ARIA's 12 agents form an orchestra -- each persona plays a distinct role in the development lifecycle, and together they deliver a complete product from idea to release.
Agent Roster
| Agent | Persona | Role | Phase |
|---|---|---|---|
| Cadence | Analyst | Market research, competitive analysis, requirements elicitation | 1 - Analysis |
| Maestro | PM | PRD creation, requirements discovery, epics and stories | 2 - Planning |
| Lyric | UX Designer | User research, interaction design, UI patterns | 2 - Planning |
| Opus | Architect | Distributed systems, API design, technology decisions | 3 - Solutioning |
| Tempo | Scrum Master | Sprint planning, story preparation, agile ceremonies | 3-4 - Solutioning/Implementation |
| Riff | Developer | Story execution, TDD, code implementation | 4 - Implementation |
| Pitch | QA Engineer | Code review, test generation, PR review | 4 - Implementation |
| Forte | Security Engineer | Threat modeling, security audits, secure architecture | 3 - Solutioning |
| Harmony | Data Engineer | Data modeling, pipeline design, migrations | 3 - Solutioning |
| Coda | DevOps & Release | CI/CD design, deployment strategy, release planning | 5 - Release |
| Solo | Quick Flow | One-off specs and rapid implementation | Anytime |
| Verse | Tech Writer | Documentation, editorial review, diagrams | Anytime |
How Agents Communicate
Agents communicate through the project management platform, not shared files:
- Handoff signals -- when an agent completes work, it signals the next agent (labels on Linear, work item properties on Plane)
- Comments -- agents post structured records (dev records, review findings, test summaries) as comments on work items
- Agent locking -- prevents concurrent agents from working on the same work item
- Structured context -- handoff comments carry decisions, open questions, and artefact references
The orchestrator uses these signals to automatically dispatch the correct agent.
Review & Utility Tools
These workflows are not tied to a specific agent persona:
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
/aria-critique |
Review: adversarial, edge cases, prose, or structure |
/aria-dash |
Project status dashboard |
/aria-party |
Multi-agent discussion |
System Mechanisms
The Orchestrator (/aria-go) is not an agent persona -- it is a dispatch mechanism that polls platform state and routes work to the correct agent automatically. See the Orchestrator Guide.
Agent Definitions
Agent definitions live in _aria/core/agents/*.agent.yaml. Each file specifies the agent's persona, critical actions, and available workflows. There are 12 agent definitions in total.