Filed unassigned by the domain:cli execution seat (session session_019bmVFqoQPq63zhKrxdYG1r). I got this wrong and it cost real time, which is the evidence. Recording only — ⛔ not claiming.
The ambiguity
SKILL.md states the tiering plainly:
⛔ 强制条款两条:① 凡改 .claude/skills/pm-dispatch/** … ② 凡改变契约接受/拒绝行为或扩大公开面的卡 … 一律 claude-fable-5。两条唯一降档出口:额度耗尽豁免(维护者 2026-08-13 原话:「fable 如果用完了,可以用 opus」):仅当 fable 实测不可用…才落 opus
So: the exemption is the named exit for both mandatory clauses, with needs:contract-review as the compensating control — "豁免的对象是派发;复审的存在意义就是补偿一次低于地板的派发".
But a seat's on-card restatement of clause ② does not carry that context, and reads as an independent, absolute floor. #9180 comment 5310450985 says:
⇒ There is no step of this ruling that is below the fable floor. ⛔ Do not dispatch ② or ③ at opus.
Read at claim time, on the card, with no pointer back to the exemption, that is indistinguishable from a stronger rule.
What it cost — measured
#10077 (and #10078 behind it) were parked from ~00:52Z to ~11:45Z — ~11 hours — because this seat read the on-card floor as beating the exemption. The reasoning I wrote down at the time was: "a later, card-specific ⛔ governs an earlier general accommodation."
That reasoning is wrong, and the card itself says why if you read it closely: comment 5310450985 argues entirely from clause-② limbs (a table mapping each step to accept/reject or public-surface), states outright that the floor "can only be seen" because paths cannot derive clause ②, and is authored by a seat, not the maintainer. The maintainer's own 2026-08-17 re-weigh likewise justifies it as "published-surface change, per the standing note". ⇒ It is clause ② restated for visibility, not a new rule.
Once read correctly, the card dispatched at opus under the exemption with needs:contract-review applied, was reviewed by the skills seat at claude-fable-5 (a non-dispatching seat — both eligibility conditions met), and merged the same afternoon. The mechanism worked perfectly. The only failure was the ~11 hours spent believing it did not apply.
⚠️ The floor comment is a good artefact and should not be removed — it exists because the same seat breached clause ② twice, and "a rule held in memory is not a control. The card is." The defect is that it is more absolute than the rule it restates, and nothing at the point of use says so.
Why this will recur
Everything about the situation pushes toward the wrong reading:
- the on-card text is later and more specific than the skill's general paragraph, and "later + specific beats earlier + general" is a sound instinct that is wrong here;
- the ⛔ is unqualified — no "except under the quota exemption", no pointer to it;
- a seat that guesses wrong in the permissive direction commits the exact breach the note exists to prevent, so the incentive is to over-read it. ⛔ Erring conservatively cost 11 hours and looked responsible the whole time, which is what makes it hard to notice.
Directions, ⛔ not prescriptive
- Make the restatement carry its own scope. A card-level clause-② note should say what it is: "this is clause ②; the quota-exhaustion exemption applies, with
needs:contract-review as the compensation." Cheapest, and it fixes the artefact at the point of use. - Say it once in the skill, at the clause-② paragraph: a card-level restatement of clause ② is still clause ②, and only a maintainer ruling can set a floor the exemption does not reach. ⚠️ This is the load-bearing sentence — it also settles who can create such a floor, which is currently unstated.
- Give dispatch-gates a
--tier line for it — it already prints "Clause ② is NOT reachable from paths"; it could also print the exemption and its compensating control, so the exit is visible in the same output as the floor. - Have the claim template ask the question explicitly — a
Tier floor source: line (clause ① / clause ② / maintainer ruling) would have forced the distinction at the moment it mattered, since only the third is exemption-proof.
⭐ The generalisation, which is not about tiers: a rule copied onto a card for visibility loses the exceptions that lived beside it, and the copy is what gets read.#10076 retired an ADR commitment this week for a related reason — prose carried from seat to seat is a carrier, not a mechanism.
Related: #9180 (the ruling and its floor note) · #10077 (the card that was parked) · #10078 (parked behind it).
Filed unassigned by the
domain:cliexecution seat (sessionsession_019bmVFqoQPq63zhKrxdYG1r). I got this wrong and it cost real time, which is the evidence. Recording only — ⛔ not claiming.The ambiguity
SKILL.mdstates the tiering plainly:So: the exemption is the named exit for both mandatory clauses, with
needs:contract-reviewas the compensating control — "豁免的对象是派发;复审的存在意义就是补偿一次低于地板的派发".But a seat's on-card restatement of clause ② does not carry that context, and reads as an independent, absolute floor. #9180 comment
5310450985says:Read at claim time, on the card, with no pointer back to the exemption, that is indistinguishable from a stronger rule.
What it cost — measured
#10077 (and #10078 behind it) were parked from ~00:52Z to ~11:45Z — ~11 hours — because this seat read the on-card floor as beating the exemption. The reasoning I wrote down at the time was: "a later, card-specific ⛔ governs an earlier general accommodation."
That reasoning is wrong, and the card itself says why if you read it closely: comment
5310450985argues entirely from clause-② limbs (a table mapping each step to accept/reject or public-surface), states outright that the floor "can only be seen" because paths cannot derive clause ②, and is authored by a seat, not the maintainer. The maintainer's own 2026-08-17 re-weigh likewise justifies it as "published-surface change, per the standing note". ⇒ It is clause ② restated for visibility, not a new rule.Once read correctly, the card dispatched at
opusunder the exemption withneeds:contract-reviewapplied, was reviewed by the skills seat atclaude-fable-5(a non-dispatching seat — both eligibility conditions met), and merged the same afternoon. The mechanism worked perfectly. The only failure was the ~11 hours spent believing it did not apply.Why this will recur
Everything about the situation pushes toward the wrong reading:
Directions, ⛔ not prescriptive
needs:contract-reviewas the compensation." Cheapest, and it fixes the artefact at the point of use.--tierline for it — it already prints "Clause ② is NOT reachable from paths"; it could also print the exemption and its compensating control, so the exit is visible in the same output as the floor.Tier floor source:line (clause ① / clause ② / maintainer ruling) would have forced the distinction at the moment it mattered, since only the third is exemption-proof.⭐ The generalisation, which is not about tiers: a rule copied onto a card for visibility loses the exceptions that lived beside it, and the copy is what gets read.#10076 retired an ADR commitment this week for a related reason — prose carried from seat to seat is a carrier, not a mechanism.
Related: #9180 (the ruling and its floor note) · #10077 (the card that was parked) · #10078 (parked behind it).