Conciseness

Lookup tables are properly deferred to references and most prose is load-bearing, but the body still spends tokens on things Claude already knows: the opening Fowler definition and the etymology of "flaky test", the inline derivation of (1-p)^N = 0.05 and the pooled two-proportion z formula, and a marginal "note on where flakes concentrate" section, plus a time-sensitive CDP version-drift caution in the main body. Mostly efficient with several sections that could be tightened fits 3 rather than 4 — the removable material is more than minor — and clearly not 2, since the majority of the content instructs rather than explains.

Actionability

Concrete runner flags (--workers, --repeat-each, --runInBand, --randomize, --showSeed/--seed), explicit N budgets, the 1.96 threshold, and a copy-paste report template make the protocol mostly executable. Three of the eight axes (network, viewport, animation suppression) name their variations but give no executable knob, which is more than a minor gap, so 4 rather than 5; well above 3 since nothing is pseudocode.

Workflow Clarity

Steps 1-6 are sequenced in dependency order with an explicit decision rule as the validation checkpoint, an early-stop rule, a confirmation feedback loop (2x screening hit -> re-measure at N=60 -> apply the z rule), a required report shape, and guidance for the negative-result case. Matches the 5 anchor's explicit validation and error-recovery loop.

Progressive Disclosure

Two real, one-level-deep reference files (both verified present on disk and containing what the body claims) are linked in context and catalogued in a "Deep references" section describing each file's contents; the body inlines only the distilled numbers. Clear overview with well-signaled references fits the 5 anchor.

Specificity

"Varies one condition at a time (isolation, order, workers, viewport, latency, repetition)", "counts passes and failures with confidence intervals", and "walks shared resources once parallelism is implicated" are multiple concrete, comprehensive actions. Fits the 5 anchor rather than 4 because the actions named cover the whole protocol, not just most of it.

Completeness

The what (vary one axis at a time, count outcomes with confidence intervals, walk shared resources) and an explicit, staged when ("Use when one test is known to fail intermittently and reading its code has not explained why") are both clearly present with concrete triggers. Matches the 5 anchor; 4 would require the when-clause to be less explicit than it is.

Trigger Term Quality

"one test is known to fail intermittently", "passes and failures", and "parallelism" are natural phrases, but the most common user phrasings — "flaky test", "flaky", "test fails sometimes" — never appear. Good coverage with a few natural terms missing fits 4; it is above 3 because the terms present are ones users would actually say, and below 5 because synonyms of the single most likely trigger term are absent.

Distinctiveness Conflict Risk

The trigger is a narrow niche — a single intermittently failing test that code inspection has already failed to explain — which distinguishes it from catalog-matching and commit-bisection skills. Clear niche with distinct triggers and minimal conflict risk fits the 5 anchor.