What a great lunch read! I've been weekend-warrioring a terminal-based CRPG for a bit myself. I was recently exploring ways to use agents to help with balance testing, which is a real scale problem for solo indie dev. So far, all I've created is a fight simulator: essentially, have the current player state (stats, effects, gear, companions, etc.) do this fight, simulated, X number of times using one of the currently-implemented GOAP personalities and report how often it wins, loses, average end turn, stuff like that.

I hadn't really thought about trying to create a harness for agents to play the full game interactively. I'd love to explore this. If you don't mind, here are a few questions:

1) Correct to assume that I probably need a text-only harness even though my game is text-based already because I do make use of menu selections made via arrow-key-and-enter interactions?

2) Do you have prompt recommendations for the type of feedback you have found to be useful? I would guess in your case, the objectives of the game are more clear than an open-world RPG. What dead ends have you run into? Maybe a variety of approaches would be good? One agent tries to fight everything. Another focuses on gaining and completing as many quests as possible?

3) How bad is the token burn doing this? Any optimization strategies you've employed?