Scientific Writing — Stage 3: Draft

Overview

Turn the approved outline.md into full prose, then enforce the style guide in a separate pass. Two phases:

1. Draft — section-by-section prose from the outline, in the user's voice. Content fidelity is the priority.
2. Style correction — a dedicated subagent re-reads the full style guide with fresh context and corrects the whole draft.

Why split them: during a long drafting conversation the style guide drifts out of context and its rules stop being applied. A final subagent whose only context is the style guide + the draft applies the guide cleanly.

Every sentence traces to an outline bullet — drafting does not introduce new claims.

Method backbone — Steps 13–15

Drafting is Steps 13–15 of the fifteen steps: turn each planned paragraph (its Step-11 purpose statement) into one paragraph of three parts (detail: scientific-writing/fifteen-steps.md):

• Topic sentence (Step 13). Often the paragraph's purpose statement itself; or a question, a turning point ("Having established X, we turn to Y"), a complication ("…but it fails to account for…"), or a development ("This can be made concrete with a model"). If the paragraph doesn't support the paper's main point, rewrite or cut it.
• Supporting sentences (Step 15). Typically 3–6. For Methods/Results/Discussion responses, lift them from the outline's method/result/response lists. Equations, algorithms, and code count as supporting sentences. Strike any sentence that doesn't advance the paragraph's purpose.
• Concluding sentence (Step 14). Closes the theme the topic sentence opened (a declaration → develops/summarizes it; a question → answers it) and segues to the next paragraph in logic if not syntax. If the topic and concluding sentences are disconnected, rewrite both.

This is the phrasing stage; the thinking is already fixed in the outline. Style polish is deferred entirely to Phase 2.