[BUG] Plugin agents and skills not discovered - only MCP servers load from plugins

Plugin agents and skills don't load, only MCP servers

Description

Plugins installed via ~/.claude/plugins/ correctly load MCP servers from .mcp.json, but agents from agents/ and skills from skills/ are not discovered or loaded.

Environment

• Claude Code version: 2.1.4
• Platform: macOS (Darwin 25.1.0)
• Plugin location: ~/.claude/plugins/atypicaltech-toolkit/

Plugin Structure

atypicaltech-toolkit/
├── .claude-plugin/
│   └── plugin.json
├── .mcp.json           # ✅ MCP servers load correctly
├── agents/             # ❌ Not discovered
│   ├── software-engineer.md
│   └── ... (14 agents)
└── skills/             # ❌ Not discovered
    ├── dev-workflows/
    └── ... (6 skills)

Expected Behavior

Per Create custom subagents:

"Plugin subagents come from plugins you've installed. They appear in /agents alongside your custom subagents."

Expected:

• /agents command lists plugin agents
• Plugin skills are invocable

Actual Behavior

• /agents shows "No agents found" (empty list)
• Plugin skills are not recognized
• MCP servers from .mcp.json do work correctly

Steps to Reproduce

1. Create a plugin with agents and MCP servers:

``bash
mkdir -p ~/test-plugin/.claude-plugin ~/test-plugin/agents
echo '{"name":"test","version":"1.0.0"}' > ~/test-plugin/.claude-plugin/plugin.json
echo '{"mcpServers":{"time":{"command":"docker","args":["run","-i","--rm","mcp/time"]}}}' > ~/test-plugin/.mcp.json
cat > ~/test-plugin/agents/test-agent.md << 'EOF'
---
name: test-agent
description: Test agent for debugging
model: sonnet
---
You are a test agent.
EOF
``

1. Install the plugin:

``bash
ln -s ~/test-plugin ~/.claude/plugins/test-plugin
``

1. Restart Claude Code

1. Verify MCP servers work:

• Call mcp__time__get_current_time → works ✅

1. Check agents:

• Run /agents → empty list ❌

Workaround

Symlink plugin directories to user-level locations:

# Agents
ln -s ~/.claude/plugins/test-plugin/agents ~/.claude/agents

# Skills (individual)
ln -s ~/.claude/plugins/test-plugin/skills/my-skill ~/.claude/skills/my-skill

This works, confirming the agent/skill format is correct - the plugin discovery is the issue.

Additional Context

• Tried adding "agents": "./agents/" to plugin.json - no effect
• Plugin appears in ~/.claude/plugins/installed_plugins.json
• Agent markdown files follow exact format from official plugin examples
• Related issues: #4728, #4706, #8558 (similar symptoms but marked closed/fixed)

Impact

This makes plugin distribution difficult. Users expect a simple install, but must manually symlink each component. The docs suggest plugins should "just work" for agents.