decisive-action
Guidance on when to ask clarifying questions vs proceed with standard approaches. Reduces unnecessary interaction rounds
Install via CLI (Recommended)
clawhub install openclaw/skills/skills/athola/nm-conserve-decisive-actionNight Market Skill — ported from claude-night-market/conserve. For the full experience with agents, hooks, and commands, install the Claude Code plugin.
Table of Contents
- Core Principle
- When to Ask (High Impact Ambiguity)
- When to Proceed Without Asking
- Decision Matrix
- Safety Mechanisms
- Examples
- Anti-Patterns
- Integration
Decisive Action
Guidance on when to ask clarifying questions versus proceeding autonomously.
When To Use
- Reducing unnecessary clarifying questions
- Taking autonomous action when intent is clear
When NOT To Use
- High-stakes irreversible operations requiring explicit confirmation
- Ambiguous requirements where clarification prevents wasted work
Core Principle
Ask questions only when ambiguity would materially impair correctness or capacity to fulfill the request precisely.
When to Ask (High Impact Ambiguity)
Always Ask For
| Scenario | Why | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Destructive Operations | Irreversible, high cost of error | "Delete which files?" |
| Multiple Valid Approaches | Materially different tradeoffs | "Add index vs cache vs denormalize?" |
| Security-Critical | Wrong choice = vulnerability | "Which auth method?" |
| Data Migration | Data loss risk | "Preserve or transform?" |
| Breaking Changes | Affects downstream users | "Deprecate or remove?" |
Ask Threshold Checklist
Before asking, verify:
- >30% chance of wrong interpretation
- Error cost > correction cost
- No clear standard approach exists
- User context doesn't clarify intent
When to Proceed Without Asking
Default to Action For
| Scenario | Why | Assumption |
|---|---|---|
| Standard Approach Exists | Industry convention | Use conventional pattern |
| Easily Reversible | Low cost of error | Can undo via git/backup |
| Clear from Context | Intent is obvious | Proceed with stated goal |
| User Can Review | PR/dry-run available | Changes are inspectable |
Proceed Threshold Checklist
Proceed without asking if:
- Standard/obvious solution exists
- Easily reversible (git, backup)
- User can review before finalize
- Context makes intent clear
- Error cost < interruption cost
Decision Matrix
| Reversibility | Ambiguity | Action |
|---|---|---|
| Reversible | Low | Proceed |
| Reversible | High | Proceed with preview |
| Irreversible | Low | Proceed with confirmation |
| Irreversible | High | Ask |
Safety Mechanisms
Before Proceeding Autonomously
Metadata
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Find the right skillPaste this into your clawhub.json to enable this plugin.
{
"plugins": {
"official-athola-nm-conserve-decisive-action": {
"enabled": true,
"auto_update": true
}
}
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