refactor(plugins): delete the 10 external-tool check and check-prerequisites skills (*:check wave 3)

.changes/animation/refactor-12488-delete-external-tool-check-skills-841061ea.md

@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+---
+bump: major
+---
+
+### Removed
+
+- The `check-prerequisites` skill is gone. To check this plugin's prerequisites, run `node "<plugin root>/lib/prerequisites.mjs" check "<plugin root>"`.

.changes/context7/refactor-12488-delete-external-tool-check-skills-dfe10f98.md

@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+---
+bump: major
+---
+
+### Removed
+
+- The `check` skill is gone. To check this plugin's prerequisites, run `node "<plugin root>/lib/prerequisites.mjs" check "<plugin root>"`. `prerequisites.json` now declares `CONTEXT7_API_KEY` and the Context7 MCP server.

.changes/disk-hygiene/refactor-12488-delete-external-tool-check-skills-41fc5559.md

@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+---
+bump: major
+---
+
+### Removed
+
+- The `check` skill is gone. To check this plugin's prerequisites, run `node "<plugin root>/lib/prerequisites.mjs" check "<plugin root>"`. `/disk-hygiene:setup check` also covers the launcher registration and the interpreter ladder. `prerequisites.json` now declares Python, and the guard messages name the checker.

.changes/explainer-video/refactor-12488-delete-external-tool-check-skills-14b5d1f1.md

@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+---
+bump: major
+---
+
+### Removed
+
+- The `check` skill is gone. To check this plugin's prerequisites, run `python3 "<plugin root>/scripts/pydeps.py" check --data-dir "<plugin data>"`.

.changes/harness-ops/refactor-12488-delete-external-tool-check-skills-438b22ec.md

@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+---
+bump: patch
+---
+
+### Changed
+
+- The prerequisites skill's ranking probe no longer lists a deleted skill as a competitor.

.changes/instruction-placement/refactor-12488-delete-external-tool-check-skills-01292a90.md

@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+---
+bump: major
+---
+
+### Removed
+
+- The `check-prerequisites` skill is gone. To check this plugin's prerequisites, run `node "<plugin root>/lib/prerequisites.mjs" check "<plugin root>"`. The rule-glob gate `check` stays.

.changes/knowledge/refactor-12488-delete-external-tool-check-skills-1c721635.md

@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+---
+bump: major
+---
+
+### Removed
+
+- The `check` skill is gone. To check this plugin's prerequisites, run `node "<plugin root>/lib/prerequisites.mjs" check "<plugin root>"`.

.changes/playwright/refactor-12488-delete-external-tool-check-skills-c7685c36.md

@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+---
+bump: major
+---
+
+### Removed
+
+- The `check` skill is gone. To check this plugin's prerequisites, run `node "<plugin root>/lib/prerequisites.mjs" check "<plugin root>"`. `/playwright:setup check` also reports the browser and the artifact directory.

.changes/skill-quality/refactor-12488-delete-external-tool-check-skills-34865243.md

@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+---
+bump: major
+---
+
+### Removed
+
+- The `check-prerequisites` skill is gone. To check this plugin's prerequisites, run `node "<plugin root>/lib/prerequisites.mjs" check "<plugin root>"`. The skill gate `check` stays.

.changes/speech/refactor-12488-delete-external-tool-check-skills-7deecd99.md

@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+---
+bump: major
+---
+
+### Removed
+
+- The `check` skill is gone. To check this plugin's prerequisites, run `python3 "<plugin root>/scripts/check.py" --data-dir "<plugin data>"`. `/speech:setup check` is the same report.

.changes/toolchain/refactor-12488-delete-external-tool-check-skills-6d875025.md

@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+---
+bump: major
+---
+
+### Removed
+
+- The `check-prerequisites` skill is gone. To check this plugin's prerequisites, run `node "<plugin root>/lib/prerequisites.mjs" check "<plugin root>"`. The build and test skill `check` stays.

docs/catalog.md

@@ -138,13 +138,13 @@ plugin manifests and kept in sync by CI. Never hand-edit it; the category vocabu
 
 - [`pixel-art`](../plugins/pixel-art): Creates pixel art with no external tools: sprites (sprite), animation sprite sheets for RPG Maker MZ, Godot, PICO-8, or plain strips with Aseprite-style frame data and GIF previews (animate), tilesets and parallax (tileset), UI skins and bitmap fonts (ui), effect sheets (vfx), and animated scenes as one HTML file (scene). Specs are palette-locked; a humanoid kit and a Python stdlib renderer write PNG, GIF, and frame data with a render-review loop. Optional Aseprite adapter.
 - [`animation`](../plugins/animation): Hand-drawn-style 2D animation as code, rendered in headless Chromium by an ink brush engine. rotoscope copies a reference clip drawing by drawing: trace to vector paths, render, measure against the source (XOR, SSIM), and fit per-shot brush overrides. learn-style measures a clip into a style pack (ships woodcut-ink) and checks films against it. produce turns a brief into approved boards, a shot list, frames, and a delivered file. setup checks ffmpeg, Node, Chromium, and Python.
-- [`explainer-video`](../plugins/explainer-video): Short explainer videos made with ManimCE, narrated when the speech plugin is installed and silent otherwise. The produce skill plans the beats, writes one scene script whose scene changes follow the narration's word timings, renders at low quality first, muxes narration and captions with ffmpeg, and checks every render with ffprobe and a frame read-back. A SessionStart hook installs the hash-locked Python packages; the check skill reports readiness.
+- [`explainer-video`](../plugins/explainer-video): Short explainer videos made with ManimCE, narrated when the speech plugin is installed and silent otherwise. The produce skill plans the beats, writes one scene script whose scene changes follow the narration's word timings, renders at low quality first, muxes narration and captions with ffmpeg, and checks every render with ffprobe and a frame read-back. A SessionStart hook installs the hash-locked Python packages; scripts/pydeps.py check reports readiness.
 
 ## Audio
 
 - [`songwriting`](../plugins/songwriting): Songwriting craft companion: nine concern-scoped lyric-craft skills (workflow router, rhyme, object-writing, metaphor, meter-prosody, song-form, co-write, diagnose, practice) applying Pat Pattison's methods, with an object-writing agent that performs the sensory exercise itself and per-skill emission boundaries that route generation to the skill that owns it, plus Suno v5.5 prompt engineering (style prompts, tagged lyrics, genre templates, troubleshooting).
 - [`retro-audio`](../plugins/retro-audio): Renders retro sound effects and short chiptune loops to WAV with the Python standard library only: an sfxr-style parameter model and an MML subset with Game Boy and NES pulse duties and channel limits for Game Boy, NES, and PICO-8 (four channels, one noise part). Another plugin can play the WAV; this one does not read that plugin's files.
-- [`speech`](../plugins/speech): Text-to-speech narration. The narrate skill turns a script into narration.wav plus words.json, with a start and end time per word. The default backend runs Kokoro-82M locally. The optional elevenlabs backend sends the text to the third-party ElevenLabs API (ELEVENLABS_API_KEY or vault-exec) after showing the character count against your quota, caching repeats; an organization can forbid it. You install espeak-ng (GPL-3.0); a hook installs Python packages, setup the models, check reports gaps.
+- [`speech`](../plugins/speech): Text-to-speech narration. The narrate skill turns a script into narration.wav plus words.json, with a start and end time per word. The default backend runs Kokoro-82M locally. The optional elevenlabs backend sends the text to the third-party ElevenLabs API (ELEVENLABS_API_KEY or vault-exec) after showing the character count against your quota, caching repeats; an organization can forbid it. You install espeak-ng (GPL-3.0); a hook installs Python packages, setup the models, check.py reports gaps.
 
 ## Personal
 

docs/contracts/invocation-mode/README.md

@@ -106,10 +106,8 @@ documented budget.
    only the human knows when it fits.
 2. **(ii) Setup skills.** Per the plugin-philosophy setup contract ("Setup is explicit and
    repeatable"): `setup` skills are named `setup` and carry `disable-model-invocation: true`. The
-   class covers `setup` only. A read-only `check` skill beside it (`<plugin>:check`, which reads
-   and follows only setup's `check` section and installs nothing) is an ordinary `false`-default
-   skill, not an exception. The flag is per skill, so the split is the only way to keep `apply`
-   manual and `check` reachable by a hook's notice; the claim's verification record is in the
+   class covers `setup` only. The flag is per skill, so `apply` stays manual and a hook's notice names the
+   plugin's bundled checker, which is no skill; the claim's verification record is in the
    [setup contract](../../plugin-philosophy.md#setup-is-explicit-and-repeatable).
 3. **(iii) Maintainer-only skills.** Operate on this marketplace's working tree (vendored-content
    sync, drift checks); meaningless or harmful for consumers to reach via the model.

docs/contracts/prerequisites/README.md

@@ -68,7 +68,7 @@ Every entry carries the first seven fields; `check` is optional:
 | `detect` | How the checker finds it. The shape depends on `kind` (next table). |
 | `degrade` | What stops working without it, and what still works. The checker prints it. |
 | `install` | Hints keyed by package manager or `docs`. The checker prints them and never runs them. Key order is not a preference. |
-| `check` | Optional. A skill a person runs to re-check, such as `/<plugin>:check`. `check` mode and `report` print it; hook notices never do ([Hook notices](#hook-notices)). |
+| `check` | Optional. A skill a person runs to re-check, such as `/harness-ops:prerequisites`. `check` mode and `report` print it; hook notices never do ([Hook notices](#hook-notices)). |
 
 `need` and `for` together give the absence class. `required` for `plugin` means the plugin cannot
 work without it; hook plugins use that for `node`. `required` for `skill:x` means skill `x` stops
@@ -159,8 +159,8 @@ check "<root>"`, where `<root>` is the absolute plugin root. `check` mode is the
 `node-pkg` entry that only the plugin data directory holds reports `unverified` there.
 
 The node notice names `/harness-ops:prerequisites`, passed by harness-ops' row, because the notice
-speaks for the whole fleet. An entry's `check` may still name a per-plugin `check` or
-`check-prerequisites` skill until the wave that deletes it drops the field. A probe the checker
+speaks for the whole fleet. A plugin has no separate prerequisites skill: its bundled checker is the
+read-only entry point the model runs. A probe the checker
 cannot express stays a script in that plugin's `scripts/`: `check-hook-registration.sh` for hook
 registration, `check-mod-load.sh` for whether a mod can load. The plugin's `degrade` text and README
 name it, and it runs after the checker. Neither notice names `/<plugin>:setup`,
@@ -238,7 +238,7 @@ The fix is the declared one: the `install` hints, the repair line, or a `setup`
 an undeclared tool.
 
 Observed 2026-10-04: the speech plugin was enabled mid-session, so its install hook never
-ran; `/speech:check` printed commands only, and `espeak-ng` (sudo) and the Kokoro model download
+ran; the speech check printed commands only, and `espeak-ng` (sudo) and the Kokoro model download
 were left for the user to run by hand.
 
 ## The CI gate

docs/plugin-philosophy.md

@@ -625,13 +625,12 @@ flag fragmented across per-skill actions. Where distinct skills carry distinct r
 setup skill aggregates and reports it per skill.
 
 `disable-model-invocation` is a whole-skill flag, so `setup` cannot hide `apply` from Claude and
-leave `check` reachable. A plugin whose hook or probe names a read-only check therefore also ships
-a separate `<plugin>:check` skill with `disable-model-invocation: false`. It reads `setup` and
-follows only its `check` section, so `setup` stays the one account of what is checked, and it
-installs and writes nothing. `setup` keeps `true`, and `apply` stays manual. A hook or probe names
-`/<plugin>:check`, never `/<plugin>:setup check`, which the flag hides from Claude.
-`plugins/context7/skills/check/SKILL.md` is the shape to copy. Decision record: we set the flag
-per skill and split `check` into its own skill, because we found no per-action invocation flag.
+leave `check` reachable. A hook or probe that points at a read-only check therefore names the plugin's
+bundled checker, `node "<plugin root>/lib/prerequisites.mjs" check "<plugin root>"`, which Claude can run and which
+installs and writes nothing, or a read-only script in the plugin's `scripts/` for a probe the checker
+cannot express, never `/<plugin>:setup check`, which the flag hides from Claude. `setup` keeps
+`true`, and `apply` stays manual. Decision record: we set the flag per skill, because we found no
+per-action invocation flag.
 Pointer: for `disable-model-invocation`, see
 <https://code.claude.com/docs/en/skills#frontmatter-reference> and
 <https://code.claude.com/docs/en/skills#control-who-invokes-a-skill>. As of: 2026-09-29. Recheck