Review Brief Skill

Purpose

Evaluate a visual brief from three stakeholder perspectives adapted to the brief type, then optionally apply improvements based on the review verdict. This skill wraps the brief-review-assessor agent with discovery, presentation, and optional revision capabilities.

Visual briefs are the decision point between narrative content and visual rendering — every headline, layout choice, section sequence, and CTA in the brief directly shapes the final deliverable. Reviewing at the brief stage is efficient because changes are cheap (edit text) vs. post-rendering (re-render entire scene).

Parameters

Parameter	Default	Description
brief_path	auto-discovered	Path to the brief file. When omitted, searches nearby for *-brief.md files.
source_narrative	auto-discovered	Path to the source narrative (for completeness checks). Optional.
brief_type	auto-detected	One of: slides, big-picture, web, storyboard, big-block. Auto-detected from brief frontmatter type: field or filename pattern.
auto_improve	false	When true, apply CRITICAL and HIGH improvements automatically (max 2 rounds).
audience_context	none	Optional audience description (industry, role, language) for more targeted evaluation.

Workflow

Step 0: Discover Brief

If brief_path is not provided:

1. Search for *-brief.md files in the current directory and cogni-visual/ subdirectory
2. If multiple briefs found, present them via AskUserQuestion and let the user choose
3. If one brief found, confirm it with the user

Step 1: Parse Brief & Detect Type

Read the brief file. Extract:

• YAML frontmatter (type, version, arc_type, arc_id, theme, language, title)
• Brief body content

Detect brief_type from:

1. Explicit parameter (if provided)
2. Frontmatter type: field
3. Filename pattern: presentation-brief.md → slides, big-picture-brief.md → big-picture, web-brief.md → web, storyboard-brief.md → storyboard, big-block-brief.md → big-block

Step 2: Discover Source Narrative

If source_narrative is not provided, look for it:

1. Check brief frontmatter for source_path or narrative_path
2. Search sibling directories for narrative files (files with arc_id in frontmatter)
3. If not found, proceed without it (skip completeness checks, note the gap)

Step 3: Launch Review

Launch the brief-review-assessor agent with:

• brief_path: the brief file
• brief_type: detected type
• source_narrative: if found
• audience_context: if provided
• round: 1

Step 4: Present Results

Parse the assessor's JSON response and present a formatted summary:

## Brief Review: {title}

**Verdict: {ACCEPT|REVISE|REJECT}** (Score: {overall_score}/100, Round {round})

### Perspective Scores
| Perspective | Score | Status |
|-------------|-------|--------|
| {name} | {score} | {pass|warn|fail} |
| {name} | {score} | {pass|warn|fail} |
| {name} | {score} | {pass|warn|fail} |

### Improvements Needed
**CRITICAL:**
- {description} (flagged by: {stakeholders})

**HIGH:**
- {description} (flagged by: {stakeholders})

**OPTIONAL:**
- {description} (flagged by: {stakeholders})

### Revision Guidance
{synthesis.revision_guidance}

Write the full JSON verdict to {brief_name}.review.json alongside the brief file.

Step 5: Handle Verdict

On accept: Report success. The brief is ready for rendering.

On revise (auto_improve=true):

1. Apply CRITICAL improvements first, then HIGH improvements
2. For each improvement, edit the brief content surgically — change the specific section, headline, layout type, or CTA referenced in the recommendation
3. Re-validate structural integrity (check YAML frontmatter is valid, section counts are consistent, no broken references)
4. Re-launch the assessor (round 2)
5. If round 2 accepts or scores 70+ with no CRITICAL issues: write the improved brief
6. If round 2 still has issues: present remaining issues to user, write brief with .review.json noting unresolved items

On revise (auto_improve=false): Report the findings and let the user decide. Offer:

• "Would you like me to apply the improvements automatically?"
• "Would you like to edit the brief manually and re-run the review?"

On reject: Surface to user via AskUserQuestion. Rejection means fundamental issues that need human judgment — the skill should not auto-fix rejections.

Step 6: Write Review Artifact

Write the review verdict JSON to {brief_stem}.review.json in the same directory as the brief.

If improvements were applied, also note:

{
  "improvements_applied": 3,
  "improvements_skipped": 1,
  "rounds_completed": 2,
  "final_verdict": "accept",
  "final_score": 87
}

Integration with Story-to-X Skills

This skill can be invoked standalone, but the story-to-X skills also integrate the brief-review-assessor agent directly into their workflow (between validation and write steps). When invoked from a story-to-X skill, the review is gated by the stakeholder_review parameter and follows the same assess → improve → re-assess loop.

The standalone skill exists for:

• Reviewing briefs after manual edits
• Reviewing briefs produced in earlier sessions
• Reviewing briefs from other sources
• Running a second review after rendering feedback suggests brief-level issues