# Tool-MAD: A Multi-Agent Debate Framework for Fact Verification with Diverse Tool Augmentation and Adaptive Retrieval

arXiv: https://arxiv.org/abs/2601.04742 · HTML: https://mlsanity.com/paper/2601.04742/

## Key facts

- Cited by 3 papers in the map (data through 14 Oct 2026).
- Placed in Social simulation and multi-agent debate, one of 16 directions in LLM agents and tool use.
- Builds on 38 of its 48 references that are in the map.
- First posted on arXiv 8 Jan 2026.

## Placed in

- LLM agents and tool use / [Social simulation and multi-agent debate](https://mlsanity.com/agents/social-simulation-and-multi-agent-debate/)

## Builds on (most cited first, 30 of 38)

- [BERT: Pre-training of Deep Bidirectional Transformers for Language Understanding](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1810.04805/) (2018)
- [Language Models are Few-Shot Learners](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2005.14165/) (2020)
- [The Llama 3 Herd of Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2407.21783/) (2024)
- [Chain-of-Thought Prompting Elicits Reasoning in Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2201.11903/) (2022)
- [Retrieval-Augmented Generation for Knowledge-Intensive NLP Tasks](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2005.11401/) (2020)
- [ReAct: Synergizing Reasoning and Acting in Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2210.03629/) (2022)
- [Self-Consistency Improves Chain of Thought Reasoning in Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2203.11171/) (2022)
- [Large Language Models are Zero-Shot Reasoners](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2205.11916/) (2022)
- [Reflexion: Language Agents with Verbal Reinforcement Learning](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.11366/) (2023)
- [Toolformer: Language Models Can Teach Themselves to Use Tools](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2302.04761/) (2023)
- [REALM: Retrieval-Augmented Language Model Pre-Training](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2002.08909/) (2020)
- [PaLM-E: An Embodied Multimodal Language Model](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.03378/) (2023)
- [Self-RAG: Learning to Retrieve, Generate, and Critique through Self-Reflection](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2310.11511/) (2023)
- [Improving Factuality and Reasoning in Language Models through Multiagent Debate](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.14325/) (2023)
- [FEVER: a large-scale dataset for Fact Extraction and VERification](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1803.05355/) (2018)
- [What Disease does this Patient Have? A Large-scale Open Domain Question Answering Dataset from Medical Exams](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2009.13081/) (2020)
- [PubMedQA: A Dataset for Biomedical Research Question Answering](https://mlsanity.com/paper/1909.06146/) (2019)
- [FActScore: Fine-grained Atomic Evaluation of Factual Precision in Long Form Text Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.14251/) (2023)
- [LaMDA: Language Models for Dialog Applications](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2201.08239/) (2022)
- [HuggingGPT: Solving AI Tasks with ChatGPT and its Friends in Hugging Face](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.17580/) (2023)
- [Encouraging Divergent Thinking in Large Language Models through Multi-Agent Debate](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.19118/) (2023)
- [DSPy: Compiling Declarative Language Model Calls into Self-Improving Pipelines](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2310.03714/) (2023)
- [SelfCheckGPT: Zero-Resource Black-Box Hallucination Detection for Generative Large Language Models](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2303.08896/) (2023)
- [Active Retrieval Augmented Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.06983/) (2023)
- [Adaptive-RAG: Learning to Adapt Retrieval-Augmented Large Language Models through Question Complexity](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2403.14403/) (2024)
- [Ragas: Automated Evaluation of Retrieval Augmented Generation](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2309.15217/) (2023)
- [ReConcile: Round-Table Conference Improves Reasoning via Consensus among Diverse LLMs](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2309.13007/) (2023)
- [OpenAlex: A fully-open index of scholarly works, authors, venues, institutions, and concepts](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2205.01833/) (2022)
- [FEVEROUS: Fact Extraction and VERification Over Unstructured and Structured information](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2106.05707/) (2021)
- [AVeriTeC: A Dataset for Real-world Claim Verification with Evidence from the Web](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2305.13117/) (2023)

## Built on by (most cited first, 3 of 3)

- [Courtroom-Style Multi-Agent Debate with Progressive RAG and Role-Switching for Controversial Claim Verification](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2603.28488/) (2026)
- [Verification Required: The Impact of Information Credibility on AI Persuasion](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2602.00970/) (2026)
- [Diagnosing and Mitigating Compounding Failures in Agentic Persuasion via Taxonomic Strategy Retrieval](https://mlsanity.com/paper/2606.24976/) (2026)

## Abstract (arXiv)

Large Language Models (LLMs) suffer from hallucinations and factual inaccuracies, especially in complex reasoning and fact verification tasks. Multi-Agent Debate (MAD) systems aim to improve answer accuracy by enabling multiple LLM agents to engage in dialogue, promoting diverse reasoning and mutual verification. However, existing MAD frameworks primarily rely on internal knowledge or static documents, making them vulnerable to hallucinations. While MADKE introduces external evidence to mitigate this, its one-time retrieval mechanism limits adaptability to new arguments or emerging information during the debate. To address these limitations, We propose Tool-MAD, a multi-agent debate framework that enhances factual verification by assigning each agent a distinct external tool, such as a search API or RAG module. Tool-MAD introduces three key innovations: (1) a multi-agent debate framework where agents leverage heterogeneous external tools, encouraging diverse perspectives, (2) an adaptive query formulation mechanism that iteratively refines evidence retrieval based on the flow of the debate, and (3) the integration of Faithfulness and Answer Relevance scores into the final decision process, allowing the Judge agent to quantitatively assess the coherence and question alignment of each response and effectively detect hallucinations. Experimental results on four fact verification benchmarks demonstrate that Tool-MAD consistently outperforms state-of-the-art MAD frameworks, achieving up to 5.5% accuracy improvement. Furthermore, in medically specialized domains, Tool-MAD exhibits strong robustness and adaptability across various tool configurations and domain conditions, confirming its potential for broader real-world fact-checking applications.