Agent Skills: Devil's Advocate

Structured critical analysis using parallel advocate and critic agents. Use when asked to evaluate a decision, play devils advocate, challenge an approach, or weigh pros and cons of architecture/technology choices.

UncategorizedID: hairihou/dotfiles/devils-advocate

Install this agent skill to your local

pnpm dlx add-skill https://github.com/hairihou/dotfiles/tree/HEAD/src/.config/claude/skills/devils-advocate

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src/.config/claude/skills/devils-advocate/SKILL.md

Skill Metadata

Name
devils-advocate
Description
Structured critical analysis using parallel advocate and critic agents. Use when asked to evaluate a decision, play devils advocate, challenge an approach, or weigh pros and cons of architecture/technology choices.

Devil's Advocate

Topic: $ARGUMENTS

1. Gather Context

Search the codebase for code, documentation, and configuration related to the topic (Glob/Grep to locate, Read up to 5 key files). Identify:

  • Current state and constraints
  • Stakeholders and affected systems
  • Prior art or existing patterns in the codebase

2. Run Parallel Sub-agents

Use the Agent tool to launch both agents simultaneously in a single message (two Agent tool calls in parallel). Each agent receives the gathered context but cannot see the other's output.

For each agent, read the prompt template from ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/agents/ and substitute {{topic}} and {{context}} with actual values.

| Agent | Prompt file | | -------- | ---------------------------------------- | | Advocate | ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/agents/advocate.md | | Critic | ${CLAUDE_SKILL_DIR}/agents/critic.md |

3. Synthesize

After both agents return, combine their outputs into the following format. Do not editorialize — present both sides faithfully, then identify where they conflict.

Output Format

## Advocate

[Advocate agent output — arguments in favor]

## Critic

[Critic agent output — arguments against, risks, alternatives]

## Key Tensions

| Advocate claims | Critic claims |
| --------------- | ------------- |
| [Position A]    | [Counter A]   |

## Decision Factors

[What information or validation would resolve each tension — actionable next steps]