Context budget: tool and policy payload grows unbounded with plugins and MCP servers

[JustAGhosT]

Problem

The tool surface in a fully-configured workspace is enormous:

• 27+ Serena tools
• 50+ cloud MCP tools (Amplitude, Canva, Gmail, Calendar, Intercom, Invideo, Linear x2, Notion, Sentry, Figma)
• 30+ plugin-provided skills
• Built-in Claude Code tools
• Each tool includes its JSON schema + usage instructions in the system prompt

Even with deferred tool loading, the MCP server instructions (Pinecone usage guide, Microsoft Docs workflow, Figma design-to-code workflow, Amplitude context guide) are injected into every session regardless of whether those tools are called.

Proposed Solutions

1. Per-project MCP allowlist — retort should support a .retort/mcp-scope.yaml that declares which MCP servers are relevant. Others are suppressed at the project level.
2. Tool budget audit command — retort audit tools should count the token cost of all tool definitions + MCP instructions and flag the top offenders.
3. MCP instruction deferral — advocate upstream (Claude Code) for deferring MCP server instructions alongside tool schemas, not just the schemas.
4. Document the disable pattern — retort docs should cover how to disable unused MCP servers and plugins at the project level via settings.json overrides.

Current State (mystira-workspace)

Disabled 16 plugins at project level. Cloud MCP servers (Amplitude, Canva, Gmail, etc.) require claude.ai account disconnection — can't be controlled locally.

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