AgentTeamsDebugger

agent-teams-debugger

Diagnose and resolve issues in Damascus /forge-team Agent Teams sessions. This skill encodes hard-won debugging knowledge from real production failures.

Quick Triage

When the user reports a stuck session, identify which phase is stuck:

Symptom	Likely Phase	Jump To
"Nothing happening after start"	Phase 0 or 1	Setup Phase Failures first, then Planner Issues
"Explorers finished but plan not submitted"	Phase 1 — ExitPlanMode	ExitPlanMode Failures
"Plan submitted but file not written"	Phase 2 — Writing	Scribe Issues
"File written but reviews not arriving"	Phase 3 — Review	Message Routing
"Reviews done but no verdict / no next round"	Phase 4 — Consolidation	Message Routing
"Session just hangs indefinitely"	Any	Full Diagnostic

Full Diagnostic Procedure

Run these steps in order. At each step, also rule out other known failures — explicitly note which patterns you checked and eliminated. This differential diagnosis prevents misattribution when symptoms overlap (e.g., "nothing happening" could be Setup Phase failure OR ExitPlanMode failure).

Step 1: Check Team Exists

ls ~/.claude/teams/damascus-forge/

Expected: config.json + inboxes/ directory. If missing → team was never created or was already deleted.

Step 2: Check Inbox State

# List all inboxes
ls ~/.claude/teams/damascus-forge/inboxes/

# Check Lead's inbox for unread messages
cat ~/.claude/teams/damascus-forge/inboxes/team-lead.json | jq '.[] | select(.read == false)'

# Check specific teammate inbox
cat ~/.claude/teams/damascus-forge/inboxes/planner.json | jq '.[] | select(.read == false)'

Key insight: Lead's inbox is team-lead.json, NOT lead.json. This is the #1 routing bug — see Message Routing.

Differential checks at this step:

• If lead.json exists → routing bug (F-001), jump to Message Routing
• If only team-lead.json + planner.json exist (no explorer/scribe/reviewer inboxes) → Setup Phase Failures
• If explorer inboxes exist but team-lead.json has no plan_approval_request → ExitPlanMode Failures

Step 3: Trace Message Flow

# See all messages in order
for f in ~/.claude/teams/damascus-forge/inboxes/*.json; do
  echo "=== $(basename $f) ==="
  cat "$f" | jq -r '.[] | "\(.read)\t\(.type)\t\(.sender // "system")\t\(.content[:80])"'
done

Look for:

• Messages with read: false — these are undelivered/unread
• Messages in lead.json (wrong) instead of team-lead.json (correct)
• Missing expected messages (e.g., explorer findings never sent to planner)

Known Failure Patterns

Setup Phase Failures

Lead skips spawning teammates (F-008) — Explorers, scribe, or reviewers never created

The Lead must spawn all teammates during the Setup Phase before entering the Round Flow. If it jumps directly to sending PLANNING PHASE to the planner without spawning explorers, the planner has no one to assign work to and stalls.

Diagnosis:

# Check which inboxes exist — missing inboxes = missing teammates
ls ~/.claude/teams/damascus-forge/inboxes/

# Expected for a healthy session: team-lead.json, planner.json, explorer-1.json,
# explorer-2.json (or more), scribe.json, reviewer-claude.json, etc.
# If only team-lead.json + planner.json exist → Setup Phase was skipped

Malformed task message — even if teammates are spawned, the PLANNING PHASE message to the planner must include the explorer list, mode, and ExitPlanMode reinforcement. Compare the actual message against the format in skills/ForgeTeamOrchestrator/references/round-flow.md.

Fix: Delete team and restart. Verify the Lead follows ForgeTeamOrchestrator's Setup Phase (spawn all teammates) before entering Round 1.

Message Routing

The 'lead' vs 'team-lead' Bug — CRITICAL, confirmed in 9+ sessions

The Lead teammate is spawned with name: "team-lead". Its inbox file is team-lead.json. However, it's natural to use recipient: "lead" in SendMessage — this creates a separate lead.json file that Lead never reads.

Diagnosis:

# If this file exists, you have the routing bug
ls ~/.claude/teams/damascus-forge/inboxes/lead.json

# Check for unread messages in wrong inbox
cat ~/.claude/teams/damascus-forge/inboxes/lead.json | jq 'length'

Fix: All teammate prompts must use recipient: "team-lead" (not "lead"). Check skills/ForgeTeamOrchestrator/references/teammate-prompts.md — every SendMessage example must specify recipient: "team-lead".

ExitPlanMode Failures

ExitPlanMode not mentioned in prompt → plan mode never works

100% correlation across 9 sessions: if the planner's spawn prompt does not explicitly mention ExitPlanMode, the planner never submits a plan. The mode: "plan" on the Agent tool sets planModeRequired: true, but the planner needs to know it must call ExitPlanMode.

Diagnosis:

# Check if planner has been in plan mode
cat ~/.claude/teams/damascus-forge/inboxes/team-lead.json | jq '.[] | select(.type == "plan_approval_request")'

If no plan_approval_request exists → planner never called ExitPlanMode.

Fix: Ensure the planner prompt contains:

1. "You operate in plan mode"
2. "Call ExitPlanMode to submit your plan to Lead"
3. Both phrases — one alone is insufficient

Planner Issues

Planner waiting for explorers that finished

The planner prompt says "wait until all have reported." If an explorer sends findings but the planner doesn't receive them, it waits indefinitely.

Diagnosis:

# Check explorer messages to planner
cat ~/.claude/teams/damascus-forge/inboxes/planner.json | jq '.[] | select(.sender | startswith("explorer"))'

Planner stuck in revision loop (Round 2+)

On Round 2+, the planner must call EnterPlanMode before ExitPlanMode. If it doesn't, it can't submit the revised plan.

Diagnosis: Check if planner received the revision message from team-lead and whether a plan_approval_request was generated.

Scribe Issues

Scribe not writing

The scribe is the ONLY agent with write access (subagent_type: "general-purpose"). If it's stuck, the file won't be written.

Diagnosis:

# Check if scribe received instructions
cat ~/.claude/teams/damascus-forge/inboxes/scribe.json | jq '.[] | select(.read == false)'

# Check if scribe confirmed write
cat ~/.claude/teams/damascus-forge/inboxes/team-lead.json | jq '.[] | select(.sender == "scribe")'

N-Planner Sync (Architecture Warning)

Never use multiple planners. When a planner sends a DONE message and then receives any new message, it reactivates and may send conflicting plans. This was solved by using a single Planner + N Explorers architecture. If you see multiple planner-N teammates, the architecture is wrong.

Diagnostic Commands Reference

See references/diagnostic-commands.md for copy-paste diagnostic commands.

Recovery Actions

Problem	Recovery
Wrong inbox routing	Fix prompts, restart session
ExitPlanMode not called	Cannot fix mid-session — restart with corrected prompt
Setup Phase skipped	TeamDelete("damascus-forge"), restart — verify Lead spawns all teammates before Round 1
Malformed task message	Restart — check message format against round-flow.md
Single teammate stuck	Send a nudge message via SendMessage
Team state corrupted	TeamDelete("damascus-forge"), restart session
Max rounds reached but not approved	Normal behavior — report final verdict to user