Plan

/archcore:plan

Plan a feature or initiative through a computed route. The conductor (skills/_shared/delta-routing.md) derives the canon delta Δ, the gap profile Π, the zone maturity M, and the risk flags R, then assembles the document package; instruments produce the documents. Vision types are the primary output. Reads cover all three categories: vision supplies intent and resumption targets, knowledge supplies constraints, experience supplies precedent.

When to use

• "Plan the auth redesign" → computed route — typically capability: one spec plus one plan
• "Create a roadmap for the API migration" → computed route
• "Plan a new feature for CSV export" → computed route
• "Plan the notifications platform" → computed route — typically umbrella: prd, one spec per capability, one plan
• "I need market research before we plan" → acquisition instrument (sources expert path)
• "We're regulated — start the ISO requirements cascade" → iso links (iso expert path)
• "Investigate X before we plan" → research instrument, research; "Compare the alternatives for Y" → research instrument, rnd — a named pending decision or candidate set selects rnd, otherwise research
• plan research <topic> → research instrument; the instrument selects research (closed by scope coverage) or rnd (closed by a recommendation) by its closing test

Not plan:

• Recording a decision → /archcore:document
• Documenting existing code → /archcore:document
• Codifying a team standard → /archcore:document
• Checking documents against code → /archcore:review

Route computation

Apply in this order:

Research boundary: discovery feeding an mrd → brd → urd requirements chain belongs to acquisition. A request naming a pending decision or a set of candidates to choose between produces rnd; any other investigation produces research. The path name research selects the instrument, not the type; the same test applies. Neither rnd nor evidence is an entry on this command: an rnd comes only from that test, the spike, or the compatibility fallback, and a standalone material is filed through /archcore:document evidence. A request proposing a specific target for team acceptance ("should we switch to Y", "let's adopt Y") belongs to /archcore:document's decision instrument.

Execution

1. Ground

Complete this step before asking the user any question. The research vocabulary probe (skills/_shared/research-compatibility.md) runs only under its own condition 1 — a request or type naming research or evidence, a route engaging the research instrument, or a grounding result of either type. Add research and evidence to the planning-moment filter below only when the probe returns yes; a topic search without a type filter finds documents of both types on every engine. If this skill has no shell tool, use the probe result the host supplied; if none was supplied, report needs-vocabulary-probe with the helper path and stop before the first MCP call that names either type.

1. Search .archcore/ with mcp__archcore__search_documents and mcp__archcore__list_documents across all three categories. Pass a planning-moment type filter — for example types=["idea", "prd", "plan", "spec", "rnd", "rfc", "adr", "rule", "task-type", "cpat"] — instead of relying on the global type ranking. Do not exclude a category from reads.
2. WHEN a found document carries implements or related relations, pull the linked documents one hop via mcp__archcore__list_relations and mcp__archcore__get_document.
3. WHEN a found draft on the topic carries an archcore:track state block, resume it per the resume rules in skills/_shared/gate-contract.md and skills/_shared/delta-routing.md instead of opening a new track.
4. Read git state — current branch, recent commits, working tree — and the code areas the topic names. Record the concrete files and modules for Step 5, and note zone documents whose referenced paths changed after them — the staleness input to Derivation.
5. IF .archcore/ exists but contains no documents, THEN proceed on outer-context grounding (git state and the codebase) and report that zero documents were found.
6. IF .archcore/ does not exist, THEN announce initialization in one line and call mcp__archcore__init_project without asking a question.

Global sources. If a list_documents / search_documents result has global: true / read_only: true / source_kind: "global", load skills/_shared/globals.md. Also load it when a search_documents response's coverage names a source other than "local" — even when results is empty: the empty page is exactly where that file's retry ladder applies. Never modify a global document and never target one with add_relation. Absent any global match, proceed as usual.

2. Route

Compute the route per the Derivation section of skills/_shared/delta-routing.md and report the route announcement. WHEN the user names an alias or a document type, execute its mapped instrument without route computation. WHEN the user names a route, fix that route and still run Derivation to compute its package. Never ask the user to choose a route or a size label.

3. Budget

Interview mechanics, question form, and ceilings: skills/_shared/elicitation-contract.md. Auto mode draws every question from the shared per-invocation ceiling; an expert invocation raises per-gate budgets to the maxima the track file declares.

4. Execute the package

Invoke each instrument the route names, in conductor order, per the instrument registry and sequencing rules in skills/_shared/delta-routing.md. Run each instrument's gates per skills/_shared/gate-contract.md: evaluate skip_when first at every gate, keep track state only in the archcore:track block inside the draft artifact (with the route: and delta: fields this command adds), persist each gate close in one mcp__archcore__update_document call, and follow the resume rules on re-entry. Gate bodies, per-gate questions, and relation wiring live in the track files — do not restate them.

Before delegating research or evidence work, pass the current vocabulary probe result and absolute plugin root to the assistant. If the assistant returns needs-vocabulary-probe, run the helper and resume the same task.

5. Map tasks to files

WHEN the package produced a plan document:

1. Annotate each task in the plan's Tasks section with the concrete files or modules that grounding surfaced for it, using @path/to/file notation, in one mcp__archcore__update_document call.
2. WHEN grounding surfaced no file or module for a task, state that no target was found for that task. Do not guess a path.
3. Confirm the plan carries its ## Declared Delta section per sequencing rule 9 of skills/_shared/delta-routing.md.

WHEN the package produced no plan document (the null, decision, and amendment routes, the acquisition and research paths), skip to Result — the exit gate or the announcement names the follow-ups.

6. Implement fork

Offer exactly two exits and let the user choose:

• Implement now — start on the mapped task list, first phase first, against the files mapped in Step 5.
• Stop here — the draft documents and relations stay in .archcore/; a later /archcore:plan invocation resumes any draft that still carries a state block.

Result

Report:

• The route announcement — route, size label, and the Δ, Π, M, R values that produced them.
• Produced documents grouped by category — vision, knowledge, experience — with each document's path and status.
• Relations created, plus candidate mcp__archcore__add_relation targets among existing documents, or a statement that none match.
• retires entries reported for closeout discharge, when any exist.
• Next actions, naming only v2 commands: /archcore:plan to continue a package, /archcore:document to record a decision or document code touched during implementation, /archcore:review to check the implementation against the recorded plan and reconcile the declared Δ.