Spawn N parallel candidates at the same task, pick a base, graft the strongest parts of the losers into it. Use for /arena, 'arena this', 'throw it in the arena', or when one attempt at a non-trivial artifact would lock in the wrong shape.
Collected from public GitHub. Every version is saved exactly as it was and never changes. Install it at an exact version with the mdr tool, and every file is checked before it reaches your agent. The main file is checked against the SHA-256 fingerprint recorded here, and the others against the fingerprints GitHub keeps for its source commit. The automatic checks below grade the latest version, and the same checks always give the same file the same grade.
What the file says
# Arena
Fan out N parallel attempts at the same task. Read every candidate end to end. Pick the strongest as the base. Graft the best ideas from the others into it. Verify the synthesized result.
## Start
Open a todolist with one entry per phase before launching anything. The arena runs autonomously and the list keeps phases from silently disappearing.
1. Frame
2. Fan out
3. Cross-judge
4. Pick
5. Graft
6. Verify
## Phase A: Frame
The N candidates will receive the same prompt, so the prompt is the contract. Get it right before spawning anything.
1. State the artifact each candidate is producing.
2. Derive the rubric. State what success looks like for *this* task, then turn it into 3-6 concrete gradeable criteria. Concrete: `Adds a --dry-run flag that skips writes`. Vague: `code is correct`. The rubric is the picker's tool in Phase D; candidates only see the task.
3. Pick the runners. Use the parent model by default. When the host supports model selection, prefer different available model families for judgment-heavy work. Reusing the parent model is fine when generation breadth matters more than model diversity.
…
The line at the top of this page pins the label git:20260827.04830a9, which is what most people want. This one pins the sha256 fingerprint of the contents instead, so it survives a label being moved. Either way the exact version is written to mdr.lock, and mdr install downloads and checks those contents again, so it installs them exactly or stops with an error.
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/artifacts/art_7xrnlcn4rkuxsjzi
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/resolve?ref=painhardcore/pstack/arena
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/blob/307cc49502103d9e498adffe003f58d8a15a7ab0301c116aa18e018c7a97d4d7
Your AI assistant does the legwork. You hear about the deals worth your word. Hand yours the standing instructions at modelranch.com and it joins the network that reads files like this one.
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