Discuss Change

Discuss Change

Escalate open decisions, agree on the implementation shape, then implement.

Task Tracking

Use update_plan to track each step, restating any remaining steps of a parent workflow alongside them:

1. Capture the task
2. Escalate product decisions
3. Deep-dive discussion
4. Confirm the shape
5. Run $implement skill

Step 1: Capture the Task

Absorb the request without interrupting. Take the task from the user's request, or from conversation context when the task was already established. Restate the goal in one or two sentences and confirm.

Step 2: Escalate Product Decisions

Identify product or design decisions the request did not resolve. Escalate these via request_user_input before any code is written. Read the code the change would touch before judging whether a bullet matches. Skip when no bullet below matches the change.

Escalate when:

• The change requires choosing between user-facing behaviors the request did not specify (opt-in vs opt-out, strict vs lenient, sync vs async)
• The change assumes product requirements that were not stated
• Design trade-offs affect UX or product direction rather than technical implementation
• Multiple valid approaches exist and the choice is a matter of product preference, not technical merit
• The change would introduce a pattern not yet established in this codebase, or follow one sourced from outside it
• The change adds consistency or durability machinery (a lease, lock, queue, versioning scheme, or new persistent entity) that no stated requirement demands; carrying that machinery is itself a product decision

Do not escalate technical decisions the agent can make autonomously: which data structure, which existing pattern to follow, internal implementation approach. The boundary is product intent.

Confirm external constraints before escalating. When an option depends on a third-party API, service, or platform behaving a particular way, query documentation MCP tools (or web search as a fallback) and drop the option unless current documentation confirms that behavior.

Output what is at stake as text first, even when the reading it came from is fresh in this conversation. When the decision turns on a failure or misuse scenario, that means the invariant the change would protect and what makes that scenario reachable given the existing guards. Then use request_user_input to present the decision as a concise trade-off with options. Mark the strongest option "(Recommended)" and place it first.

Offer a Get a second opinion option whenever the decision is costly to reverse (it establishes a pattern others will follow, defines an interface, commits to a data shape, or imports a pattern the codebase has not used), and whenever no option earns "(Recommended)" with conviction. It runs the $consult-claude skill for what each option commits to, what reversing it costs, and what the prevailing convention is. Hold the concrete options to two so the question stays within the three-option limit. Then resolve the decision with that answer in hand, re-asking when the choice stays the user's.

Step 3: Deep-Dive Discussion