orchestrate

name	orchestrate
description	Apply the deterministic route-vs-solo cost preflight to an opted-in orchestration task. Default to one agent with the fixed lens menu; launch a Workflow recipe only when its multi-agent cost floor allows it. Pulled on demand; not always-on.

orchestrate — pick a recipe, fill its args, launch it

This skill turns Fable's orchestration edge into something a non-Fable worker can reuse: a small menu of executable Workflow recipes. Your job is the part that transplants — recognize the task shape and select the recipe — not to author an agent graph from scratch. The recipes live in orchestration/recipes/*.mjs and are self-contained Workflow scripts; launch one with the Workflow tool by scriptPath.

Read orchestration/README.md and docs/ORCHESTRATION-RESEARCH.md for the why.

Mandatory preflight — before any Workflow call

The default cost route is single-lens: stay in the current agent and apply the relevant fixed lens menu in one context. A multi-agent recipe is allowed only after the shipped JS gate returns allow:true.

1. Normalize the prospective route:
   • panel — adversarial-verify or judge-panel
   • decompose — divergent-explore, decompose-first, or pipeline-map
2. Supply deterministic task attributes:
   • taskSize — trimmed character count of the task or artifact
   • independentParts — actual separable task parts/items, never a desired agent count
   • precisionNeed — use at-scale only when the task explicitly requires it; otherwise omit it
3. Run the installed immutable gate (use the repository copy during development):

node "$HOME/.claude/fable-profile/runtime/orchestration/lib/preflight-gate.mjs" \
  --route decompose --task-size 640 --independent-parts 3 --require-multi

node "$HOME/.claude/fable-profile/runtime/orchestration/lib/preflight-gate.mjs" \
  --route panel --task-size 640 --precision-need at-scale --require-multi

Only exit 0 plus JSON allow:true authorizes a Workflow launch. On any refusal, invalid input, or single-lens decision, do not call Workflow and do not spawn an agent; continue in the current context with the lens menu. When allowed, pass the returned decision as args.preflight to the recipe. The gate authorizes spend only; agent count remains a cost denominator.

When NOT to use this

• A trivial or single-step task → answer inline. Fan-out on a one-liner is over-building, and every recipe has a complexity floor that will no-op anyway.
• The user has not opted into multi-agent orchestration → don't spend the agents.
• You only need a fact you can look up directly → just look it up.

Decision table

If the task is…	preflight route	use recipe	launch with args
"is this artifact / plan / diff / answer sound?"	panel	adversarial-verify.mjs	{ artifact, preflight }
"what are the possible approaches / designs / causes?"	decompose	divergent-explore.mjs	{ question, lenses?, preflight }
"do this big multi-part task"	decompose	decompose-first.mjs	{ task, preflight }
"process each of these N items through stages"	decompose	pipeline-map.mjs	{ items, extract, transform, verify, preflight }
"produce this ONE high-stakes artifact really well"	panel	judge-panel.mjs	{ task, angles?, rubric?, preflight }

If two apply, compose: e.g. decompose-first for the build, then adversarial-verify on its output before delivering. Run preflight separately before each prospective Workflow launch.

How to select lenses (recognition, not invention)

For adversarial-verify and divergent-explore, pick lenses from the fixed menu in orchestration/lenses.md — choose the ~5 whose descriptions actually fit this task, drop overlapping ones. Do not invent a full lens set from scratch; classifying against the menu is the part a weaker worker does reliably.

Cross-model verification (optional, off by default)

Before launching adversarial-verify (or judge-panel), check whether cross-model verification is enabled — it reduces the correlated blind spots a same-family Claude panel shares by adding a genuinely different-weights reviewer (GPT/Gemini).

1. Read ~/.claude/fable-profile/xverify.json (it may not exist → treat as off). It carries a preset plus a compatible mode. The user picks the preset via node orchestration/lib/xverify-preset.mjs set <preset> (it persists as the default).
2. Resolve by mode:
   • "off" (preset claude-only) or file absent → pass nothing; Claude-only, zero overhead.
   • "codex" (preset gpt-oauth) → args.crossModel = { provider: "codex", models } — the GPT reviewer runs through the codex MCP on the user's ChatGPT login (no API key).
   • "openrouter" (preset gpt-api+gemini-api) → args.crossModel = { provider: "openrouter", models }.
   • "codex+gemini" (preset gpt-oauth+gemini-api) → run both legs: the GPT verdict via the codex MCP, and a Gemini verdict via the Gemini API (GEMINI_API_KEY). Fold both into findings.
3. Before using a key-based leg, confirm the key is present with node orchestration/lib/xverify-preset.mjs doctor (it reports presence only, never the value). If a required key/login is missing, skip that leg and tell the user what to provide — never block.

Do not enable it yourself or hard-code a provider; the file is the single switch (set by the preset command, ./install.sh --with-xverify=..., or edited by the user; export FABLE_XVERIFY=off force-disables). The cross-model arm is bonus coverage — it never gates delivery, and it never becomes the A/B eval judge (that would leak the treatment; see eval/README.md).

Binding guardrails (do not break these)

• Never set a count quota. Let decompose-first key width to the sub-problems it actually finds; let divergent-explore stop on its dry-streak. Quotas reward-hack.
• Verifiers must be fresh-context. The recipes already spawn skeptics in their own contexts — never paste the original answer into a "review this" prompt in the same thread; that rubber-stamps.
• Agent count is cost, not success. Report what a recipe found, not how many agents it ran.
• Don't claim a magnitude. These recipes are validated for direction by mechanism, not yet for size of gain. Say "ran independent adversarial review," not "caught 30% more bugs," until eval/ says otherwise.
• The RED gate proves verification ran, not that it was deep. Treat a passing gate as "someone independent looked," not "this is certainly correct."

After a recipe runs

Relay what it found (confirmed defects, distinct approaches, the integrated answer) — the recipe's return value is data for you, not a user-facing message. Lead with the outcome; keep the agent-count and cost out of the headline.