subagent-prompting

subagent-prompting is a skill for Claude Code from QBall-Inc/the-bulwark. It costs 49 tokens per session (2,405 once invoked), scanned A, original, MIT.

A template for giving structured instructions to sub-agents, meaning smaller agents that handle parts of a larger task. It organizes each request into the goal, limits, background information, and expected output.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it when coordinating code reviewers, test reviewers, or other specialist agents, especially in workflows with multiple agents or conditional steps.
Why use it?
It makes delegated work more consistent by ensuring every sub-agent receives the information and boundaries it needs.

Skill for Claude Code

Written for Claude Code: allowed-tools in frontmatter. Also seen: reads .claude/ paths; mentions subagents; mentions Claude Code.

Part of the the-bulwark plugin — 30 skills, 17 agents, 6 hooks shipped together

Good fit Use it when coordinating code reviewers, test reviewers, or other specialist agents, especially in workflows with multiple agents or conditional steps.

Compare 6 skills from other repositories ↓
Install with agentmods
npx agentmods add skills/qball-inc/the-bulwark/subagent-prompting
Install

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.

Any agent
npx skills add QBall-Inc/the-bulwark --skill subagent-prompting
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/QBall-Inc/the-bulwark

Made for: Claude Code.

Or install the-bulwark, the plugin that ships this one along with the rest of its 30 skills, 17 agents, 6 hooks.

Wrote 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.

agentmods badge for subagent-prompting

README.md
[![agentmods](https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/qball-inc/the-bulwark/subagent-prompting/github.svg)](https://agentmods.dev/skills/qball-inc/the-bulwark/subagent-prompting)
Your own site
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/qball-inc/the-bulwark/subagent-prompting"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/qball-inc/the-bulwark/subagent-prompting/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.

agentmods 80×15 button for subagent-prompting

Your own site · 80×15
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/qball-inc/the-bulwark/subagent-prompting"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/qball-inc/the-bulwark/subagent-prompting.svg" alt="Reviewed on agentmods" width="80" height="20"></a>
Per session 49 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 2,405 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. A grade says what 26 rules found in the file — not that it is safe. Third-party audits
  • NVIDIA SkillSpector pass 7 Sept 2026
How audits are shown
Origin original No closer match found in the catalogue.
Token cost

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.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5.1 $0.00049 $0.02405
Opus 5 $0.00024 $0.01203
Sonnet 5 $0.00010 $0.00481
Haiku 4.5 $0.00005 $0.00241

Measured 11d ago against content hash f2a54cd34924, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-09-11, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

subagent-prompting 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 11d 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.

Origin

Copies of this mod

1 near-identical copy found in the catalogue:

skills/subagent-prompting/SKILL.md · 369 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 369 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Sub-Agent Prompting Template

Overview

This skill provides a standardized template for invoking sub-agents with deterministic inputs and predictable outputs. Use this when:

  • Orchestrating specialist sub-agents (code auditor, test auditor, etc.)
  • Designing multi-agent workflows with conditional branching
  • Ensuring consistent prompt structure across sub-agent invocations

4-Part Template (Required)

Every sub-agent invocation MUST include all four parts. Incomplete prompts lead to unpredictable behavior.

GOAL (What Success Looks Like)

State the high-level objective, not just the action. Good goals are outcome-focused.

## GOAL

[Describe the desired end state, not the process]

Examples:
- GOOD: "Identify all security vulnerabilities that could allow unauthorized data access"
- BAD: "Review the auth file"

- GOOD: "Refactor authentication module for improved maintainability without breaking existing tests"
- BAD: "Refactor the code"

CONSTRAINTS (What You Cannot Do)

Explicit boundaries prevent scope creep and unexpected changes.

## CONSTRAINTS

- [Hard limit 1: e.g., "Do NOT modify any files"]
- [Hard limit 2: e.g., "Do NOT add new dependencies"]
- [Hard limit 3: e.g., "Maintain backward API compatibility"]
- [Resource limit: e.g., "Complete within 50 tool calls"]

Examples:
- "Identify issues only - do NOT implement fixes"
- "Read-only analysis - no file modifications"
- "Focus only on files in src/auth/ directory"

CONTEXT (What You Need to Know)

Provide all information required to complete the task. Sub-agents run in isolated context and cannot access parent conversation.

## CONTEXT

### Files to Analyze
- `path/to/file1.ts` - [brief description of relevance]
- `path/to/file2.ts` - [brief description of relevance]

### Related Context
- Previous findings: [summary of relevant prior work]
- Architecture notes: [relevant design decisions]
- Known issues: [existing problems to be aware of]

### Standards to Apply
- [Coding standard or guideline reference]
- [Security policy reference if applicable]

Read the full file on GitHub · 369 lines

Files

What ships with it

1 file beside SKILL.md in the same directory: the scripts, references and assets a skill reads on demand. Not counted in the per-session cost; read them before you install if any of them is executable.

Changes

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.

  1. 11d ago First seen · 369 lines · 49 tokens per session scan A f2a54cd34924

Subscribe to this mod's changes

subagent-prompting is a skill published in the GitHub repository QBall-Inc/the-bulwark (8 stars, last pushed today), licensed MIT. It adds 49 tokens to every session and 2,405 once invoked, about $0.0002 per session on Opus 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 2026-08-31.

Related

Other skills, from other repositories

github-pr-review

Handles PR review comments and feedback resolution. Use when user wants to resolve PR comments, handle review feedback, fix review comments, address PR review, check review status, respond to reviewer, verify PR readiness, review PR comments, analyze review feedback, evaluate PR comments, assess review suggestions, or…

fvadicamo/dev-agent-skills · 95 tokens

privacy-guard

Prevents private infrastructure details (node hostnames, internal project names, local usernames and personal emails, absolute home paths, private and VPN IP ranges) from leaking into public repositories through commits, PRs, docs or release artifacts. Use when working in a public or soon-to-be-public repo, before…

fvadicamo/dev-agent-skills · 128 tokens

github-pr-merge

Merges GitHub Pull Requests after validating pre-merge checklist. Use when user wants to merge PR, close PR, finalize PR, complete merge, approve and merge, or execute merge. Runs pre-merge validation (tests, lint, CI, comments), confirms with user, merges with proper format, handles post-merge cleanup.

fvadicamo/dev-agent-skills · 72 tokens

github-pr-creation

Creates GitHub Pull Requests with automated validation and task tracking. Use when user wants to create PR, open pull request, submit for review, or check if ready for PR. Analyzes commits, validates task completion, generates Conventional Commits title and description, suggests labels. NOTE - for merging existing…

fvadicamo/dev-agent-skills · 75 tokens

git-commit

Creates git commits following Conventional Commits format with type/scope/subject. Use when user wants to commit changes, create commit, save work, or stage and commit. Enforces project-specific conventions from CLAUDE.md.

fvadicamo/dev-agent-skills · 49 tokens

resolve-plugins

Curate Claude Code skill / MCP / hook picks against live upstream sources and pin them in .claude/settings.json. Adding a process harness (a paired skill set) is an ordinary pick this door handles. Reads stack from docs/techstack.md, workflow signal from docs/overview.md + existing pins, then live-queries six source…

RockyHong/super-bootstrap · 133 tokens