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brainstorming

You MUST use this before any creative work - creating features, building components, adding functionality, modifying behavior, or planning anything new, in software or out of it (a talk, a business, a renovation).

77

1.76x
Quality

76%

Does it follow best practices?

Impact

83%

1.76x

Average score across 3 eval scenarios

SecuritybySnyk

Low

Low-risk findings worth noting

Fix and improve this skill with Tessl

tessl review fix ./skills/brainstorming/SKILL.md
SKILL.md
Quality
Evals
Security

Quality

Content

88%Weight 40%Scale 1-5

Reviews the quality of instructions and guidance provided to agents. Good implementation is clear, handles edge cases, and produces reliable results.

The body is an exceptionally well-crafted instruction-only skill: a clearly sequenced conversational workflow with explicit validation checkpoints (playback corrections, builder check, approval gate), concrete scripts and examples throughout, and tight, jargon-free prose. Its weaknesses are minor — a small amount of duplicated guidance and a motivational opener that could be trimmed — leaving the content efficient and highly actionable.

DimensionReasoningScore

Conciseness

The body is dense and assumes Claude's competence — it never explains concepts Claude already knows, and the guidance is concrete throughout ('about 200-300 words', a sizing table, an exact offer message). Minor trimming opportunities exist: the guidance against jargon is stated twice ('Use plain language... never use process jargon' then 'Avoid jargon' four lines later at 'Be clear and concise. Lead with what matters. Avoid jargon.'), and the two-paragraph motivational opener ('You are very good at building...') is padding by the rubric's standard. This matches anchor 4: efficient with minor instances of over-explanation.

4 / 5

Actionability

For an instruction-only skill the guidance is highly concrete: exact scripts to send ('This might be easier if I show you. Want me to open a browser tab with some mockups?'), example questions ('Walk me through the last time...'), a specific output path ('docs/superpowers/specs/YYYY-MM-DD-<topic>-design.md'), a three-pile triage for builder questions, and a hard gate with enumerated exceptions. The gap that keeps it from 5: it instructs the reader to 'read visual-companion.md in this directory before starting the server' and to 'dispatch a fresh subagent with builder-check-prompt.md in this directory', but neither file exists in the bundle — those steps cannot be executed as written, and the scripts/ directory (start-server.sh, server.cjs, etc.) is never named.

4 / 5

Workflow Clarity

The multi-step process is clearly sequenced — know-check, first message, conversation (ground to cover, recon, spikes), playback, sizing, written design, builder check, then the HARD-GATE — with explicit validation checkpoints and feedback loops throughout: 'End each chunk by asking what's wrong or missing', the builder check before handover ('Don't hand over the document until the check is back'), approval required before building, and mid-task escalation ('If it grows mid-task, stop, say so, and step up a size'). The Red Flags table adds error-recovery guidance for predictable failure modes. This matches anchor 5: clear sequence, explicit validation, feedback loops.

5 / 5

Progressive Disclosure

The SKILL.md is a well-organized overview that appropriately defers detail to per-topic files ('read visual-companion.md in this directory', 'builder-check-prompt.md'), keeps those references one level deep and clearly signaled at point of use, and holds its own content at overview altitude. The one organizational gap: the referenced paths are said to be 'in this directory' but the bundle's actual support files live in scripts/ (start-server.sh, stop-server.sh, server.cjs, helper.js, frame-template.html) and are never named from the body, so the server workflow's entry point is not directly navigable. This is a minor organization gap against anchor 5, matching anchor 4 ('most content appropriately placed; references mostly clear; minor organization gaps').

4 / 5

Total

17

/

20

Passed

Description

53%Weight 40%Scale 1-5

Based on the skill's description, can an agent find and select it at the right time? Clear, specific descriptions lead to better discovery.

The description is an extremely strong trigger — explicit, imperative, and rich with natural phrases users say before creative work — but it is only a trigger. It states when the skill must fire and says nothing about what the skill does, and its deliberately maximal scope creates high overlap risk with other planning and implementation skills.

Suggestions

Add a clause stating what the skill does, e.g. 'Clarifies intent through open questions, plays back understanding, and writes a design document before building' — this would complete the missing 'what' half of the description.

Narrow or clarify the trigger boundary against closely related skills (e.g. planning or implementation skills) so 'MUST use before any creative work' does not claim precedence over every build request.

Add common trigger synonyms such as 'brainstorm', 'design', or 'new project/idea' to round out the natural-term coverage.

DimensionReasoningScore

Specificity

The description names its domain ('before any creative work') and enumerates concrete trigger activities ('creating features, building components, adding functionality, modifying behavior, or planning anything new'), but it never states a single concrete action the skill itself performs — the only skill action stated is 'use this'. Per the guideline to score only what is explicitly stated, the enumerated triggers lift it above the generic-action anchor 2, but the total absence of the skill's own capabilities keeps it below anchor 4.

3 / 5

Completeness

The 'when' is explicit and thorough ('You MUST use this before any creative work... in software or out of it'), but the 'what' — what the skill actually does when invoked (asks clarifying questions, plays back understanding, writes a design document) — is entirely absent. This sits between anchor 2's when-only profile ('Use when working with documents') and anchor 4's both-present profile: the exceptional trigger quality keeps it above the minimal when-only anchor, but the missing capability statement bars it from 4.

3 / 5

Trigger Term Quality

Phrases like 'creating features', 'building components', 'adding functionality', 'modifying behavior', and 'planning anything new' are natural things users say when starting work, and the out-of-software list ('a talk, a business, a renovation') broadens natural coverage. However, common synonyms users would actually say — 'brainstorm', 'design', 'new idea', 'new project' — are missing, so it falls short of anchor 5's comprehensive synonym coverage.

4 / 5

Distinctiveness Conflict Risk

The scope is deliberately maximal — 'before ANY creative work', spanning 'creating features, building components, adding functionality, modifying behavior, or planning anything new, in software or out of it'. This overlaps with nearly every build/plan/implement skill and would claim precedence over them, matching anchor 2 ('very broad; high overlap risk with many similar skills'). It is not entirely generic — it is specifically positioned as a pre-work intercept — so it does not fall to anchor 1.

2 / 5

Total

12

/

20

Passed

Validation

100%

Checks the skill against the spec for correct structure and formatting. All validation checks must pass before discovery and implementation can be scored.

Validation — 16 / 16 Passed

Validation for skill structure

No warnings or errors.

Repository

obra/superpowers

Path

skills/brainstorming/SKILL.md

Reviewed

Table of Contents

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