athola/scope-guard

The cheapest feature is the one you never build. Scope-guard weighs each proposed feature against its value, its cost, and the branch budget, so only what is earned ships.

Table of Contents

• Philosophy
• When to Use
• When NOT to Use
• Quick Start
• 1. Score the Feature
• 2. Check Against Backlog
• 3. Verify Branch Budget
• 4. Monitor Thresholds
• Core Workflow
• Step 1: Calculate Worthiness (scope-guard:worthiness-scored)
• Step 2: Compare Against Backlog (scope-guard:backlog-compared)
• Step 3: Check Branch Budget (scope-guard:budget-checked)
• Step 4: Document Decision (scope-guard:decision-documented)
• Anti-Overengineering Rules
• Backlog Management
• Directory Structure
• Queue Rules
• Adding to Queue
• Integration Points
• With superpowers:brainstorming
• With superpowers:writing-plans
• During superpowers:executing-plans
• Required TodoWrite Items
• Related Skills
• Module Reference

Scope Guard

Prevents overengineering by both Claude and human during the brainstorm, plan, and execute workflow. Forces explicit evaluation of every proposed feature against business value, opportunity cost, and branch constraints.

Philosophy

Core Belief: Not all features deserve implementation. Most ideas should be deferred to backlog until proven necessary.

Three Pillars:

1. Worthiness Scoring - Quantify value vs cost before building
2. Opportunity Cost - Compare against existing backlog
3. Branch Discipline - Respect size thresholds

When To Use

• During brainstorming sessions before documenting designs
• During planning sessions before finalizing implementation plans
• When evaluating "should we add this?" decisions
• Automatically via hooks when branches approach thresholds
• When proposing new features, abstractions, or patterns

When NOT To Use

• Bug fixes with clear, bounded scope
• Documentation-only changes
• Trivial single-file edits (< 50 lines)
• Emergency production fixes

Quick Start

1. Score the Feature

Use the Worthiness formula:

(Business Value + Time Criticality + Risk Reduction) / (Complexity + Token Cost + Scope Drift)

Verification: Run the command with --help flag to verify availability.

See decision-framework.md for details.

Thresholds:

• > 2.0 → Implement now
• 1.0 - 2.0 → Discuss first
• < 1.0 → Defer to backlog

2. Check Against Backlog

Compare against docs/backlog/queue.md:

• Does it beat top queued items?
• Is there room in branch budget?

3. Verify Branch Budget

Default: 3 major features per branch

If at capacity, must drop existing feature, split to new branch, or justify override.

4. Monitor Thresholds

Watch for Yellow/Red zones:

• Lines: 1000/1500/2000
• Commits: 15/25/30
• Days: 3/7/7+

See branch-management.md for monitoring.

Core Workflow

Step 1: Calculate Worthiness (scope-guard:worthiness-scored)

Score each factor (1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13):

• Value Factors: Business Value, Time Criticality, Risk Reduction
• Cost Factors: Complexity, Token Cost, Scope Drift

Details: decision-framework.md

Step 2: Compare Against Backlog (scope-guard:backlog-compared)

1. Check docs/backlog/queue.md for existing items
2. Compare Worthiness Scores
3. New item must beat top queued item OR fit within branch budget

Step 3: Check Branch Budget (scope-guard:budget-checked)

Count current features in branch. If at budget (default: 3), new feature requires:

• Dropping an existing feature, OR
• Splitting to new branch, OR
• Explicit override with justification

Step 4: Document Decision (scope-guard:decision-documented)

Record outcome:

• Implementing: Note Worthiness Score and budget slot
• Deferring (MANDATORY STEPS):
  1. Create GitHub issue immediately - See github-integration.md Steps 1-3
  2. Mark scope-guard:github-issue-created complete
  3. Create Discussion - See github-integration.md Step 4. Prompt: "Creating a Discussion with full reasoning context. [Y/n]" Publishing is the default. If the user explicitly declines, skip Discussion creation. If publishing fails, continue.
  4. Optionally add to docs/backlog/queue.md with issue link
• Rejecting: Document why (low value, out of scope)

IMPORTANT: Deferral is NOT complete until a GitHub issue exists. This prevents context loss when branches are merged or abandoned.

Anti-Overengineering Rules

Key Principles:

• Ask clarifying questions BEFORE proposing solutions
• No abstraction until 3rd use case
• Defer "nice to have" features
• Stay within branch budget

See anti-overengineering.md for full rules and red flags.

Backlog Management

Directory Structure

**Verification:** Run the command with `--help` flag to verify availability.
docs/backlog/
├── queue.md              # Active ranked queue
└── archive/
    ├── ideas.md          # Deferred feature ideas
    ├── optimizations.md  # Deferred performance work
    ├── refactors.md      # Deferred cleanup
    └── abstractions.md   # Deferred patterns

Verification: Run the command with --help flag to verify availability.

Queue Rules

• Max 10 items in active queue
• Items older than 30 days without pickup → move to archive
• Re-score monthly or when project context changes

Adding to Queue

When deferring, add to docs/backlog/queue.md:

| Rank | Item | Worthiness | Added | Branch/Epic | Category |
|------|------|------------|-------|-------------|----------|
| 1 | [New item description] | 1.8 | 2025-12-08 | current-branch | idea |

Verification: Run the command with --help flag to verify availability.

Re-rank by Worthiness Score after adding.

Integration Points

With superpowers:brainstorming

At end of brainstorming, before documenting design:

1. List all proposed features/components
2. Score each with Worthiness formula
3. Defer items scoring < 1.0 to backlog
4. Check branch budget for remaining items

Self-invoke prompt: "Before documenting this design, let me evaluate the proposed features with scope-guard."

With superpowers:writing-plans

Before finalizing implementation plan:

1. Verify all planned items have Worthiness > 1.0
2. Compare against backlog queue
3. Confirm within branch budget
4. Document any deferrals

Self-invoke prompt: "Before finalizing this plan, let me verify scope with scope-guard."

During superpowers:executing-plans

Periodically during execution:

1. Run threshold check: lines, files, commits, days
2. Warn if Yellow zone reached
3. Require justification if Red zone reached

Self-invoke prompt: "This branch has grown significantly. Let me check scope-guard thresholds."

Required TodoWrite Items

When evaluating a feature, create these todos:

1. scope-guard:worthiness-scored
2. scope-guard:backlog-compared
3. scope-guard:budget-checked
4. scope-guard:github-issue-created (MANDATORY if deferring - blocks step 5)
5. scope-guard:decision-documented

Note: Step 4 (github-issue-created) is REQUIRED when deferring items. You cannot mark decision-documented complete without first completing github-issue-created for deferrals.

Related Skills

• superpowers:brainstorming - Ideation workflow this guards
• superpowers:writing-plans - Planning workflow this validates
• imbue:review-core - Review methodology pattern
• imbue:karpathy-principles - Compact four-principle synthesis covering scope, simplicity, surgical edits, and verifiable goals
• See docs/quality-gates.md#skill-level-quality-gate-composition for the full gate-skill federation graph

Module Reference

• decision-framework.md - Worthiness formula, scoring, thresholds
• github-integration.md - MANDATORY issue creation for deferrals
• anti-overengineering.md - Rules, patterns, red flags
• branch-management.md - Thresholds, monitoring, zones
• baseline-scenarios.md - Testing scenarios and validation

Exit Criteria

• [ ] Every proposed feature has a Worthiness Score computed from the formula (Business Value + Time Criticality + Risk Reduction) / (Complexity + Token Cost + Scope Drift) and a disposition: implement (>2.0), discuss (1.0-2.0), or defer (<1.0)
• [ ] Deferred items have a GitHub issue created before scope-guard:decision-documented is marked complete; the issue URL is recorded in the todo
• [ ] Branch budget checked: if at 3 major features, a new feature requires dropping an existing one, splitting to a new branch, or an explicit written override with justification
• [ ] Branch threshold zones checked (lines 1000/1500/2000, commits 15/25/30, days 3/7/7+); Yellow zone triggers a warning, Red zone blocks without justification