One bad step, N bad steps: how agent failures cascade

A single agent error rarely stays a single error. The bad output goes into the context, the next step reasons on top of it, and the mistake compounds down the trajectory — one wrong step becoming N wrong steps. This is the cascade, why it’s structurally different from a fleet-wide blast radius, and the three interruption points that stop a local mistake from eating the whole run.

July 14, 2026 · 7 min · 1470 words · Loop & Retry