Efficient Tokens & Effective Teams in Buzz
A **Block Engineering** benchmark post from **August 6, 2026**, signed by **Atish Patel**, about **Buzz** — the human + agent workspace launched on July 21 — asking a cost question: which agent team is **the cheapest one that reliably succeeds**? Three findings. **(A) A negative result, published in full**: on **Terminal-Bench 2.1**, **twelve team compositions** (pairs, triads, cheap swarms under a *frontier* model) were pitted against the solo agent each was built around, and **none beat it at equal cost**. The explanation is structural — a task that finishes in minutes *"doesn't have enough structure to divide"*, and *"More agents mostly buys you the cost of explaining it twice"*. **(B) The horizon reverses the result**: on **Long-Horizon Terminal-Bench** (44 tasks, one task worth hours of work, same lead **GPT-5.6 Sol** at *high* effort), solo finishes 15 tasks for 59.1%, +2 QuickBees 19 for 64.1%, +1 QuickBee +1 WorkerBee 19 for 69.5%, **+2 WorkerBees 20 for 71.5%** — a **+12.4-point** gain, of which 11.4 comes from tasks carried to completion. *"Same seats, opposite result, because the work is a different shape."* These runs ran at **3× the timeout**, solo included. **(C) Beyond a threshold, price stops buying quality**: solo on Terminal-Bench 2.1, **Opus 5 at *xhigh* effort is the most expensive run ($140.63) for 75.0%**, trailing six runs ranging from $20.08 to $109.82 and 79.5% to 88.4% — the stated cause is over-reasoning that drove 17 of 88 tasks to timeout. Among the six best runs, **a 5.5× price gap for an 8.9-point score gap**: *"choosing between them is not a quality decision at all. It is a budget decision."* The post proposes a taxonomy it owns as *ad hoc* — **QuickBee**, **WorkerBee**, **SmartBee**, plus the human as *"honorary bee"* — and two team forms, the permanent **Hive** that remembers your preferences and the disposable **Swarm** that remembers the project. Conditions: everything runs on **Harbor**, against real Buzz agents on a **live** relay, **one attempt per task, no retry**, prices fixed as of **2026-07-30**.
- **Atish Patel** — *« Building AI solutions @ Block »* · auteur unique du billet · publié le **6 août 2026** sur `engineering.block.xyz`.