount of 4 clues at a different location [The rules of "As if" say: "Other card abilities or game effects resolved during the duration of the indicated ability or action are also resolved with the altered game state in mind."]

•• Use Mists of R'lyeh for evasion + move and send an immediate investigation on that new location with Rite of Seeking for an evasion, one move and 2 clues in one turn to make Ursula Downs feel like a sloth.

•• It also looks like it will bring nice combinations with the soon to be released Blur and its Fight version. Evade with Blur, investigate right after with Rite of Seeking and get your action back.

•• Finally a fun one: Borrowed Time will gain 1 free click per turn as it is a Ritual, unfortunately no one so far can use level 3 and level 3 in the same deck.

Conclusion:

I will prefer Sign Magick to The Hierophant • V for the Fast Aspect, to keep the Tarot slot free for Four of Cups, and most importantly for a free trigger of spells: You killed an enemy, get a free investigation, you didn't kill the enemy, get an extra attack or an evade to dodge the damages.

Valentin1331 · 67657
I suppose you need to spend a charge if you decide to use the reaction, because the ability says spend a charge... and reveal a token. You only save the action — Tharzax · 1
In the RR, there is this: — Valentin1331 · 67657
"For example: “Ashcan” Pete is at the Miskatonic Quad and activates Duke’s second ability, which reads: "[ACTION] Exhaust Duke: Investigate. You investigate with a base skill of 4. You may move to a connecting location immediately before investigating with this effect.” Pete pays the cost to activate this ability, which is spending one action and exhausting Duke." — Valentin1331 · 67657
We can therefore conclude that the "exhaust" in this example is included in the cost, therefore should the charges spent during the trigger of your spell. (sorry for the multiple comments) — Valentin1331 · 67657
The exhaust is part of the costs. This is right but the leveled sign magic says your can only ignore the action to activate the spell indicated through the arrow. All other cost like the charges are still need to be paid. — Tharzax · 1
I agree with Tharzax: The card literally says, that you don't have to pay the action cost. What other indications does it need to clarify, that you have to pay all other costs? Still a very strong card. You can combo an evade spell like Mists with a Shrivelling. (Perferably on a beefy oponent, that will sorvive one round.) Or even trigger a Rite of Seeking off a Shrivelling without AoO. Regarding "Uncage the Soul" on this spell: it's possible, but note, that you would loose the "Fast" that way. — Susumu · 363
After the discussion on this deck: https://arkhamdb.com/decklist/view/31648/, it seems indeed that the charges need to be spent, this doesn't change how good this card is for spell-heavy decks. — Valentin1331 · 67657
I agree, getting an extra action is always good and on top you can avoid AoO from enemies. — Tharzax · 1
Sadly, while your reading of the "As if" rules is correct, the reaction on Sign Magick (3) is an AFTER trigger, and so the entire Sixth Sense (4) ability will be completed before whatever other spell you are using. Can't use the second spell at whatever location you are investigating with Sixth Sense (4). — Veronica212 · 294
@wern212, Thanks for the comment, do you have any examples of other cases similar or the rules that are supporting your saying? From the card reading, I see "After you activate" as if they both resolve in a row, allowing the Haste combo in my opinion too. — Valentin1331 · 67657
Can someone explain to me why we cannot use the ability on a second copy of Sixth Sense, if we have two of them down? — 1337duck · 1
To add to what I am asking the ability of [Dexter Drake](https://arkhamdb.com/card/07004) explicitly mentions "different title". Is there a ruling which we can refer to for why 2 different Sixth Sense that are in arcane slot cannot be used? — 1337duck · 1

Sign Magick has good combo with charge spell and non-charge spell, of course. I think it also has good with supporting spell assets, such as Scrying, Clarity of Mind, Alchemical Transmutation, or Healing Words. In many cases, we confront two problem when we use thoes spells. One is leaks of arcane slot; we have only two arcane slots, one for fight and the other for investigate. The other is leaks of action to activate thoes spells. Sign Magick solves both problems.

elkeinkrad · 485
For Luke and Marie "Feed the Mind" might be an interesting choice for that. Marie can even take the upgrade. They would still need book buffs like "St. Hubert's Key". — Susumu · 363

Sign Magick is a combo card, and one with rather strict limitations. You need to have two different Spell or Ritual assets in play, both with an => activation cost. And you need to have useful targets for those assets.

Would you like to combine Shrivelling and Rite of Seeking? Then you need an enemy and two clues on your location. Want to combine Sixth Sense and Rite of Seeking? Fine, but there better be at least 3 clues on your location for that to be worth a RoS charge, and it better be your last action this round (Since a special token + Rite of Seeking will end your turn early). What about earning cash from Alchemic Transmution while searching for clues with Sixth Sense? Yep, that can be effective but you need to include Alchemic Transmution in your deck - a card that's almost never worth it unless you can activate it for free.

In reality it's hard to line up three, often expensive assets in Arkam Horror, and then find enough useful situations to make Sign Magic worth your time. Especially since Sign Magic is quite useless on its own and since the combo falters as soon as one of your spell/ritual assets run out of charges.

I can see some use for this card, however. For example an Akachi deck with lots of spell assets. She has her own charge economy, so it's easier for her to find room for the necessary pieces and get them in play.

olahren · 3364
I think this works best with support spells like alchemical transmutation or scrying 0. Or assets with unlimited uses like wither and sixth sense — Django · 5070
I suppose the upgraded version of sixth sense is also a potent option only fot the chance to find a clue at another location — Tharzax · 1
You definitely need a lot of play actions to take use of this card. You likely want to take use of the third arcane slot anyway. I think Dexter and Mystics with access to "Ever Vigilant" have an advantage here. On the other hand might Agnes want this card to try to make "Clarity of Mind" work. (Or in case of parallel Agnes "Healing Word".) I don't think, this card will become a Mystic staple, but I see decks, that might want it. — Susumu · 363
The community has long since criticized this game for how boring mystics came be. This card, as Django points out, enables you to play spells that you ordinarily would never touch like Alchemy (which is cheap) or Wither for a combat focused multiplayer mystic. Yes, it’s not likely to help with your generic fight and clue spells, but it does shake up the class and help unplayed cards see the table now. — LaRoix · 1643
Let's hope for a 4 Xp, Exceptional version of Sign Magic that's a *permanent*. Now that would open up some interesting playstyles. :) — olahren · 3364
Oh man, a permanent version of this card would be so good! — snacc · 980
Does this card allow to play the 2nd spell without using it's charge? — Gracchus · 1
@Gracchus You should pay all cost except action, so that you should pay the charge of second spell if necessary. — elkeinkrad · 485
"Different spell" does not mean "spell with a different name", right? Means I could use two copies of a spell/ritual with it? — Magitator · 1
As per the "Different" entry in the Rules section, it does need to be a different card title so two copies of the same spell/ritual would NOT count as "different." — MindControlMouse · 41

If you fill your extra slot with Haste you can activate one spell, then activate one other and then exhaust Haste to reactivate one of the two (or your Henry Wan if you are going the blurse way with Dexter) for one measly action! Just make sure one of the spells doesn't require charges because you'll be going through them like nobody's business (but Dexter doesn't really care as long as you have good card draw to replace the empty spells). Spectacular upgrade to a very weak card.

Gandalph · 34
Unfortunately, I don't think this works quite that swimmingly. Haste actually checks that you performed the action, and there is a long standing rules principle in this game that abilities that check to see if actions are performed check to see if they are spent. (See frozen in fear and say pathfinder or shortcut which uses the same "perform language") so all you'd need to do is do a second activate after your free one from sign magick to get the haste to trigger. 4 actions for 2 clicks--not quite as good as 3 for 1 but pretty damn good nonetheless! — Sycopath · 1
Mmm... I don't know. A ruling or errata on Haste is long overdue but the way I see it actions and action cost (arrow or click in Netrunner terminology) are two very distinct things. If it works like you say, they should have worded "when you spend one or more arrows to perform the same action twice in a row...". The ruling on Pathfinder + Frozen in fear doesn't make much sense: activating the free trigger is obviously not an activate action (there's a rules entry which specifies what an activate action is and it needs to have an arrow cost), but the move action it allows you to do is in fact an action, as is playing a fast event, they simply do not require a cost. So you cannot trigger Haste by using Hard knocks multiple times because it's not an activate action and it doesn't let you perform actions (receiving a bonus is not listed as an action), but you should be able to trigger Haste by using the free trigger on Cryptic Cypher to investigate and then playing a fast event with an investigate designator: the first is not an activate action and the second doesn't cost any arrows but they are both investigate actions. So — Gandalph · 34
So when Sign Magick says activate the activate action on a different spell you are indeed performing an activate action even if you don't spend any arrows and you should be allowed to trigger Haste. — Gandalph · 34
I think they should have maintained a stricter distinction between action and action cost (arrow). For example, Leo De Luca and Quick Thinking should have said "gain one arrow" (as in Netrunner "gain one click", instead of you may perform one extra action. It would have been much clearer for everything, including the actions which require multiple arrows (which are not as widely used as in Netrunner but still an important mechanic in the game) — Gandalph · 34
@Gabdalf, they DO have a strict distinction between action and action cost. Technically there are NO ‘actions’ on assets, so ‘activate the activate action on a [spell]” is not a thing. I’d suggest rereading the rules on Actions and abilities. What happens in your example is 1) You take the Activate action, choosing an action-costed ability on a spell. Then you trigger the reaction ability on Haste to ‘resolve the ability’ on another spell. You seem to be using the words ‘action’ and ‘ability’ interchangeably, which is not the case. In your example of investigation actions, neither of your suggested ‘actions’ are actions according to the rules. The cypher is a free trigger ability and the fast card was NOT played with the Play Action (See the first line of the rules for Fast cards). They are both ‘investigates’ and thus trigger all sorts of abilities that resolve ‘when investigating’ or ‘after you successfully investigate’ etc. If Sign Magic worked the way you thought, it would be phrased similarly to Ursula and Marie: “Take an activate action which can only be used to activate Spell or Ritual -> abilities.” — Death by Chocolate · 1440
@Death by Chocolate thanks for the clarification! The problem that creates confusion and potential inconsistencies is that Haste does treat action designator as actions, so it's still not really clear if a free trigger or a fast event with an Investigate designator - while obviously not being activate or play actions - are to be considered investigate actions (I guess not?) — Gandalph · 34
The ruling on action designator says "Activating such an ability performs the designated action", so it should be at least possible to activate Wither, trigger Sign Magick to perform the Fight ability on Shrivelling and then trigger Haste to punch/Shrivel/Wither/Sword cane with only one action spent, since - rules as written - you are indeed performing three fight actions. Then again, if this is allowed I find it a bit clunky that the "activate" on Sign Magick is not considered by itself as performing an activate action (but can be considered as a fight action as we have seen) just because is not in the Form of a bold designator, but I guess it's necessary to prevent Haste from triggering too easily (play, draw, move and activate effects triggered by cards such events or Double, double do not count as performing an action, but if I double double a Chuck Fergus fast Backstab I can trigger Haste to shoot with the Beretta, I guess) — Gandalph · 34

This has become one of my new favorite cards, it is great for mitigating the bad effects of Azure Flame, Shriveling, Blur, and Clairvoyance use one of those take horror or damage and then immediately heal it with Clarity of Mind or Healing Words with Sign Magick, absolutely great combo!

tactis · 17