writing-plans
An agent skill by obra, from obra/superpowers. Tags: design, developer-tools, documents.
What it does
Use when you have a spec or requirements for a multi-step task, before touching code
Install
With the skills CLI, which installs into Claude Code, Codex, Cursor and other agents:
npx skills add obra/superpowers --skill writing-plansOr copy the skill folder into Claude Code's skills directory by hand (~/.claude/skills for every project, or .claude/skills inside one):
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/obra/superpowers
cp -r superpowers/skills/writing-plans ~/.claude/skills/writing-plansSafety box score
Grade A, minimal risk: 4 of 100 risk points, rated 2026-10-17. The grade rates what the skill and its scripts can reach on the machine of whoever installs it, across eight categories from shell execution to secrets access. How the score works.
This skill is documentation-only: it tells an agent how to write implementation plans and save them as markdown under `docs/superpowers/plans/`. It does not ship code, run commands, access the network, or touch secrets; the main effect is constrained file creation inside the repository.
| Category | Level | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Code & shell execution | 0 (none) | No scripts or code runners are included; the only shipped file is `SKILL.md` with planning instructions. |
| Network access | 0 (none) | The skill does not instruct downloading, uploading, or sending data to remote hosts. |
| Filesystem reach | 1 (low) | It writes plan documents to `docs/superpowers/plans/YYYY-MM-DD-<feature-name>.md`, but the scope is confined to the repository tree. |
| Secrets & credentials | 0 (none) | It does not ask for API keys, passwords, `.env` files, or other credentials. |
| Privilege & persistence | 0 (none) | There is no sudo, service installation, shell startup modification, or other privilege-changing behavior. |
| Instruction hijack surface | 0 (none) | The instructions direct planning and review behavior, but do not tell the agent to ignore rules, skip confirmations, or follow external instructions. |
| Irreversible actions | 0 (none) | It produces a plan and asks for human review; it does not itself deploy, publish, delete, pay, or message anyone. |
| Transparency | 0 (none) | The skill is plain text markdown only; there are no binaries, installers, or runtime-decoded payloads. |
Before installing
- Confirm you want plan documents created under `docs/superpowers/plans/`.
- Check whether your workflow expects the plan to reference a separate spec file path.
- If you use an isolated worktree, verify the worktree was created by `superpowers:using-git-worktrees` as the skill assumes.
Rated 2026-10-17 by an automated review of 1 file from the skill's repository.
Source
- Repository
- obra/superpowers (all skills from this repository)
- Path
- skills/writing-plans/SKILL.md
- Branch
- main
- Updated
- 2026-09-19
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