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name description
subagents invoke this skill when the user asks you to use subagents

Subagents

Each subagent is headless, has its own context window, cannot see the parent conversation, cannot ask the user, and cannot spawn subagents or workflows. Give every child a self-contained prompt with paths, constraints, and the expected report.

Pi Harness

Harness: pi Prompt nicknames: “pi”, “pi agent”, “pi subagent” Best default: Use when the user does not request another harness. It inherits the parent model and thinking level when model or reasoning_effort is omitted.

Do not use models from the Anthropic provider even if one appears in the model list.

Pi can use any model shown by pi --list-models. Prefer provider/model-id; a bare model id only works when unambiguous. Common picks in this environment:

Model Recommended effort
inherited parent model (default) inherited
openai-codex/gpt-5.6-sol high
openai-codex/gpt-5.6-terra high
opencode/claude-fable-5 medium

Thinking budgets: off, minimal, low, medium, high, xhigh, max. These map directly to pi thinking levels.

Claude Code Harness

Harness: claude Prompt nicknames: “claude”, “Claude Code”, “claude agent”, “claude subagent”, "cc" Best default: use the latest fable model on high reasoning. Do not default to anything else, if the user does not specify, use fable.

Model hint Model Recommended effort
fable latest Claude Fable high

Thinking budgets: off, minimal, low, medium, high, xhigh, max. The extension maps these to Claude thinking-token budgets: 0, 1,024, 4,096, 10,000, 16,000, 32,000, and 63,999 tokens respectively.

Requires Claude Code to be installed and authenticated.

Codex Harness

Harness: codex Prompt nicknames: “codex”, “Codex CLI”, “codex agent”, “codex subagent” Best default: gpt-5.6-sol with high effort for coding work. Do not use anything other than sol unless the user specifically asks for it.

Model Recommended effort
gpt-5.6-sol high
gpt-5.6-terra high
gpt-5.6-luna high

Thinking budgets accepted by the extension: off, minimal, low, medium, high, xhigh, max. Codex maps these to the nearest effort supported by the selected model; off/minimal become minimal, while max becomes the highest extension-supported Codex effort.

Requires the Codex CLI to be installed and authenticated.

Spawn and Manage

Call subagent_spawn with a complete prompt, short name, chosen harness, and optional working_dir, model, and reasoning_effort. At most four subagents run concurrently.

  • subagent_check({ id }): peek without blocking.
  • subagent_list(): list all runs.
  • subagent_wait({ ids }): block only when results are required to proceed.
  • subagent_cancel({ ids }): stop runs while preserving partial transcripts.
  • /subagents: inspect or take over a run interactively.

Results return automatically. After spawning, continue useful parent work instead of immediately waiting.