Mission orchestrator

Overview

Wraps the entire attune development lifecycle (brainstorm → specify → plan → execute) into a single mission with automatic state detection, type selection, and phase routing. Follows the "persistent presence lens" pattern from spec-kit:speckit-orchestrator: delegates entirely to existing skills via Skill() calls, never re-implements phase logic.

When To Use

Starting a new project from scratch (full lifecycle)
Resuming an interrupted project workflow
Running a focused tactical implementation from existing specs
Quick-fixing from an existing implementation plan

When NOT To Use

Running a single phase directly (use /attune:brainstorm, /attune:specify, etc.)
Non-project work (code review, debugging, research)
When you need fine-grained control over phase transitions

Mission Lifecycle

1. State Detection
   Scan for existing artifacts (project-brief.md, specification.md, etc.)
       |
2. Mission Type Selection
   Auto-detect type based on artifacts, or accept user override
       |
3. Phase Routing Loop
   For each phase in the mission type:
       a. Pre-phase validation (check prerequisites)
       b. Invoke Skill(attune:{phase-skill})
       c. Post-phase artifact check (verify output exists)
       d. Post-phase backlog triage (create GitHub issues
          for out-of-scope items after brainstorm/specify)
       e. Update mission state
       f. User checkpoint (skippable with --auto)
       g. Error handling via leyline:damage-control
       |
4. Completion
   All phases complete, final state saved

Mission Types

Type	Phases	Auto-detected When
`full`	brainstorm → specify → plan → execute	No artifacts exist
`standard`	specify → plan → execute	`docs/project-brief.md` exists
`tactical`	plan → execute	`docs/specification.md` exists
`quickfix`	execute	`docs/implementation-plan.md` exists

See modules/mission-types.md for full type definitions and custom type support.

Phase-to-Skill Mapping

Phase	Skill Invoked	Artifact Produced
brainstorm	`Skill(attune:project-brainstorming)`	`docs/project-brief.md`
specify	`Skill(attune:project-specification)`	`docs/specification.md`
plan	`Skill(attune:project-planning)`	`docs/implementation-plan.md`
execute	`Skill(attune:project-execution)`	Implemented code and tests

The orchestrator never re-implements phase logic. Each phase is a complete Skill() invocation that handles its own workflow.

Session Recovery

Missions persist state to .attune/mission-state.json. On resume:

Load mission state file
Validate referenced artifacts still exist on disk
Identify last completed phase
Continue from next phase in sequence

See modules/mission-state.md for the state schema and recovery protocol.

Interactive Plan Review

The plan-to-execute transition uses an interactive review loop instead of a simple checkpoint. Plans are reviewed section by section, revised based on feedback, and must pass a mandatory war-room gate before execution.

Key capabilities:

Section-by-section terminal review (architecture first, then phases)
Approve/revise/reject verdicts with rationale
Plan version tracking with diff summaries
Context improvement from structured feedback
Additive bias scanning before user review
Maximum 3 revision rounds before forced decision
Mandatory war-room approval with Prosecution Counsel

See modules/plan-review.md for the full protocol.

Review Modules

plan-review.md: Main orchestrator for the review loop
plan-versioner.md: Version tracking and diff generation
feedback-collector.md: Verdict capture and JSON output
context-injector.md: Revision prompt construction
iteration-governor.md: Round tracking and escalation

User Directive Overrides

The orchestrator parses the user's command-args and free-text at mission start for natural-language trust signals. Phrases like "ignore scope guard", "ultrathink", "don't keep asking", and "be autonomous" are recognized as directive overrides that adjust the constraint profile without requiring an explicit --constraints= flag.

Directive overrides win over mission-type defaults but never bypass the Safety Floor (pre-commit hooks, proof-of-work evidence, destructive-operation confirmation, external-facing actions). When a directive is detected, the orchestrator acknowledges it once at mission start and stops asking for the corresponding checkpoints. Repeated approval-seeking after a directive override is itself a workflow bug.

See modules/adaptive-constraints.md "User Directive Override" section for the parsing table.

Mission Charter

Define mission boundaries using the structured template from references/mission-charter.md. A Mission Charter specifies:

Outcome: What success looks like
Success metric: Measurable completion criteria
Deadline: Time boundary (session, date, or duration)
Constraints: Token/time budgets, forbidden actions
Scope: In-scope and out-of-scope areas
Stop criteria: Conditions that halt the mission

See references/mission-charter.md for the full template and examples.

Progress Reports

Track progress with structured checkpoints using references/progress-report.md. Generate reports at:

Phase boundaries (between brainstorm→specify→plan→execute)
Blocker identification
Risk escalation
Budget thresholds (50%, 75%, 90%)

See references/progress-report.md for the template and checkpoint rhythm guidance.

Module Reference

Core modules (always loaded)

mission-types.md: Type definitions, auto-detection logic, custom types
state-detection.md: Artifact existence checks, quality validation, staleness
phase-routing.md: Phase execution protocol, transition hooks, error handling
mission-state.md: State schema, persistence, recovery protocol

Plan-review modules (load when plan phase runs)

plan-review.md: Interactive section-by-section review with bias scanning
plan-versioner.md: Version tracking and diff summaries
feedback-collector.md: Verdict capture and feedback files
context-injector.md: Revision prompt construction from feedback
iteration-governor.md: Round tracking, cap enforcement, escalation

Conditional modules (load only when triggered)

reflexion-buffer.md: Cross-session learning buffer; load when iteration count > 1 or after a failed revision round.
trust-tier.md: Constraint-profile classifier; load when a user directive override is detected at mission start.
adaptive-constraints.md: Constraint adaptation rules; load alongside trust-tier.md when directive overrides are active.

Module Loading by Mission Type

This skill declares progressive_loading: true. To keep the orchestrator's resident token cost minimal, load only the subset of modules each mission type actually needs. The orchestrator itself loads only the four core modules at mission start; the rest are loaded on-demand when their phase runs.

Mission type	Core	Plan-review	Reflexion	Trust and adaptive
`quickfix` (execute only)	yes	--	--	if directive
`tactical` (plan -> execute)	yes	yes	if revising	if directive
`standard` (specify -> plan -> execute)	yes	yes	if revising	if directive
`full` (brainstorm -> specify -> plan -> execute)	yes	yes	yes	if directive

Token cost (approximate, computed from wc -w on hub + loaded modules and converted at ~1.3 tokens per word):

Mission type	Loaded modules	Approx tokens
`quickfix`	hub and core (4)	~4,100
`tactical`	hub, core, and plan-review (9)	~6,900
`standard`	same as tactical (9)	~6,900
`full`	hub, core, plan-review, and reflexion (10)	~7,900

The previous load-all pattern brought in roughly 10,100 tokens for every mission, including quickfix runs that only need the execute phase. With per-type loading, quickfix is ~60% lighter and the standard / tactical / full paths save 22-32%.

When a directive override fires, the trust-tier + adaptive-constraints pair adds ~2,200 tokens on top of the mission-type baseline.

Reference Modules

mission-charter.md: Structured mission definition template (load only when defining a charter)
progress-report.md: Checkpoint status report template (load only when emitting a progress report)

Related Skills

Skill(attune:project-brainstorming) - Brainstorm phase
Skill(attune:project-specification) - Specify phase
Skill(attune:project-planning) - Plan phase
Skill(attune:project-execution) - Execute phase
Skill(attune:war-room-checkpoint) - Risk assessment for RED/CRITICAL tasks
Skill(leyline:risk-classification) - Task risk classification
Skill(leyline:damage-control) - Error recovery during phases

Related Commands

/attune:mission - Invoke this skill
/attune:mission --resume - Resume from saved state
/attune:mission --type tactical - Override mission type

Exit Criteria

All phases in mission type completed successfully
Artifacts exist for each completed phase
Mission state saved to .attune/mission-state.json
Risk summary generated (tier counts across all tasks)
No unresolved errors or blockers

Mission orchestrator

What its author says it does

SKILL.md

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