Orchestrator + Subagents in opencode with Open Models

Melvin Vivas · X post · 2026-09-11 · Open on X

Topics: AI Agents, Tool Use & MCP, AI Dev Tools & Productivity · Level: intermediate

Summary

Melvin Vivas is testing opencode to recreate the orchestrator-and-subagents pattern with open models such as DeepSeek, Qwen, GLM and Kimi. In his hybrid setup, cloud models do the orchestration and smaller local models run as subagents.

Key points

• The orchestrator-plus-subagents pattern can be built in opencode, not only in proprietary coding agents.
• Open models to try: DeepSeek, Qwen, GLM and Kimi.
• Hybrid design: a stronger cloud model orchestrates while locally running models act as subagents.
• Running subagents locally can cut API cost and keep some work on your own machine.

Resources mentioned

• OpenCode · tool · x.com · free
  Open-source terminal coding agent that can be configured with different model providers, including open models.
  Also in: T3Code: a better interface for terminal coding agents (Melvin Vivas on X · notes), OpenCode Go: Open Coding Models (DeepSeek, Qwen, Kimi, GLM) for $10/mo (Melvin Vivas on X · notes), Trying OpenCode Go After Upgrading OpenCode (Melvin Vivas on X · notes), Try Muse Spark 1.3 for Free in OpenCode (Melvin Vivas on X · notes) and 10 more
• DeepSeek · tool · deepseek.com · free
  Open-weight large language models from DeepSeek, known for strong reasoning and coding at low cost.
  Also in: Open models now dominate token volume on Vercel AI Gateway (Melvin Vivas on X · notes), jina-ocr-v1: Turning PDFs, Scans and Tables into Markdown (Melvin Vivas on X · notes), Bolt.new Adds Open Models (GLM, DeepSeek, Kimi) via Bolt Forge (Melvin Vivas on X · notes), OpenCode Go: Open Coding Models (DeepSeek, Qwen, Kimi, GLM) for $10/mo (Melvin Vivas on X · notes) and 4 more
• Qwen · tool · qwen.ai · free
  Alibaba's family of open-weight LLMs.
  Also in: OpenCode Go: Open Coding Models (DeepSeek, Qwen, Kimi, GLM) for $10/mo (Melvin Vivas on X · notes), Why Chinese AI Models Are Mostly Open Source (Melvin Vivas on X · notes)
• GLM · tool · github.com · free
  Chinese open-weight LLM family from Zhipu AI.
  Also in: OpenCode Go: Open Coding Models (DeepSeek, Qwen, Kimi, GLM) for $10/mo (Melvin Vivas on X · notes), Why Chinese AI Models Are Mostly Open Source (Melvin Vivas on X · notes)
• Kimi · tool · github.com · free
  Open-weight large language models from Moonshot AI, aimed at agent and coding tasks.
  Also in: Bolt.new Adds Open Models (GLM, DeepSeek, Kimi) via Bolt Forge (Melvin Vivas on X · notes), OpenCode Go: Open Coding Models (DeepSeek, Qwen, Kimi, GLM) for $10/mo (Melvin Vivas on X · notes), Why Chinese AI Models Are Mostly Open Source (Melvin Vivas on X · notes)

Try this

• Set up opencode with a cloud orchestrator model and local open models (e.g. Qwen) as subagents.