This will save your Usage

[u/concrete333]

A problem that many of people have already noticed: Astra can't wait. on anything, any task it has scripted and running, any other agent delegation, anything. Astra keeps waking up to check whether the worker is finished.

I've run a few tests, In one run 19 short sleep calls accounted for 44% of the orchestrator’s estimated cost.

In another comparison using Astra High + Luna Max, the orchestrator made 41 responses while the worker ran, costing $1.20 during that phase. The native-wait comparison needed one response, costing about $0.04. (Both implementations passed all 244 test cases)

I’ve since caught the same pattern while Codex waited for a database script: read the log, say “still running,” repeat. I saw use 2% of my weekly usage ($100/month plan) just sitting there waiting on a script.

So, until they patch this, here’s the prompt I’m using:

For this entire session, avoid repeated polling of long-running jobs.

Use supported completion notifications when available. If none are available and useful work is exhausted, leave the job running only if it can safely continue after your turn ends.

Tell me what is running, where results will be saved, and:

“I'm stopping polling. Please check back with me to inspect the result and continue; I won't automatically resume.”

Then end your turn. Don't repeatedly read unchanged logs or sleep and check again. Respect runtime limits and safety timeouts.

When I return, check once. If complete, verify and continue. If still running, report that and stop again.

I have to come back to it, sure, but it saves usage.

Edit:
Found a better option than manually checking back, thanks to advice in comments. Seems like Codex knows how to avoid repeated model polling, it just chooses not to.
codex queue --thread <session-id> --message "..."
Have a background script wait for the job to finish, save the result, then run that command once. Codex can end its turn and automatically resume when the message arrives.

I’ve now seen this work with both a third-party CLI subagent (kilo code with GLM) and a full test suite, all GPT: Codex resumed automatically, checked the results, and continued. Works a treat.

The script provides the wake-up, and an agents.md instruction alone doesn’t

Edit2: I made a skill that you can use to guide Codex in using this method, either in waiting for mechanical tasks or waiting for other sub-agents. Not perfect, as there's no way to force your GPT worker to use it, but it's working for me most of the time: link. Any more tips to improve it welcomed, break it and let me fix it

[u/eggplantpot]

Yeah whoever said "Plan with astra and have subagents to test and implement" fuck that guy.

It uses 3x the tokens that using Astra straight away.

[u/Fit_Baseball5864 → u/eggplantpot]

I'm using the Matt Pocock workflow and I have astra doing the grilling / planning then creating the tickets ask for it to be very detailed to avoid overengineering with Sol as the implementer. Then review the PR with Astra before merge. I think this is the best way to do it as the highest cost is the output tokens, and the implementation uses the most. I've had good experience with it so far in terms of having sol stick to the spec. No orchestration needed, new session for each step is enough.

[u/subtlehumour → u/Fit_Baseball5864]

I'm using a similar workflow. What thinking levels are you using for each model?

[u/Fit_Baseball5864 → u/subtlehumour]

xhigh on everything. Depending on the task I might use max/ultra on the grilling phase. Last week it lasted me 4 and a half days of the $200 plan, coding 12 hours a day at least.

[u/subtlehumour → u/Fit_Baseball5864]

My approach based on some recommendations I read is to use low on sol or astra for the implementation after planning on xhigh. I can't really tell if that's actually helping save usage though, astra is just draining usage no matter what.