Skills

Retornatus does not ship a giant library of preloaded skills that rot.

When a Change needs specialization, you create one Skill for that need, research current sources, then activate under a gate.

Lifecycle

skill need? → create → research (web/docs) → fill RESEARCH + PROCEDURE
           → gate skill-research → activate → export? → evolve from Learning

retornatus skill need --action C-0001/A-001
retornatus skill create --need "Stripe webhook signatures (current API)" --action C-0001/A-001
retornatus inspect S-0001
# agent fills .retornatus/adaptation/skills/S-0001/SKILL.md
retornatus gate skill-research S-0001
retornatus skill activate S-0001
retornatus skill export S-0001
retornatus skill evolve S-0001 --note "Added timestamp tolerance"

Storage vs projection

Location	Role
`.retornatus/adaptation/skills/S-xxxx/SKILL.md`	Canonical Skill
`.cursor/skills/…` (or host equivalent)	Native projection via `export` / hub

Subagents should consume the same snapshot — do not rewrite Skill mid-execution.

Complexity-sensitive need

skill need skips ceremony for trivial Actions (e.g. typo fixes) and flags specialization when complexity or novelty warrants it.

Bypass

retornatus skill activate S-0001 --force --reason "…"

Records Bypass + Decision. Prefer research; bypass is governed exception, not the default path.

See also: hub skill text under src/retornatus/infrastructure/environment/hub/SKILL.md (installed by integrate).

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