5 ms·

Every time that Sonnet is acting like it has brain damage (which is once or twice a day), I switch to Opus and it seems to sort things out pretty fast. This is

Every time that Sonnet is acting like it has brain damage (which is once or twice a day), I switch to Opus and it seems to sort things out pretty fast. This is unscientific anicdata though, and it could just be that switching models (any model) would have worked.

HarHarVeryFunny 1y ago
Maybe context rot? If model's output seems to be getting worse or in a rut, then try just clearing context / starting a new session.
- adastra22 1y ago
  Switching models with the same context, in this case.
anonzzzies 1y ago
Exactly that.
j45 1y ago
They both seem to behave differently depending on how loaded the system seems to be.
- api 1y ago
  I have suspected for a long time that hosted models load shed by diverting some requests to lesser models or running more quantized versions under high load.
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
  - parineum 1y ago
    I think OpenRouter saves tokens by summarizing queries through another model, IIRC.
monatron 1y ago
This is a great use case for sub-agents IMO. By default, sub-agents use sonnet. You can have opus orchestrate the various agents and get (close to) the best of both worlds.
- adastra22 1y ago
  Is there a way to get persistent sub-agents? I'd love to have a bunch of YAML files in my repository, one for each sub-agent, and have those automatically used across all Claude Code instances I have on multiple machines (I dev on laptop and desktop), or across the team.
  - mwigdahl 1y ago
    Yep: https://docs.anthropic.com/en/docs/claude-code/sub-agents https://docs.anthropic.com/en/docs/claude-code/sub-agents
    - adastra22 1y ago
      Thanks!
  - theshrike79 1y ago
    In my experience the best use for subagents is saving context. Example: you need to review some code to see if it has proper test coverage. If you use the "main" context, it'll waste tokens on reading the codebase and running tests to see coverage results. But if you launch an agent (a subprocess pretty much), it can use a "disposable" context to do that and only return with the relevant data - which bits of the code need more tests. Now you can either use the main context to implement the tests or if you're feeling really fancy launch another sub-agent to do it.
- rapind 1y ago
  In this case I don't think the controller needs to be the smartest model. I use sonnet as the main driver and pass the heavy thinking (via zen mcp) onto Gemini pro for example, but I could use openai or opus or all of them via OpenRouter. Subagents seem pretty similar to using zen mcp w/ OpenRouter but maybe better or at least more turnkey? I'll be checking them out.
gpm 1y ago
This seems like a case of reversion to the mean. When one model is performing below average, changing anything (like switching to another model) is likely to improve it by random chance...
- keeeba 1y ago
  Anthropic say Opus is better, benchmarks & evals say Opus is better, Opus has more parameters and parameters determine how much a NN can learn. Maybe Opus just is better
  - deleted 1y ago
    [deleted]
  - 8n4vidtmkvmk 1y ago
    Even if it's better on average, doesn't mean it's better for every possible query
aghilmort 1y ago
switching models great best practice whether get stuck or not can look at primal check the mean or dual get out of local minima in all cases, model, tokenizer, etc is just enough different that will generally pay off in spaces quickly

HarHarVeryFunny 1y ago

Maybe context rot? If model's output seems to be getting worse or in a rut, then try just clearing context / starting a new session.

adastra22 1y ago
Switching models with the same context, in this case.

anonzzzies 1y ago

Exactly that.

j45 1y ago

They both seem to behave differently depending on how loaded the system seems to be.

api 1y ago
I have suspected for a long time that hosted models load shed by diverting some requests to lesser models or running more quantized versions under high load.
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
- parineum 1y ago
  I think OpenRouter saves tokens by summarizing queries through another model, IIRC.

monatron 1y ago

This is a great use case for sub-agents IMO. By default, sub-agents use sonnet. You can have opus orchestrate the various agents and get (close to) the best of both worlds.

adastra22 1y ago
Is there a way to get persistent sub-agents? I'd love to have a bunch of YAML files in my repository, one for each sub-agent, and have those automatically used across all Claude Code instances I have on multiple machines (I dev on laptop and desktop), or across the team.
- mwigdahl 1y ago
  Yep: https://docs.anthropic.com/en/docs/claude-code/sub-agents https://docs.anthropic.com/en/docs/claude-code/sub-agents
  - adastra22 1y ago
    Thanks!
- theshrike79 1y ago
  In my experience the best use for subagents is saving context. Example: you need to review some code to see if it has proper test coverage. If you use the "main" context, it'll waste tokens on reading the codebase and running tests to see coverage results. But if you launch an agent (a subprocess pretty much), it can use a "disposable" context to do that and only return with the relevant data - which bits of the code need more tests. Now you can either use the main context to implement the tests or if you're feeling really fancy launch another sub-agent to do it.
rapind 1y ago
In this case I don't think the controller needs to be the smartest model. I use sonnet as the main driver and pass the heavy thinking (via zen mcp) onto Gemini pro for example, but I could use openai or opus or all of them via OpenRouter. Subagents seem pretty similar to using zen mcp w/ OpenRouter but maybe better or at least more turnkey? I'll be checking them out.

gpm 1y ago

This seems like a case of reversion to the mean. When one model is performing below average, changing anything (like switching to another model) is likely to improve it by random chance...

keeeba 1y ago
Anthropic say Opus is better, benchmarks & evals say Opus is better, Opus has more parameters and parameters determine how much a NN can learn. Maybe Opus just is better
- deleted 1y ago
  [deleted]
- 8n4vidtmkvmk 1y ago
  Even if it's better on average, doesn't mean it's better for every possible query

aghilmort 1y ago

switching models great best practice whether get stuck or not can look at primal check the mean or dual get out of local minima in all cases, model, tokenizer, etc is just enough different that will generally pay off in spaces quickly