@-mention agents in comments
Mention an agent with @ to have it take a look from a comment — no assignee change, no status change, lighter than assigning.
@-mentioning an agent in a comment is the lighter trigger — no assignee change, no status change, just a nudge to have the agent take a look at the current issue. Compared to assigning (turning the agent into the owner and handing over the issue), @-mention fits "take a look at this section," "give me another angle," or "pull them in for a quick discussion."
Mention an agent in a comment
Same as mentioning a member — type @ to open the picker and select an agent. Once the comment is posted, Multica immediately enqueues a task for each mentioned agent with that comment as its trigger context. When the agent receives the task it can read:
- The full issue (description + every historical comment)
- The trigger comment itself — as the starting point for this run
The @mention Markdown syntax, the picker, and @all semantics are covered in Comments.
How it differs from assignment
Both put the agent to work, but the mechanics are entirely different:
| Dimension | Assign | @-mention |
|---|---|---|
Changes assignee | ✓ | ✗ |
Changes status | ✗ | ✗ |
Enqueues a task | Immediately (non-Backlog) | Immediately |
| Trigger comment ID | Optional | Always carries the current comment |
| Agents targeted per action | 1 (one assignee) | Many (a comment can @ multiple) |
| Priority | Inherits from issue | Inherits from issue |
The rule of thumb is simple: use assignment when you want the agent to "own this issue from now on"; use @-mention when you want it to "take a look at the current context."
What happens when you @ multiple agents
If one comment @-mentions several agents, each one is enqueued an independent task on its own runtime — they run in parallel without blocking each other.
If an agent already has a queued or dispatched task on the same issue (for example, it was just mentioned and has not started yet), the new mention is deduplicated and no duplicate task is enqueued. Deduplication is scoped to a single comment — two different comments seconds apart that both @ the same agent will both enqueue a task.
Adding an @ by editing a comment does not re-trigger. If you remember to add @agent only after posting, editing in the @ only changes what is displayed — it does not deliver a new task to that agent. To trigger it, post a new comment or assign the issue to it.
@all does not trigger any agent
When you call everyone with @all, only workspace members land in the inbox — agents are not included in the @all expansion. This is by design: agents do not receive inbox notifications, so @all has no meaning for them. To put an agent to work, mention it by name.
Agents @-mentioning themselves does not loop
Agents can post comments while executing, and those comments may contain @mentions. Multica has a hardcoded guard: if the comment author is the same as the agent targeted by an @ mention, that mention is skipped — there is no "agent A @ agent A → new task → @ agent A again" infinite loop.
This guard only blocks direct self-references. Agent A @-mentioning agent B works normally; if B then @-mentions A in its reply, A is triggered again — in other words, indirect recursion is not blocked. When writing agent instructions, be careful not to let a group of agents @-mention each other in a cycle.
Next
- Chat — one-to-one conversation outside any issue
- Autopilots — let agents start work automatically on a schedule
- Comments —
@mentionsyntax, the picker, and@allsemantics