Getting it into your agent
One page per mod, every tool's command on it. A separate URL per tool would split the same page into five that compete with each other.
npx skills add AgentWorkforce/relay --skill choosing-swarm-patternsgit clone --depth 1 https://github.com/AgentWorkforce/relayWrote this? Show the measurements
A badge with what this costs and how it scanned, read live from this page, so it follows the numbers instead of freezing them. Markdown for a README, HTML for a documentation site or a project page.
[](https://agentmods.dev/skills/agentworkforce/relay/choosing-swarm-patterns)<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/agentworkforce/relay/choosing-swarm-patterns"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/agentworkforce/relay/choosing-swarm-patterns/github.svg" alt="Measured on agentmods" height="20"></a>Or the 80×15 button, for a site that already has a row of RSS and ATOM ones. Only the verdict fits; the numbers stay here.
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/agentworkforce/relay/choosing-swarm-patterns"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/agentworkforce/relay/choosing-swarm-patterns.svg" alt="Reviewed on agentmods" width="80" height="20"></a>- NVIDIA SkillSpector warn
SkillSpector: 6 findings, up to medium
These are SkillSpector’s own severities. On a checked sample its high-severity flags on skills were ~96% false positives — a documented command, a public API, a “never do X” rule — so we show them as a caution to read, not a verdict. Why →
- medium Prompt Injection · line 72 Large whitespace padding was detected (a block of blank lines or a long run of spaces). This can push injected instructions below or to the right of the visible area so a human reviewer never sees them while the agent still reads them. Manual review of the hidden content is recommended.Fix: Remove the large whitespace padding (blank-line blocks or long space runs) and review any content hidden below or to the right of it. Keep skill files compact and reviewable so no instructions can be
- medium Prompt Injection · line 75 Large whitespace padding was detected (a block of blank lines or a long run of spaces). This can push injected instructions below or to the right of the visible area so a human reviewer never sees them while the agent still reads them. Manual review of the hidden content is recommended.Fix: Remove the large whitespace padding (blank-line blocks or long space runs) and review any content hidden below or to the right of it. Keep skill files compact and reviewable so no instructions can be
- medium Prompt Injection · line 79 Large whitespace padding was detected (a block of blank lines or a long run of spaces). This can push injected instructions below or to the right of the visible area so a human reviewer never sees them while the agent still reads them. Manual review of the hidden content is recommended.Fix: Remove the large whitespace padding (blank-line blocks or long space runs) and review any content hidden below or to the right of it. Keep skill files compact and reviewable so no instructions can be
- medium Prompt Injection · line 81 Large whitespace padding was detected (a block of blank lines or a long run of spaces). This can push injected instructions below or to the right of the visible area so a human reviewer never sees them while the agent still reads them. Manual review of the hidden content is recommended.Fix: Remove the large whitespace padding (blank-line blocks or long space runs) and review any content hidden below or to the right of it. Keep skill files compact and reviewable so no instructions can be
- medium Prompt Injection · line 341 Large whitespace padding was detected (a block of blank lines or a long run of spaces). This can push injected instructions below or to the right of the visible area so a human reviewer never sees them while the agent still reads them. Manual review of the hidden content is recommended.Fix: Remove the large whitespace padding (blank-line blocks or long space runs) and review any content hidden below or to the right of it. Keep skill files compact and reviewable so no instructions can be
- medium Prompt Injection · line 427 Large whitespace padding was detected (a block of blank lines or a long run of spaces). This can push injected instructions below or to the right of the visible area so a human reviewer never sees them while the agent still reads them. Manual review of the hidden content is recommended.Fix: Remove the large whitespace padding (blank-line blocks or long space runs) and review any content hidden below or to the right of it. Keep skill files compact and reviewable so no instructions can be
What it costs to keep this loaded
Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.
| Model | Per session | Once invoked |
|---|---|---|
| Fable 5.1 | $0.00076 | $0.05295 |
| Opus 5.5 | $0.00030 | $0.02118 |
| Sonnet 5.5 | $0.00015 | $0.01059 |
| Haiku 4.5 | $0.00008 | $0.00530 |
Grade A, and why
choosing-swarm-patterns scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 1mo ago.
A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.
Nothing flagged
None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.
Copies of this mod
1 near-identical copy found in the catalogue:
- choosing-swarm-patterns — 100% identical, 0 lines differ
How it starts
The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 426 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.
Overview
Overview
The Agent Relay SDK (@agent-relay/sdk) supports 24 swarm patterns via a single swarm.pattern field. Patterns are configured declaratively in YAML — there are no standalone fanOut(...) / hubAndSpoke(...) helpers. Pick the simplest pattern that solves the problem; add complexity only when the system proves it's insufficient.
Run a pattern
TypeScript SDK runner
import { runWorkflow } from '@agent-relay/sdk/workflows';
const run = await runWorkflow('workflows/feature-dev.yaml', {
vars: { task: 'Add OAuth login' },
});
Quick Decision Framework
Is the task independent per agent?
YES → fan-out (parallel workers, hub collects)
Does each step need the previous step's output?
YES → Is it strictly linear?
YES → pipeline
NO → dag (parallel where possible, `dependsOn` edges)
Does a coordinator need to stay alive and adapt?
YES → hub-spoke (single-level hub + workers)
hierarchical (structurally identical in current impl; use for naming/intent)
Is the task about making a decision?
YES → Do agents need to argue opposing sides?
YES → debate (adversarial, full mesh)
NO → consensus (cooperative, full mesh + coordination.consensusStrategy)
Does the right specialist emerge during processing?
YES → handoff (sequential chain, one active at a time)
Do all agents need to freely collaborate?
YES → mesh (full peer-to-peer edges)
Is cost the primary concern?
YES → cascade (chain of increasingly capable agents; each step's prompt
decides whether to pass through or redo the prior output)
Pattern Reference (Core 10)
| # | Pattern | Topology (actual edges) | Best For |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | fan-out | Hub broadcasts to N workers; workers reply to hub only | Independent subtasks (reviews, research, tests) |
| 2 | pipeline | Linear chain (agent_i → agent_{i+1}) |
Ordered stages (design → implement → test) |
| 3 | hub-spoke | Hub ↔ spokes (bidirectional); no spoke-to-spoke | Dynamic coordination, lead reviews/adjusts |
| 4 | consensus | Full mesh; decision via coordination.consensusStrategy |
Architecture decisions, approval gates |
| 5 | mesh | Full mesh (every agent ↔ every other) | Brainstorming, collaborative debugging |
| 6 | handoff | Chain; passes control forward | Triage, specialist routing |
| 7 | cascade | Chain of dependsOn steps; all run on success, downstream skipped on upstream failure (no built-in "fall through") |
Cost optimization: cheap first, each step's prompt passes through or redoes |
| 8 | dag | Edges from step dependsOn |
Mixed dependencies, parallel where possible |
| 9 | debate | Full mesh (same topology as mesh; roles drive behavior) | Rigorous adversarial examination |
| 10 | hierarchical | Hub + subordinates (single-level in current impl) | Large teams; semantic distinction from hub-spoke |
What this file has done since we first saw it
Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.
- 1mo ago Changed · -13 lines a04d7d8a5c9e
- 1mo ago First seen · 439 lines · 76 tokens per session scan A c2a730270d9a
choosing-swarm-patterns is a skill published in the GitHub repository AgentWorkforce/relay (888 stars, last pushed today), licensed Apache-2.0. It adds 76 tokens to every session and 5,295 once invoked, about $0.0003 per session on Opus 5.5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-08-30.
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