Subagent Patterns

Overview

This skill helps you decide what to dispatch to a subagent and how. Each dispatch comes down to five choices: whether to dispatch at all, which model, what job the worker does, why to isolate it, and how to wire several together. Make those choices deliberately instead of reaching for a named pattern.

Resolve the five decisions in order, then apply the rules that hold for every dispatch.

Harness note: this skill says dispatch, worker, and the model on the dispatch for whatever your harness calls its subagent tool and per-call model parameter — substitute the equivalents.

When to Use

• You're about to farm work out to one or more subagents and want the shape right: how many, which model, what job, what to withhold.
• Executing a multi-task plan (e.g. an sdd-apply run) with a coordinator that gates each task.
• A cheap primary keeps hitting decisions above its weight and needs an on-demand expert.
• You want a genuinely independent second opinion, from a fresh context or a stronger model.
• Long autonomous runs are drowning in their own history and you need to move state to files.