DangerBoy

Well done.. keep at it..

What a load of twaddle.. it's so far off the mark I wonder whether you even bothered to read the thread,the lighted buttons game is not meant to represent the market.. merely to try and invoke some thought as to how flawed the process is of trying to compare the ideas of "over" and "under" trading when at the heart of it they are two totally different concepts.. (and the the first in itself is a totally different concept from what is implied) I do find it quite interesting though that you have given yourself sole authority as to what defines the "real game" in the markets.. Who is to say that the market should have a long and a short button? What if I create a game where I have a button that simultaneously goes long in one market and short in another market? Better yet, what if in my game I have no buttons, my game is simply to watch the stream of information and every time price ticks into a whole number I mark it down on my notepad... why? who cares.. maybe I'm obssessive compulsive and I take enjoyment from it as bizarre as it is.. the point is, are any of these two games any less real than your game??? As far as I see it the market is just a continuous flow of chaotic information, maybe even labelling it as chaotic is going to far.. but at the end of the day what you decide to do with it is entirely of your own making. In any case I can see this conversation has far outlived it's useful purpose, so I'll leave it at that and wish you both well on your trading endevours..

I just made it up off the top of my head, it was not intended to be a representation of the market, only a simple game with basic rules to illustrate a point.. scenario 1 and 3 both have no risk what so ever since you cannot lose, in scenario three you will make less money but you are not influencing the expectancy of the game. In scenario 2 you change everything because now you are choosing a flash that is outside the parameters of the system, depending on the frequency of occurrence of the flashes and how often you are breaching the rules, you could easily end up losing money since the yellow button is negative expectancy, the more you play it the more impact it will have on your returns, possibly negative depending on frequency of red and yellow flashes and how often you hit yellow. The point was that what you are doing in scenario 2 and scenario 3 are two completely different things and yet somehow on this thread they were being compared as if one and the same and primarily because people are using the wrong terms in the first place.. I will say again, there is no such thing as excessive trading within the realms of a positive expectancy game, if you are taking trades that are not within the realms of the plan then call it for what it is, a punt.. and if you are taking punts because you cannot identify your entries, then call that for what it is, a poorly defined plan..

it is only a possibility if your trade set ups are not clearly defined, your system does not have to be mechanical to clearly define your set ups.. in fact I do not know of a successful trader who does not use clearly defined set ups.. It's your reality... I do not say that to belittle you in any way, merely to point out how you generalise your own personal experience.. For me there is very little thinking during the day, I spend most of my time working on execution.. the markets move to quickly to be sitting wondering whether a set up just occurred or not. Some peoples realities yes.. The biggest problem with this type of thing is that if your set up was never clearly defined in the first place then how do you ever decide whether it was a good or bad trade?? Inevitably what you will do is decide after, once you have either won or lost, in the majority of cases you will decide that losers were bad trades and the winners you'll hardly pay any more attention to.. often on the losers you will make a slight note not to do that particular thing again and so you will forever be the donkey chasing the carrot.. Some peoples yes.. Racking up 10,000 hours behind a screen does not necessarily mean you will be any better for it.. I have come across countless traders who have been at it for years, still asking the same basic questions.. or worse answering the same basic questions.. Why is it not practical to implement?? I will give you an example from our previous conversation and show you why throwing around these terms so flippanlty leads to great confusion and my own frustration... Let me take it back to a simple analogy to show the shortcomings of this to try and illustrate my point.. it is a ridiculous analogy but I think you will catch my drift.. let's say we have a game, a light flashes three colours, red, green and yellow... when it flashes you have the choice to hit a button, if it's red and you hit the button you get paid 3 dollars, if it's yellow and you hit it, 50% of the time you will get paid a dollar and 65% of the time you will lose a dollar, if it's green, you will lose two dollars.. That is the game right and we know all the variables are constant.. so now I create my "system", I want it as simple as can be and I define my rules.. the red flash is my set up.. when I see it flash red, I'm going to hit the button.. but only on a red flash.. the other two I will ignore, even if it takes 100 yellow flashes.. so we start playing.. and I execute 100% and I have a pretty good result.. we can be assured of positive expectancy right?? that is obvious.. now I play the game a second time, but this time I get bored so I begin "overpressing", now instead of hitting just on the red flashes I start hitting the yellow flashes also because I see that once in a while the yellow flashes are paying out.. this is scenario two right.. what do you think happens to the results of the system in this scenario? Scenario 3, I play the game again, however in this instance I'm being more cautious, so I begin "underpressing", I play the game as originally intended, only pressing the button on red flashes, however in this case, on occasion I decide to skip a red flash for whatever illogical reason, it would make no sense to skip but you get the drift.. So now having heard the idea laid out this way do you think that "overpressing" as you would call it, is in any way shape or form comparable to "underpessing"?? Like I said before time does not necessarily lead to success in my view, in some people it only helps to ingrain bad habits.. what I would say is this.. find yourself some basic 100% definable set ups.. you need to get passed the hurdle of thinking during the day... it is like our above analogy in Scenario 2 but in this case you are hitting the yellow flashes not because of boredom but because you are not entirely sure what constitutes a yellow or a red flash, you eventually make up your mind, you hit the button and you get a win and you decide the light must have been red... you see the problem with this approach?

I have racked up my 10 000 hours yes.. the first 2000 sifting through allot of this "overtrading" type garbage. I rarely bother with boards but once in a while I get bored and do and then wish I hadn't bothered..

Taking trades that are not part of a well defined plan already has a term, it's called GAMBLING.. if you are not able to identify your set ups like the back of your hand, you have no business trading.. "Overtrading" implies trading to often, likely coined by Trading Instructors and the like.. put simply there is no such thing as trading to much.. your use of the term only serves to confuse new traders but each to his own.. With regards to a mechanical system I don't quite understand the point you are trying to make.. a system that provides positive expectancy or an edge over a large number of trades is simply that, a system with an edge.. increasing the frequency of occurrence of this type of system by operating multiple systems or the same system on multiple uncorrelated markets will increase cumulative profits, whether it is completely mechanical/discretionary or a mix of the two has no bearing on the concept. Sigh... :crap:

The term excessive trading makes no sense what so ever.. . Key factor in increasing profits in a positive expectancy game is to increase frequency of occurrence.. See how professional online poker players seek to maximize there edge by playing multiple simultaneous games, some of the best up to 20 - 25 games at a time.. Anyone who tells you, you are losing money because you are trading to much does not know what they are talking about, you are losing money because you have a crap system... in that instance trading less will only slow down your DD...