Sub-agents - Aster

Inside a turn, the agent can delegate self-contained tasks to sub-agents. Each starts with a fresh context and reports back; the parent weighs the report rather than trusting it.

The roster

Agent	Role
`scout`	Read-only recon, fast: where does X live, how does Y work
`cartographer`	Read-only architecture mapping: how subsystems connect
`sentinel`	Skeptical review; tries to refute a claim before reporting it
`forge`	Applies a specific, well-described change to files
`scribe`	Writes and updates docs so they match the code
`prism`	Synthesis: deduplicates collector reports into one result

Custom agents

A directory with an AGENT.md is a custom agent: frontmatter (name, tools, edit permission) plus the system prompt as the body. See docs/SWARM.md in the main repository for the format.

Limits

Under agents: in aster.yaml: max_concurrent, max_per_turn, agent_timeout_secs, and collector_model (the model that synthesizes fan-out reports).

Headless runs

aster run sentinel "review yesterday's commits on main" [--notify] [--cwd DIR] [--schedule NAME]

aster run executes one agent task and exits, --notify sends the result where the agent’s config says to, and --schedule NAME attaches the run to a schedule. aster run --help mentions aster agents; that command does not exist, the roster above is the list.