---
deferred_work_file: '{implementation_artifacts}/deferred-work.md'
---

# Step 4: Review

## RULES

- YOU MUST ALWAYS SPEAK OUTPUT in your Agent communication style with the config `{communication_language}`
- All review subagents must run at the same model capability as the current session.

## INSTRUCTIONS

Change `{spec_file}` status to `in-review` in the frontmatter before continuing.

### Construct Diff

Read `{baseline_commit}` from `{spec_file}` frontmatter. If `{baseline_commit}` is missing or `NO_VCS`, use best effort to determine what changed. Otherwise, construct `{diff_output}` covering all changes — tracked and untracked — since `{baseline_commit}`.

Do NOT `git add` anything — this is read-only inspection.

### Review

Launch Blind Hunter and Edge Case Hunter in parallel without prior conversation context. If no subagents are available, generate two review prompt files in `{implementation_artifacts}` — one per reviewer role below — and HALT. Ask the human to run each in a separate session (ideally a different LLM) and paste back the findings.

- **Blind Hunter** — prompt:
  > Invoke the `bmad-review-adversarial-general` skill on this diff:
  >
  > {diff_output}
- **Edge Case Hunter** — prompt:
  > Invoke the `bmad-review-edge-case-hunter` skill on this diff:
  >
  > {diff_output}

### Classify

1. Deduplicate all review findings.
2. Assign severity to each finding by consequence for the artifact's main consumer (software user, document reader, etc).
   Disregard any severity assigned by a reviewing subagent. Review subagents operate under by-design information asymmetry and do not have enough context to set final severity for this workflow.
   - `low`: none or cosmetic
   - `medium`: tolerable
   - `high`: intolerable
3. Route each finding into exactly one triage category. The first three categories are **this story's problem** — caused or exposed by the current change. The last two are **not this story's problem**.
   - **intent_gap** — caused by the change; cannot be resolved from the spec because the captured intent is incomplete. Do not infer intent unless there is exactly one possible reading.
   - **bad_spec** — caused by the change, including direct deviations from spec. The spec should have been clear enough to prevent it. When in doubt between bad_spec and patch, prefer bad_spec — a spec-level fix is more likely to produce coherent code.
   - **patch** — caused by the change; trivially fixable without human input. Just part of the diff.
   - **defer** — pre-existing issue not caused by this story, surfaced incidentally by the review. Collect for later focused attention.
   - **reject** — noise. Drop silently. When unsure between defer and reject, prefer reject — only defer findings you are confident are real.
4. Process findings in cascading order. If intent_gap or bad_spec findings exist, they trigger a loopback — lower findings are moot since code will be re-derived. If neither exists, process patch and defer normally. Before each loopback, read `{spec_file}` frontmatter `review_loop_iteration` (missing means `0`), increment it by 1, and write it back. If it exceeds 5, HALT and escalate to the human.
   - **intent_gap** — Root cause is inside `<frozen-after-approval>`. Revert code changes. Loop back to the human to resolve. Once resolved, read fully and follow `./step-02-plan.md` to re-run steps 2–4.
   - **bad_spec** — Root cause is outside `<frozen-after-approval>`. Before reverting code: extract KEEP instructions for positive preservation (what worked well and must survive re-derivation). Revert code changes. Read the `## Spec Change Log` in `{spec_file}` and strictly respect all logged constraints when amending the non-frozen sections that contain the root cause. Append a new change-log entry recording: the triggering finding, what was amended, the known-bad state avoided, and the KEEP instructions. Read fully and follow `./step-03-implement.md` to re-derive the code, then this step will run again.
   - **patch** — Auto-fix. These are the only findings that survive loopbacks.
   - **defer** — Append one new entry to `{deferred_work_file}` using this format. Do not modify existing entries or look for duplicates.
     ```markdown
     - source_spec: `{spec_file}`
       summary: <one sentence>
       evidence: <why this is real>
     ```
   - **reject** — Drop silently.

## NEXT

Read fully and follow `./step-05-present.md`
