mslezak

So programming this in to find the engulfing pattern at a high or low.... What's an easy indicator to use? Low = min[30 bars] High = max[30 bars]? Easy to see on a chart but more difficult to program. Besides that, how about a volume or volatility indicator to confirm the reversal? AvgTrueRange for volatility and StandardDeviation(volume[30 bars]) > 2 or something. Thoughts?

I like this... good point about losing. I work around some very successful traders and they all lose at least half the time. Those that stick around get out shortly after seeing the trade move against them. The best traders usually just have 1 or 2 trades that go their way per year and they make their targets by letting the winners ride longer than the losers. Of course, it is harder to do with your own money. 3 trades this week, 2 won, 1 lost. The loser was less than the gains... just hope to keep that up and not let it affect my mood. The psychology of trading without it affecting your ego is really difficult to manage... I see guys blow up all the time because they can't admit they were wrong about a position. Don't be one of those guys...

Are you back testing your strategy? That is the only way you will see where to put your stops. Trust me, I did trading off technicals for ages and you just can't set stops appropriately without writing the trading program and running a backtest, tweaking your stops...