paydirt

Paydirt

A multi-agent orchestrator that coordinates Claude instances to complete complex software tasks. Paydirt models who does what (the Town), while Goldflow handles how work flows (the Engine).

Why Paydirt?

Problem: Multi-agent systems often conflate roles with execution. You end up with "agents" that are really just pipeline stages dressed in personas.

Insight: Humans reason about work through roles and ownership. Machines execute through pipelines and verification. Mixing these creates confusion.

Solution: Paydirt separates the semantic layer (Town) from the execution layer (Engine). You think in claims and prospects. The system executes through pipelines and gates.

Architecture: Town and Engine

Paydirt (The Town)

The semantic layer where humans reason about work.

Concept	Description
Claim	A piece of work to be done (issue, feature, bug)
Caravan	A group of prospects working toward a claim
Prospect	A Claude instance with a specific role
Tunnel	Context file that persists across sessions
Ledger	bd-backed issue tracker for state

Goldflow (The Engine)

The execution layer that turns inputs into outputs.

Concept	Description
Source	Fetches work (issues, specs, prompts)
Processor	Transforms input (code generation, refactoring)
Verifier	Validates output (tests, lint, review)
Pipeline	Connects stages with retry and routing
Sink	Produces artifacts (PRs, commits, docs)

Goldflow knows nothing about prospects or caravans. It executes pipelines. Paydirt assigns prospects to drive those pipelines.

Quickstart

# Install
deno install --allow-all --name pd paydirt.ts

# Stake a claim (start work)
pd stake "Implement user authentication"

# Survey current caravans
pd survey

# Continue existing work
pd continue

Core Concepts

Prospects (Roles)

Each prospect has a specific responsibility within a caravan:

Role	Responsibility
camp-boss	Strategic oversight, dashboard interface
trail-boss	Caravan coordination, user interaction
surveyor	Design and planning via brainstorming
shift-boss	Task breakdown from designs
miner	Implementation (TDD-focused)
assayer	Code review
canary	Testing and verification
smelter	Code quality and refinement
claim-agent	Issue management
scout	Research and exploration

Caravans (Work Groups)

A caravan coordinates multiple prospects toward completing a claim:

┌─────────────────────────────────────────┐
│              CARAVAN                    │
│  ┌───────────┐  ┌───────────┐          │
│  │trail-boss │──│ surveyor  │          │
│  └───────────┘  └───────────┘          │
│        │              │                 │
│  ┌───────────┐  ┌───────────┐          │
│  │shift-boss │──│   miner   │──► Work  │
│  └───────────┘  └───────────┘          │
│                       │                 │
│               ┌───────────┐            │
│               │  assayer  │──► Review  │
│               └───────────┘            │
└─────────────────────────────────────────┘

Tunnels (Context Persistence)

Tunnels preserve context across sessions and respawns. When a prospect exhausts its context window, the tunnel maintains continuity.

Ledger (State Tracking)

Paydirt uses bd (beads) for persistent state:

bd ready              # Find available work
bd show <id>          # View claim details
bd update <id> --status in_progress
bd close <id>         # Complete claim
bd sync               # Sync with git

Boomtown Dashboard

Boomtown is the TUI dashboard for managing Paydirt caravans, built with mprocs.

Launch Dashboard

# Using compiled binary
./paydirt boomtown

# Or using deno directly
deno run --allow-all paydirt.ts boomtown

# Short form
pd boomtown
pd -b

Dashboard Features

Pane	Description
Control Room	Real-time status of all caravans
Camp Boss	Interactive Claude session for commands
Caravan Panes	Direct access to running caravan tmux
Welcome	Shows available commands when no caravans

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