How one developer tunes Codex subagents with a 5-role hierarchy to cut token burn

Unixwzrd · reddit · 2026-10-19

Responding to complaints about Codex burning through usage allocations, the author shares how they run parallel projects by matching model strength and reasoning effort to each role instead of throwing more agents at problems:

Main thread: stronger model, high reasoning effort — owns architecture, planning, final decisions
Explorer: lightweight model, low effort — file discovery, dependency mapping
Implementer: stronger model, medium effort — bounded changes with explicit acceptance criteria
Reviewer: stronger model, high effort — independent correctness and regression review
Diagnostician: stronger model, high effort — investigates failures before fixes

Key takeaways:

AGENTS.md defines delegation rules; not every task deserves a subagent — five agents answering what one search resolves is counterproductive
Suitable coding tasks are delegated via shell to Cursor Agent CLI (already subscribed), with Codex reviewing changes and running tests to spread usage across paid tools
The bigger lesson: planning and steering beat clever agent configs — define objectives, constraints, and acceptance criteria up front and catch architectural drift early

The full write-up includes TOML configs, agent files, AGENTS.md rules, and a proposed methodology for measuring results. The author admits no controlled benchmark yet and claims no magic token-savings percentage.

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How one developer tunes Codex subagents with a 5-role hierarchy to cut token burn

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