Update CHANGELOG and remove unnecessary unified_api_key fields from agent action configs. Implemented a function to strip these static references before saving configurations.

CHANGELOG.yaml

@@ -15,4 +15,5 @@
   - Fixed "No episodes available" placeholder being selectable in the episode list.
   - Fixed response extraction failing when only a closing anchor tag was present in the LLM response (e.g., `</PHASE_INTENT>` without `<PHASE_INTENT>`).
   - "Director actions: Removed redundant fix_instructions LLM call from direct_scene actor path. The FOCAL callback metadata already prevents verbatim dialogue in director instructions."
-  - "Encryption: Fixed API keys in agent action configs (e.g., OpenAI-compatible TTS, visual backends) being stored in plaintext. The encryption walker now handles the nested AgentActionConfig structure where the key is wrapped in a {value: ...} dict."
+  - "Encryption: Fixed API keys in agent action configs (e.g., OpenAI-compatible TTS, visual backends) being stored in plaintext. The encryption walker now handles the nested AgentActionConfig structure where the key is wrapped in a {value: ...} dict."
+  - "Agent Config: Stopped persisting unified_api_key fields to config.yaml. These are static reference pointers (e.g., 'openai.api_key') defined in code and never change, so saving them was unnecessary."

src/talemate/agents/base.py

@@ -628,6 +628,7 @@ class Agent(ABC):
                             value=config_obj.value
                         )
                         for config_key, config_obj in action.config.items()
+                        if config_obj.type != "unified_api_key"
                     },
                 )
                 for action_key, action in self.actions.items()

src/talemate/config/state.py

@@ -57,6 +57,33 @@ async def update_config(other_config: Config | dict):
     await config.set_dirty()
 
 
+def _strip_unified_api_key_configs(config: dict):
+    """
+    Remove unified_api_key entries from agent action configs before saving.
+
+    These are static reference pointers (e.g., 'openai.api_key') defined in
+    agent code — they never change and should not be persisted.
+    """
+    from talemate.instance import AGENTS
+
+    for agent_name, agent_data in config.get("agents", {}).items():
+        agent = AGENTS.get(agent_name)
+        if not agent or not getattr(agent, "actions", None):
+            continue
+
+        actions = agent_data.get("actions", {})
+        for action_key, action_data in actions.items():
+            runtime_action = agent.actions.get(action_key)
+            if not runtime_action or not runtime_action.config:
+                continue
+
+            saved_config = action_data.get("config", {})
+            for config_key in list(saved_config.keys()):
+                runtime_cfg = runtime_action.config.get(config_key)
+                if runtime_cfg and runtime_cfg.type == "unified_api_key":
+                    del saved_config[config_key]
+
+
 def save_config():
     """
     Save the config file to the given path.
@@ -107,6 +134,8 @@ def save_config():
             )
             client["preset_group"] = ""
 
+    _strip_unified_api_key_configs(config)
+
     encrypt_sensitive_values(config)
 
     with open(CONFIG_FILE, "w") as file: