MCP gives an agent tools. A loadout gives those tools judgment — what to ask before acting, how to sequence the work, what to avoid, when to stop for human approval, and what “done” actually means. One markdown file. Any MCP client.
A Loadout doesn’t just act. It asks first.
Connect an agent to a powerful MCP and it can do a thousand things — including a hundred you'd never want. The missing layer isn't capability. It's judgment.
40 tools, zero context. The agent guesses your audience, invents your offer, sends before you've seen anything, and calls it done because it stopped.
Interviews you first. Works the sequence. Refuses what the file forbids. Slams to a stop at the approval gate. Proves it's done with a verifiable check.
Everything else in the format bends. These don't.
The file opens with a config interview — and the agent only asks what it can't discover from the file, the conversation, its memory, or the account itself. In a chat, these are questions; in a dashboard, the same lines render as a form. One artifact, two front-ends.
Before anything irreversible — a send, a post, an automation — the workflow stops and a human approves. A loadout without a gate is a script, not a loadout.
“Done means” must be checkable — name the read tool that proves the work happened. No vibes-based completion.
Seven parts, in order. Full section reference in the spec README.
# <Name> — Loadout ```yaml loadout: <slug> # required — stable id mcp: <server url> # required — the MCP this file drives tier: <access tier> # optional cadence: weekly # optional — rhythm if run as a recurring loop ``` **The job:** one paragraph. The outcome, in the operator's language. ## Before you run — ask the user Only ask what you don't already know. Check the Config, the conversation, memory, and the account first. Confirm inferences in one line. 1. **Who is this for?** (hint) 2. **What's the asset?** (name + URL) ## Config ```yaml audience: # keys become stable form-field ids asset: ``` ## Steps ### 1. See — call `a_real_tool`, study the signal ### 2. Decide — rank, filter, dedupe against history ### 3. STOP — approval gate ⛔ Present everything. Nothing irreversible happens past here without a human. ### 4. Act — only what was approved · ### 5. Close the loop for next run ## Never - The hard boundaries. No fabrication. No acting without approval. ## Done means - Verifiable — name the read tool that proves it (`list_actions`, …)
Not a hypothetical — this file runs against a production MCP. It interviews for config, studies live market signal, learns the account's voice from its own post history, drafts with the capture automation attached, and stops at the gate for approval.
Connect the MCP named in the file's header, then paste the whole file into your agent with this:
Works in Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor, or any MCP client. Dashboard runtimes render the same file as a form + checklist + approval queue — Apex by LeadShark is the reference runtime the format was proven against.
Paste a loadout.md — checked against the v0.1 spec, entirely in your browser. Nothing leaves this page.