5. When things go wrong

Stories don't always go forward. The PM rejects one, the dev pair realizes another shouldn't have been started, someone gets blocked on external work.

5.1 Reject (with a reason)

Sort the unread letters has been delivered, and the PM notices on review that the third pile is mislabeled. The red Reject button on the delivered card flips the story back to started, records the reason as a dated comment, and hands it back to the dev pair to fix.

VS Code Shell MCP

$ am reject stories/sort-the-unread-letters-into-three-quiet-piles.md \
    --reason "PM noticed the third pile is mislabeled."
✓ rejected, back to started

reject_item takes the path, the reason, and optionally the author. It writes a comment under ## Comments in the story body and flips status back to started in one operation.

Full envelope

{
  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
  "method": "tools/call",
  "params": {
    "name": "reject_item",
    "arguments": {
      "path": "stories/sort-the-unread-letters-into-three-quiet-piles.md",
      "reason": "PM noticed the third pile is mislabeled.",
      "author": "pm"
    }
  }
}

What just happened

• Status flipped to started, the story is in the dev pair's court again
• A dated comment landed under ## Comments: @pm 2026-05-22, rejected, back to started. Reason: PM noticed the third pile is mislabeled.
• accepted: was cleared (it was never set, but reject_item guarantees it stays unset)
• The card moves back into the started cluster of the current sprint

5.2 Unstart

Sometimes the dev pair starts a story and realizes it should not have, because it is the wrong story or it turns out to be larger than expected. unstart is the reset, clearing the in-flight timestamps and returning the story to unstarted.

VS Code Shell MCP

$ am unstart stories/yell-at-the-seedling-to-grow-faster.md
✓ status: unstarted   started/finished/delivered/accepted cleared

set_status with status: "unstarted" does the same thing. It's not a separate tool, the state machine treats unstarted as the full reset.

Full envelope

{
  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
  "method": "tools/call",
  "params": {
    "name": "set_status",
    "arguments": {
      "path": "stories/yell-at-the-seedling-to-grow-faster.md",
      "status": "unstarted"
    }
  }
}

What just happened

• Status reset to unstarted
• started:, finished:, delivered:, accepted: all cleared
• Cycle time will be measured from the next am start if the team comes back to this story (history is in git if you need to look)
• The card returns to the unstarted cluster below the in-flight line

5.3 Block

Blocked is different from rejected: the work has not gone wrong, it simply cannot proceed because of something outside the dev pair's control. Pace exactly seven times, for example, needs the path to dry first.

VS Code Shell MCP

$ am block stories/pace-exactly-seven-times-up-and-down-the-path.md \
    --reason "Path is wet from the rain. Waiting for it to dry."
✓ blocked

block_item writes a blocked: true flag plus blocked_reason: on the story file. The board renders the card with a red Blocked chip in place of the state pill. unblock_item clears both.

Full envelope

{
  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
  "method": "tools/call",
  "params": {
    "name": "block_item",
    "arguments": {
      "path": "stories/pace-exactly-seven-times-up-and-down-the-path.md",
      "reason": "Path is wet from the rain. Waiting for it to dry."
    }
  }
}

What just happened

• blocked: true and blocked_reason: … landed on the story file
• The card's status pill is replaced by a Blocked chip
• The story stays in priority, blocked is a flag, not a column move. When the blocker clears, am unblock flips the flag and the story resumes as if nothing happened.

Next: Epics roll up many stories →