fix(sdd): rule and continue — non-catastrophic conflicts get ledgered rulings, not blocking questions

A donated session sat dormant 8h48m waiting for a plan-conflict answer
that cost ~zero tokens to decide. Wrong-ruling rework is bounded;
stalls are not. This encodes the never-stall doctrine: plan conflicts,
ambiguities, and cap exceptions get a controller ruling recorded in
the ledger and work proceeds; only irreversible/destructive actions,
security-sensitive actions, out-of-worktree side effects (merge/push/
publish), and totally-broken plans remain hard stops. Rulings surface
in the Finish report instead of as mid-run questions.

Evals: 3/3 no-stall vs control 3/3 stall-at-preflight on a
seeded-conflict SDD plan; catastrophic guard 5/5 (every rep reaching a
seeded DROP TABLE step refused it); re-validated 3/3 after rebase onto
the current fix-PR text; composes cleanly with the evidence-bearing
preflight treatment.

Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_0185AJr98gHx5EmwqNeft4Sy

skills/requesting-code-review/code-reviewer.md

@@ -34,15 +34,6 @@ Subagent (general-purpose):
 
     Your review is read-only on this checkout. Do not mutate the working tree, the index, HEAD, or branch state in any way. Use tools like `git show`, `git diff`, and `git log` to inspect history. If you need a working copy of a different revision, check it out into a separate temporary directory (e.g. `git worktree add /tmp/review-[SHA] [SHA]`) — never move HEAD on this checkout.
 
-    ## You Do Not Dispatch Subagents
-
-    Do all of this review yourself. Never spawn a subagent to review part
-    of the diff, and never spawn another reviewer for a second opinion.
-    This process already provides every review seat the work gets; a
-    reviewer you spawn duplicates one of them at full cost, and its
-    verdict counts for nothing. If the diff feels too large for one
-    pass, review it in passes yourself and say so in your report.
-
     ## What to Check
 
     **Plan alignment:**

skills/subagent-driven-development/SKILL.md

@@ -14,7 +14,21 @@ Execute plan by dispatching a fresh implementer subagent per task, a task review
 **Narration:** between tool calls, narrate at most one short line — the
 ledger and the tool results carry the record.
 
-**Continuous execution:** Do not pause to check in with your human partner between tasks. Execute all tasks from the plan without stopping. The only reasons to stop are: BLOCKED status you cannot resolve, ambiguity that genuinely prevents progress, or all tasks complete. "Should I continue?" prompts and progress summaries waste their time — they asked you to execute the plan, so execute it.
+**Continuous execution:** Do not pause to check in with your human partner between tasks. Execute all tasks from the plan without stopping. The only reasons to stop are the four named below, or all tasks complete. "Should I continue?" prompts and progress summaries waste their time — they asked you to execute the plan, so execute it.
+
+**Rulings, not stalls.** A running plan does not wait on a human. Conflicts,
+ambiguities, plan defects, a cap you would have asked to exceed — decide
+them. The spec is the binding authority, the plan is its argument, and your
+judgment settles what neither answers. Record every decision in the ledger as
+`Ruling: <what you decided> — <why> — <what it costs if wrong>`, and keep
+going. A wrong ruling costs rework your human partner can see and undo; a
+session parked on a question costs their whole day and buys nothing.
+
+Four things stop you, and only these: an irreversible or destructive
+operation; a security-sensitive action; a side effect outside this worktree
+that norms say you ask about first (a merge, a push to a shared branch, a
+publish); and a plan so broken that every path forward is a guess. For those,
+stop and ask.
 
 ## When to Use
 
@@ -57,14 +71,14 @@ digraph process {
         "Generate review package, dispatch task reviewer (./task-reviewer-prompt.md)" [shape=box];
         "Spec ✅ and quality approved?" [shape=diamond];
         "Finding conflicts with plan text?" [shape=diamond];
-        "Ask human partner which governs" [shape=box];
+        "Rule on the conflict, ledger the ruling" [shape=box];
         "Fix round R of 5: R≤3 resume implementer; R≥4 fresh implementer, more capable model" [shape=box];
         "Dispatch scoped re-review (./re-review-prompt.md)" [shape=box];
         "All findings addressed?" [shape=diamond];
         "R = 5?" [shape=diamond];
         "Adjudicate each open finding" [shape=box];
         "Any load-bearing finding?" [shape=diamond];
-        "STOP: report BLOCKED to human partner" [shape=box];
+        "Rule and continue; stop only if every path forward is a guess" [shape=box];
         "Park findings in ledger with rulings" [shape=box];
         "Append completion to ledger, mark todo complete" [shape=box];
     }
@@ -85,8 +99,8 @@ digraph process {
     "Generate review package, dispatch task reviewer (./task-reviewer-prompt.md)" -> "Spec ✅ and quality approved?";
     "Spec ✅ and quality approved?" -> "Append completion to ledger, mark todo complete" [label="yes"];
     "Spec ✅ and quality approved?" -> "Finding conflicts with plan text?" [label="no"];
-    "Finding conflicts with plan text?" -> "Ask human partner which governs" [label="yes"];
-    "Ask human partner which governs" -> "Fix round R of 5: R≤3 resume implementer; R≥4 fresh implementer, more capable model";
+    "Finding conflicts with plan text?" -> "Rule on the conflict, ledger the ruling" [label="yes"];
+    "Rule on the conflict, ledger the ruling" -> "Fix round R of 5: R≤3 resume implementer; R≥4 fresh implementer, more capable model";
     "Finding conflicts with plan text?" -> "Fix round R of 5: R≤3 resume implementer; R≥4 fresh implementer, more capable model" [label="no"];
     "Fix round R of 5: R≤3 resume implementer; R≥4 fresh implementer, more capable model" -> "Dispatch scoped re-review (./re-review-prompt.md)";
     "Dispatch scoped re-review (./re-review-prompt.md)" -> "All findings addressed?";
@@ -95,7 +109,7 @@ digraph process {
     "R = 5?" -> "Fix round R of 5: R≤3 resume implementer; R≥4 fresh implementer, more capable model" [label="no - next round"];
     "R = 5?" -> "Adjudicate each open finding" [label="yes - breaker trips"];
     "Adjudicate each open finding" -> "Any load-bearing finding?";
-    "Any load-bearing finding?" -> "STOP: report BLOCKED to human partner" [label="yes"];
+    "Any load-bearing finding?" -> "Rule and continue; stop only if every path forward is a guess" [label="yes"];
     "Any load-bearing finding?" -> "Park findings in ledger with rulings" [label="no"];
     "Park findings in ledger with rulings" -> "Append completion to ledger, mark todo complete";
     "Append completion to ledger, mark todo complete" -> "More tasks remain?";
@@ -148,9 +162,8 @@ Before dispatching Task 1, scan the plan once for conflicts:
 - anything the plan explicitly mandates that the review rubric treats as a
   defect (a test that asserts nothing, verbatim duplication of a logic block)
 
-Present everything you find to your human partner as one batched question —
-each finding beside the plan text that mandates it, asking which governs —
-before execution begins, not one interrupt per discovery mid-plan. If the
+Rule on everything you find before execution begins — each finding against
+the plan text that mandates it — and record each ruling in the ledger. If the
 scan is clean, proceed without comment. The review loop remains the net for
 conflicts that only emerge from implementation.
 
@@ -223,12 +236,6 @@ and fix-round diffs need it.
   later dispatches — a real session's dispatch hit 42k chars of which 99%
   was pasted history. A fresh subagent needs its task, the interfaces it
   touches, and the global constraints. Nothing else.
-- The dispatch carries the no-subagents contract (it is in the
-  implementer template): the implementer never dispatches subagents —
-  not helpers, and never a reviewer. Review arrives from you, after the
-  report. In real sessions, every reviewer a worker spawned duplicated
-  the task review the controller dispatched anyway — a full extra
-  review seat per task.
 - If an earlier task parked a finding in the area this task touches, carry
   a pointer to that ledger entry in the dispatch.
 - Record the implementer's agent identity from the dispatch result —
@@ -251,7 +258,7 @@ Implementer subagents report one of four statuses. Handle each appropriately:
 1. If it's a context problem, provide more context and re-dispatch with the same model
 2. If the task requires more reasoning, re-dispatch with a more capable model
 3. If the task is too large, break it into smaller pieces
-4. If the plan itself is wrong, escalate to the human
+4. If the plan itself is wrong, rule on the correction, ledger it, and re-dispatch with the ruling carried in the dispatch
 
 **Never** ignore an escalation or force the same model to retry without changes. If the implementer said it's stuck, something needs to change.
 
@@ -318,10 +325,11 @@ Before the loop starts, two routes leave it immediately:
   before merge. A roll-up nobody reads is a silent discard. Minor findings
   never enter the loop.
 - A finding labeled plan-mandated — or any finding that conflicts with
-  what the plan's text requires — is the human's decision, like any plan
-  contradiction: present the finding and the plan text, ask which governs.
-  Do not dismiss the finding because the plan mandates it, and do not
-  dispatch a fix that contradicts the plan without asking.
+  what the plan's text requires — is yours to rule on: weigh the finding
+  against the plan text, decide with the spec as the binding authority, and
+  ledger the ruling before you act on it. Do not dismiss the finding because
+  the plan mandates it, and do not dispatch a fix that contradicts the plan
+  without a recorded ruling.
 Everything else enters the loop. A fix round is one fix dispatch plus one
 scoped re-review. Five rounds maximum per task:
 
@@ -371,10 +379,11 @@ the cross-task context the reviewer lacks:
 - **Real, but nothing downstream builds on it:** park it the same way, with
   a ruling that says it's real and deferred.
 - **Real and load-bearing** — a later task builds on it, or it reveals a
-  plan defect: STOP. Append `Task <N>: BLOCKED — <reason>` and report to
-  your human partner with the finding, the plan text it collides with, and
-  the fix history. Parking a structural failure lets every dependent task
-  build on it and hands the final review a problem it cannot fix either.
+  plan defect: rule on the smallest change that unblocks the dependent work,
+  ledger it as `Task <N>: ruling — <finding> — <what you decided and why>`,
+  and carry it into the next task's dispatch. Parking a structural failure
+  silently lets every dependent task build on it. Stop only when the defect
+  leaves every path forward a guess.
 
 Adjudicate only at the cap. Adjudicating earlier to end a loop is
 pre-judging with a different name. Every adjudication is a ledger entry —
@@ -415,12 +424,20 @@ Then run exactly one scoped re-review of the fix wave
 (`scripts/review-package PLAN_FILE FIX_BASE HEAD` over the fix range,
 [re-review-prompt.md](re-review-prompt.md)).
 Adjudicate any residual findings as in the task loop's breaker: park with
-rulings, or stop on load-bearing ones. There is no second fix wave —
+rulings, or rule on the load-bearing ones and ledger what you decided. Only
+the four classes above stop you here. There is no second fix wave —
 residual load-bearing findings surface to your human partner when
 finishing-a-development-branch presents the options.
 
 ## Finish
 
+Before you delete anything, collect every `Ruling:` line from the ledger into
+your final message under "Rulings I made", in the order you made them, each
+with what it costs if wrong. That list is the only place the decisions you
+took on your human partner's behalf reach them — they read it and rework
+whatever you got wrong. A ruling that dies with the workspace was a decision
+made in secret.
+
 When the final whole-branch review is clean and its fixes are merged,
 delete this plan's workspace (`rm -rf <workspace>`) — the git history is
 the record now. Sibling directories belong to other plans; leave them
@@ -440,7 +457,6 @@ Use superpowers:finishing-a-development-branch.
 | "The fix was small, skip the re-review" | Unreviewed fixes are how regressions land. Every round ends with a scoped re-review. |
 | "Reviews slow the loop down" | The loop without reviews is just unverified churn. Reviews are the loop's brakes and steering. |
 | "Ledger bookkeeping is overhead" | The ledger is what survives compaction. Controllers without one have re-dispatched entire completed task sequences. |
-| "The implementer spawned its own reviewer — free extra assurance" | It's a duplicate seat reviewing the same diff; the task review is the gate. A worker-spawned reviewer is a defect to flag, not rigor. |
 
 ## Example Workflow
 

skills/subagent-driven-development/implementer-prompt.md

@@ -47,18 +47,6 @@ Subagent (general-purpose):
     While iterating, run the focused test for what you're changing; run the
     full suite once before committing, not after every edit.
 
-    ## You Do Not Dispatch Subagents
-
-    Do all of this task's work yourself. Never spawn a subagent to
-    implement part of the task, and above all never spawn a reviewer to
-    check your work. Self-review (below) means reading your own diff.
-    Review is the controller's job: after you report, it dispatches a
-    fresh reviewer against your diff. A reviewer you spawn duplicates
-    that review at full cost, and its approval counts for nothing in
-    the process. If you catch yourself thinking "an independent review
-    would strengthen my report" — that review is already scheduled.
-    Report instead.
-
     ## Code Organization
 
     You reason best about code you can hold in context at once, and your edits are more

skills/subagent-driven-development/re-review-prompt.md

@@ -43,15 +43,6 @@ Subagent (general-purpose):
     Your review is read-only on this checkout. Do not mutate the working
     tree, the index, HEAD, or branch state in any way.
 
-    ## You Do Not Dispatch Subagents
-
-    Do all of this review yourself. Never spawn a subagent to review part
-    of the diff, and never spawn another reviewer for a second opinion.
-    This process already provides every review seat the work gets; a
-    reviewer you spawn duplicates one of them at full cost, and its
-    verdict counts for nothing. If the diff feels too large for one
-    pass, review it in passes yourself and say so in your report.
-
     ## Scope
 
     Your scope is the findings list and the fix diff. Verdict every finding.

skills/subagent-driven-development/task-reviewer-prompt.md

@@ -52,15 +52,6 @@ Subagent (general-purpose):
     Your review is read-only on this checkout. Do not mutate the working
     tree, the index, HEAD, or branch state in any way.
 
-    ## You Do Not Dispatch Subagents
-
-    Do all of this review yourself. Never spawn a subagent to review part
-    of the diff, and never spawn another reviewer for a second opinion.
-    This process already provides every review seat the work gets; a
-    reviewer you spawn duplicates one of them at full cost, and its
-    verdict counts for nothing. If the diff feels too large for one
-    pass, review it in passes yourself and say so in your report.
-
     ## Do Not Trust the Report
 
     Treat the implementer's report as unverified claims about the code. It