/gaia-edit-prd

What it does

/gaia-edit-prd makes targeted edits to an existing PRD while preserving unchanged content. After applying edits, it runs an adversarial review (when triggered) and assesses cascade impact on downstream artifacts -- architecture, epics, stories, and test plans.

When to use it

• You need to update requirements in the PRD after a change request, new discovery, or review feedback.
• You want GAIA to detect which downstream artifacts (architecture, epics, test plan) need updating as a result.

Prerequisites

• A PRD must exist at .gaia/artifacts/planning-artifacts/prd.md. If not, run /gaia-create-prd first.

Orchestration mode

When /gaia-edit-prd starts in subagent mode (Mode A -- the default), the framework emits a one-shot warning to your conversation. The warning text:

────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
GAIA orchestration: running in subagent mode (Mode A)

The skill you're invoking belongs to a class (heavy-procedural or
conversational) whose output benefits from cross-step context. Mode A
dispatches each sub-agent in its own forked context, so context may
be lossy between steps — sub-agents return summaries, not full reasoning.

For the full-fidelity experience, enable Mode B (Agent Teams):
  1. Set CLAUDE_CODE_EXPERIMENTAL_AGENT_TEAMS=1 in your environment.
  2. Add orchestration.mode: team to .gaia/config/project-config.yaml.

Mode B uses persistent teammates that preserve in-conversation state
across dispatches.

This warning is shown once per session.
────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────

Why Mode B is better for this command

The /gaia-edit-prd skill declares orchestration_class: heavy-procedural in its SKILL.md frontmatter. Heavy-procedural skills produce output that benefits from cross-step context -- under Mode A every sub-agent dispatch runs in its own forked context and can only return a summary back to the orchestrator, losing the full reasoning trace of every prior step. Mode B uses persistent teammates that retain in-conversation state across dispatches, so each agent's contribution can build on what was said before instead of receiving only a summary.

How to enable Mode B

Both steps are required. If either is missing, the framework falls back silently to Mode A and the warning fires again on the next session.

Step 1 -- set the environment variable:

export CLAUDE_CODE_EXPERIMENTAL_AGENT_TEAMS=1

Add this to your shell rc file to persist across sessions, or set it in Claude Code's settings.json.

Step 2 -- add the YAML block to .gaia/config/project-config.yaml:

orchestration:
  mode: team

One-shot semantics

The warning is emitted once per Claude Code session. A marker file at _memory/checkpoints/orchestration-warning-shown.<session-id> suppresses the warning for the rest of the session. Starting a new session re-emits the warning once.

How to invoke

/gaia-edit-prd

What it does step by step

1. Load PRD Reads the current PRD and displays a structure summary: sections, requirement count, last version.
2. Identify changes Asks what sections need to change, why, and whether it is linked to a change request.
3. Apply edits Makes the requested changes surgically -- unchanged sections are preserved exactly. Validates cross-references remain valid.
4. Save and version Writes the updated PRD with a version note documenting what changed and why.
5. Adversarial review If the change type triggers it, runs an adversarial review and incorporates findings.
6. Cascade assessment Compares PRD changes against the architecture scope and classifies cascade impact: NONE, MINOR, or SIGNIFICANT. Recommends the appropriate next command.

Inputs

Outputs

Example session

> /gaia-edit-prd

Current PRD: 22 FRs, 8 NFRs, version 1.0 (2026-05-01)

What sections need to change?
> Add a new API rate limiting requirement (NFR)

Why?
> Security review identified missing rate limiting

Applying edits...
  Added: NFR-009 (API rate limiting: 100 req/min per user)
  Version note: v1.1 -- Added NFR-009 rate limiting per security review

Adversarial review: not triggered (low-risk enhancement).

Cascade assessment:
  Impact: MINOR
  Architecture needs: section update for rate-limiting middleware
  Recommended: /gaia-edit-arch to update the API middleware section

What to run next

• /gaia-edit-arch -- if cascade assessment found architecture impact.
• /gaia-add-stories -- if new requirements need stories.

Troubleshooting

"No PRD found"

Run /gaia-create-prd first.

I keep seeing the GAIA orchestration warning every time I start this command

The warning is shown once per session, so if it fires again that's a new session -- not a per-skill repeat. If you want to silence it entirely, enable Mode B (full-fidelity orchestration via Agent Teams). Both of these conditions must be true:

• echo $CLAUDE_CODE_EXPERIMENTAL_AGENT_TEAMS returns 1 (not empty)
• .gaia/config/project-config.yaml contains:

  orchestration:
    mode: team

If either is missing the framework silently uses Mode A and re-emits the warning each session.

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