# NousResearch/hermes-agent · Fallback chain cascading on auth and billing errors

## Open now

- 0 issues, 1 PR open on GitHub.
- PR #17518: fix(agent): cascade nested fallback_model chains

These issues and PRs concern a provider fallback chain that fails to cascade properly when encountering 401/403 auth or billing errors, including fixes for auxiliary clients, nested chain normalization, and auto-mode auth recovery.

## TL;DR

- 4 member(s): 0 open issue(s), 2 closed issue(s), 1 open PR(s), 0 merged PR(s), 1 PR(s) closed without merging.
- No fix has been merged to main; one or more PRs were attempted (see below).
- **Recommended:** review the prior/competing PR(s) below. A fix was attempted but not merged; your case may extend or revive that work.

## Maintainer resolution verdict

- Internal-tracker verdict over this cluster's issue members: `unresolved`. This is distinct from the fix status above. Weigh it yourself.

## How this cluster was grouped

- Link evidence (`STRUCTURAL_PARTIAL`): some members are connected by structural evidence (shared changed files, or a closing/superseded reference); the rest are joined by an automated relevance judgement over their text.
- Members outside that structural core may belong to a different underlying problem.
- Pairwise link density `0.39`: the share of member pairs that carry a link, counting a structural link in full and a relevance-only link at 0.36. `1.00` means every pair is linked.

## Closed / duplicate issues

- #17485: Multi-level fallback chain aborts on 401 from first fallback instead of cascading to second fallback
- #23548: Feature Request: Fallback chain should continue after first fallback fails with non-retryable error

## Prior & competing PRs

- **#17518: fix(agent): cascade nested fallback_model chains**. open
  - maintainer direction: category `uncategorized`; implication `needs_llm`; refs `9f408989c`
  - files: `run_agent.py`, `tests/run_agent/test_provider_fallback.py`
- **#17535: fix(run_agent): normalize nested fallback chains to enable cascading provider failover**. closed without merge
  - maintainer direction: category `stale_abandoned`; implication `active`

## Fix status

- No merged fix on record.
- Subsystem: `agent`