The Grilling

Phase 2 of the Heist Pipeline

Adversarial brainstorming — a structured debate between a Proposer and a Devil's Advocate to surface risks, edge cases, and trade-offs that single-perspective design misses.

Skill: gangsta:the-grillingSkill type: Flexible — adapt principles to context

Single-Pass Multi-Agent Debate

The Grilling is a single-pass debate. The Proposer proposes, the Devils-Advocate attacks, and the Synthesizer revises — each agent runs exactly once. There are no rounds and no Round 2. The Don is grilled one question at a time, never a bundled list.

Phase A — Grill the Idea

Before any architecture is proposed, the orchestrating agent grills the Don on the objective itself, drawing on the Recon Dossier:

1. Extract every unresolved assumption, scope ambiguity, and analogue-comparison decision from the Dossier
2. Prioritize questions — most critical to the idea's validity first (problem framing → hidden assumptions → scope → analogue choices)
3. Ask the Don one question at a time; after each answer, decide whether the next question is still relevant
4. Continue until no critical idea-level question remains — or the Don says "the idea is settled, move to architecture"

Idea Verdict: REJECT (objective flawed — halt, Don must redefine), CHALLENGE (refine then proceed), or SOUND (valid — proceed).

Phase B — Proposer (single pass)

The Proposer reads the Dossier and refined objective, then produces one proposal.

Phase C — Devils-Advocate (single pass)

The Devils-Advocate attacks the proposal — architectural flaws, security, constitution violations, regressions, scalability.

Phase D — Don Weighs In (one question at a time)

Present the attack summary, then ask the Don sequentially:

1. "Do you agree with the Devil's-Advocate's attack?" — wait
2. Only if needed: "Any concerns they missed?" — wait
3. Only if needed: "Do you want to override any part of the proposal?" — wait

Phase E — Synthesizer (single pass)

The Synthesizer incorporates valid attacks and the Don's feedback, defends the valid elements, and produces the final revised solution. The Synthesizer's output is the final consensus. There is no second attack pass.

Output: Grilling Conclusions

The Grilling Conclusions document contains:

• Key Decisions — What was agreed upon and why
• Rejected Alternatives — Approaches considered and rejected, with reasoning
• Unresolved Objections — Disagreements that couldn't be settled (escalated to Don)
• Risk Assessment — Identified risks with severity and mitigation strategies
• Idea Verdict — REJECT / CHALLENGE / SOUND, with the Don's idea-level answers captured in Phase A

Phase Gate

Grilling File

The Grilling produces conclusions at:

docs/gangsta/{heist-name}/specs/{date}-contract.md

The conclusions are incorporated into the Contract during The Sit-Down.

Checklist Before Proceeding

• All major design approaches debated
• Risks identified and documented
• Alternatives considered and either accepted or rejected with reasoning
• Unresolved objections escalated to Don
• Consensus approved by Don

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