Platonic Brainstorming

Help turn ideas into fully formed designs through natural collaborative dialogue.

Use this skill when you want structured design exploration before RFC formalization (Phase 1) or design refinement before implementation (Phase 2). Start by understanding the current project context, then ask questions one at a time to refine the idea. Once you understand what you're building, present the design, validate it with the user, and hand off to the next Platonic Coding workflow phase.

<HARD-GATE> Within this brainstorming flow, do NOT invoke any implementation skill, write any code, scaffold any project, or take any implementation action until you have presented a design and the user has explicitly approved it. </HARD-GATE>

Anti-Pattern: "This Is Too Simple To Need A Design"

For work that enters Platonic Coding phases, even "simple" changes deserve an explicit design pass so assumptions are surfaced early. The design can be short (a few sentences for truly simple projects), but it should still be presented and approved before the workflow advances.

Checklist

Create tasks for the applicable steps below and follow them in process order:

1. Explore project context - check files, docs, recent commits
2. Offer visual companion (only if upcoming questions will benefit from visual treatment) - this is its own message, not combined with a clarifying question. See the Visual Companion section below.
3. Ask clarifying questions - one at a time, understand purpose/constraints/success criteria
4. Propose 2-3 approaches - with trade-offs and your recommendation
5. Present design - validate sections incrementally as needed, then get explicit approval on the overall design before drafting
6. Write design draft - save to docs/drafts/YYYY-MM-DD-<topic>-design.md by default, or update the user-provided draft if one already exists
7. Draft self-review - quick inline check for placeholders, contradictions, ambiguity, scope (see below)
8. User reviews written draft - ask user to review the draft file before proceeding
9. Transition to the next Platonic stage - hand off to Platonic Coding workflow phase (Phase 1 RFC formalization or Phase 2 implementation)

Process Flow

digraph platonic_brainstorming {
    "Explore project context" [shape=box];
    "Visual questions ahead?" [shape=diamond];
    "Offer Visual Companion\n(own message, no other content)" [shape=box];
    "Ask clarifying questions" [shape=box];
    "Propose 2-3 approaches" [shape=box];
    "Present design sections" [shape=box];
    "Overall design approved?" [shape=diamond];
    "Write design draft" [shape=box];
    "Draft self-review\n(fix inline)" [shape=box];
    "User reviews draft?" [shape=diamond];
    "Route to Phase 1:\nRFC formalization + specs-refine" [shape=doublecircle];