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AGENTS.md

Instructions for AI coding agents working in this Skyrim modding environment.

Read CLAUDE.md first — it is the full project instruction set, and it is agent-neutral apart from the parts noted below. It contains the configured paths for this install, the tool inventory and how to invoke each one, the ESP-editing workflows, and the core working principles. KNOWLEDGEBASE.md is the reference for engine quirks and version differences; consult it before making changes rather than after something breaks.

This file exists so agents that look for AGENTS.md by convention find their way in. It deliberately does not duplicate CLAUDE.md, so the two cannot drift apart.

What is portable, and what is not

Portable to any agent — this is most of the toolkit by volume:

  • KNOWLEDGEBASE.md — engine behaviour, VR/SE/AE differences, tool gotchas. Plain reference.
  • CLAUDE.md — paths, tool usage, workflows, principles.
  • Everything under tools/, examples/, and scripts/ — plain bash, Node, and Python. No agent runtime is involved; they work from any shell.

Claude Code specific — you do not get these:

  • .claude/settings.json and .claude/hooks/ — the safety layer. These hooks are what block direct writes to ESP/ESM/BSA files, require confirmation before editing anything in the game or config directories, and auto-back-up every file before it is modified, with an audit trail.
  • .claude/skills/ — packaged workflows.

Read that second list carefully. On another agent the guardrails are simply absent. Nothing will stop a bad rm, a direct binary write into a plugin, or an unreviewed edit to a live INI. The knowledge and the tools carry over; the seatbelts do not.

If you are not running under Claude Code, compensate deliberately:

  1. Back up before you touch anything. Copy the file first — the toolkit's own convention is .claude/backups/<descriptive-name>/. Assume nothing is doing this for you.
  2. Never write directly to .esp / .esm / .esl / .bsa / .ba2. Use Spriggit (serialize to YAML, edit the YAML, deserialize) or xelib. A hand-edited plugin binary is a corrupted plugin.
  3. Show the user the change before applying it, especially for INIs, load order files, and anything under the game directory. The hooks normally force this pause; without them it is on you.
  4. Snapshot .psc sources before experimenting. They are not covered by any automatic backup even under Claude Code, and reconstructing a working script from memory is miserable.

Ground rules that apply regardless of agent

  • State a confidence level before proposing a change, and investigate until it is high. Skyrim is full of undocumented quirks and version differences; things frequently do not work the way they read.
  • Never assume Skyrim SE behaviour equals Skyrim VR behaviour. Verify per feature.
  • Use the engine's own mechanisms before writing a Papyrus workaround, and model any new mechanic on how vanilla Skyrim does the closest equivalent.
  • Consult KNOWLEDGEBASE.md before acting, and add what you learn back into it afterwards.