dialectic

name	dialectic
description	Adversarial debate between the two model stacks — a Claude advocate vs a Codex opponent — to pressure-test one high-stakes decision before it locks, or to adjudicate a head-on conflict between the two reviewers. Use at zones 0–1 when a design fork resists convergence, when the user asks to "duel"/"debate" a direction, or when Codex and Claude reviews disagree on a Must Fix. Not for zone 2–3 work.
argument-hint	[the decision or conflict to debate]

Dialectic — two stacks, one motion

Parallel blind reviews give redundancy; a dialectic gives rebuttal — each side must attack the other's strongest case instead of independently missing the same thing. What survives solo review is the plausible-but-mismatched direction: a design whose assumptions — scale, maturity, team size, risk tolerance, reversibility — belong to a different context than the motion's. It reads as best practice because it is, somewhere else; it rarely survives an opponent briefed on the actual constraints.

When

• A zone 0–1 design fork that resists convergence, before the D-decision locks — offer it from a discussion or planning session.
• A head-on Must-Fix conflict between the Codex and Claude review lanes — one round, then the Overseer rules.
• The user invokes it directly on a motion.

Never for zone 2–3 items: two max-effort stacks arguing about a contained change costs more than being wrong would.

Protocol

1. Motion — the Overseer writes ./tmp/<id>/refs/dialectic-<slug>.md (standalone runs: ./tmp/dialectic/<slug>.md): the decision in one sentence, the candidate positions, and the constraints that decide it — the ACTUAL scale, the zone, reversibility, what the repo already does (with file:line where checkable). An honest motion is most of the value; a motion that omits its real constraints invites answers tuned to someone else's context.
2. Rounds (default 2, cap 3) — appended to the motion file. Round 1 is blind and parallel: both sides write their opening position from the motion alone, neither seeing the other — agreement despite different biases is the quality signal, and a blind opening prevents the second mover anchoring on the first. Later rounds are sequential rebuttal. Every round is capped at ~400 words — density over coverage; argue the load-bearing points only.
   • Advocate: a Claude sub-agent (model: opus, thinking) argues the leading position — strongest case, named tradeoffs, checkable claims cited.
   • Opponent: a Codex dispatch via Bash (timeout 600000 ms) — codex exec -m gpt-5.6-sol -c model_reasoning_effort="xhigh" --sandbox read-only --ephemeral --skip-git-repo-check -C <repo root> -o <out> "<prompt>"; each dispatch is a fresh session, so the prompt names this skill's references/instructions.md and references/opponent-round.md by absolute path, carries the motion file path, and names the round type (blind opening / rebuttal / final) so it prints the matching format variant. Its job: in round 1, an opening position from the motion alone (nothing to rebut); in later rounds, rebut the advocate's specific claims — no restating its own case as rebuttal — then present the strongest alternative under the motion's constraints.
   • Sides alternate; each round reads everything before it; no side edits another's text. A side may concede with reasons — early convergence is a valid outcome, including convergence on a third design neither side opened with.
   • Final round, both sides: end with (a) a steelman — the opponent's single strongest point, stated fairly — and (b) a blind-spot line: what neither position addresses. Both feed the verdict's grafts and residual risks.
3. Verdict — the Overseer (never either wizard) closes the file: the chosen direction, the points grafted from the losing side, and the named residual risks. The verdict lands where the decision lives — the discussion decision log, the plan's D-decision, or the review resolution — with a link to the transcript.

Rules

• One motion per dialectic; a second question mid-debate becomes its own run.
• Dispatches are ephemeral; the transcript file is the artifact and travels with the item's refs/.
• Checkable claims carry evidence (file:line, a doc, a measurement); a round of pure assertion is a wasted round — the Overseer strikes it and re-prompts.
• The Overseer must not signal a preferred side in the motion or between rounds; judging happens once, at the end.