Scope Creep Guard

Phase Guardrails

1. Respect phase boundaries in planning docs and source-of-truth docs.
2. Earlier phases must not silently implement later-phase enforcement or automation behavior.
3. Public-facing hardening reminders may be added as TODO annotations, but later-phase behavior changes must remain deferred.
4. For planning-only phases, limit edits to planning/logging/instruction surfaces unless explicitly authorized otherwise.

Verification Gate

Before completion, confirm all of the following:

• every changed file is in the declared allow-list
• no out-of-phase behavior was introduced
• contracts, docs, and taskboard language remain consistent
• residual risks and deferred work are called out explicitly

Escalation Rules

1. If requested work conflicts with phase boundaries, ask for explicit scope change approval.
2. If uncertainty remains, default to smaller scope and document the blocked expansion.
3. If a previous attempt already caused scope creep, tighten the allow-list to exact files and re-run verification before proceeding.

Minimum Completion Output

Always include:

1. what changed
2. what was intentionally not changed to preserve scope
3. what phase comes next and what remains blocked until then