Writer-Critic Iterative Loop Construction
Wire a maker agent and a checker agent into a loop with a clear rubric and a hard round limit, so quality climbs through bounded review instead of a single shot.
Description
Build a loop with two agents. One agent produces something, such as code, a plan, a summary, or a draft. A separate agent checks it against a clear pass/fail rubric. They go back and forth until the checker passes or you hit a set number of rounds. This is how you build the generator-critic-separation pattern. It says how to wire the pair together, what the rubric has to contain, and how to cap the loop so it cannot run forever.
When to apply
Use this when the output has checkable quality. For example, code that must pass tests, a plan that must meet named constraints, or a summary that must cover set points. And use it when one shot is not good enough. Apply it when you can actually write the rubric down. Don't apply it when 'good' is purely a matter of taste and the rubric boils down to 'the user likes it'. At that point you need a person in the loop, not a checker agent. One exception: even taste-based tasks can use a checker if you can spell out what to avoid.
What it involves
- Author the rubric the critic will apply
- Build the generator agent
- Build the critic agent with role separation
- Wire the bounded loop
- Calibrate the rubric against ground truth
- Instrument failure modes
Open the full interactive page →
Diagram, neighbourhood map, code examples, related patterns and full provenance.