Just learned that the confirmation box for stop limit orders is NOT quantity, it is the tick offset between the limit and stop prices!
Wow I've been using these orders for 2+ years on NT, and just today learning this.
I might actually know less than John Snow....

https://forum.ninjatrader.com/forum/ninjatrader-8/platform-technical-support-aa/1071945-stop-limit-quantity-confirmation

Another gem for having simultaneous buy stop limit and sell stop limit orders on the chart.
Now I can finally place both on the chart, far away from the current price, and drop them where I want them without fiddling with the right click menu.
So ez, but literally took me 2 years to finally google the answer.

The secret is to reselect the original ATM before placing the 2nd order.

https://forum.ninjatrader.com/forum/ninjatrader-7/platform-technical-support/80283-buy-stop-limit-sell-stop-limit?p=695641

Today's 30 min opening range blast off was at 9:45.
Off to a rocky start, shook out some weak hands, but holding until at least the price crossed above its 9:30 open worked. Was hoping for a cascade of stop losses to rocket this bad boy into a new AH, but was taken out by the trailing stop loss for +3.5 points. Initial risk was 3.5 stop loss, and closed out 1 contract for +3.5, a 1:1 rr.

I've now had 6 consecutive winning days, with a win rate ~45%.
Beginning to feel the irrational exuberance taking over again.

Unlike previous times, I refuse to increase # of contracts right now. I'd rather watch the lost opportunity of not scaling up of another 100 consecutive wins, than the pain of the market changing at exactly the time when I scale up. This is my new demon I am fighting.

Strapped myself to the rocket ship at 9:32, but experienced heavy turbulence and was stopped out by the trail for only +7 ticks. Initial stop was 14 ticks, so a very bad rr, leaving me feeling pretty bad... no dopamine high from this win.

Still feeling god like but with the additional fomo, I then broke my soft rule of no trades after 10, and entered a short at 10:08, which immediately had engine failure and burned me for -16 ticks.

Thank god I did not increase # of contracts after yesterday's irrational exuberance. On the bright side, today reminded me of the cost that will be paid if I lose the battle with my demons.
6 day streak has come to an end. But in a good way, I needed today to keep me moving forward and showed me I have a long way to go to control my emotions.

For today's platform lesson, I was inspired by another thread about hotkeys, and enabled hotkeys for entering buy stop limit and sell stop limit orders. Good bye right clicking on the chart. For me chart trading over RDP, this is even more helpful because no longer have to deal with the 1 sec lag between where I think my cursor is and where it actually is.

I've researched hotkeys for placing orders at the current price of the mouse cursor location, and it is possible with ninjascript. I stayed up late last night coding it, but have decided that the built in hot keys for now will suffice. Either way I know all this hot key business will not have an impact on my return, it's just a quality of life improvement. Maybe after another 6 day winning streak I'll find the motivation to revisit.

I've visually noted that every time the market goes into a narrow range between 7 - 930, the breakout out from that range, if there is a breakout, is super choppy filled with treacherous traps.

Going forward when I open up NT at 9:25 and see that es is stuck in a narrow range again like this, I'm just going to immediately shut it down and start day drinking earlier.

Also set a very loud alarm on my phone for 9:29. Sometimes I'll get lost in my phone waiting for 9:30 that I'll miss the open. Almost happened today.

My multiple takeaways from today's loss are making me feel pretty great right now, almost as if it was an up day.

Is there a trap indicator? Not an indicator that alerts to future traps, but that confirms a trap just occurred? It's easy to visually spot it, but thinking of ways to programmatically identify it after it has happened.

My entry selection is something like this:
1. Entries around S/R levels
2. Target a S/R level ~10pts away
3. Buy/sell stop limit order 1 tick above/below a pull back
4. Only enter if a trapped just occurred

Looking back at my losers, they are all where I was in the trap, and my winners are just after the trap. Sometimes there's multiple consecutive traps, but that's part of the game, and as long as you're ultimately correct in picking the direction, setting a wider stop below the previous swing won't get stopped out.

Today's trade is a perfect example. I am consistently impatient and take on the added risk of being trapped, in exchange for very little additional gain. Hoping I can code something that will reinforce being more trap conscious.

Typing out my last post, I'm now questioning am I back to trading PATs but with wider stops, no profit target, and trailing stop for locking in profit?

Risk reward is a tricky thing.

I started this journal in June after blowing up some accounts picking up pennies in front of a steam roller. My goal was a 5:1 strat, because that was what my idol, Paul Tudor Jones, publicly recommends. Probably because 5:1 is for swinging over multiple days, not day trading ticks.

It's now nearing the end of July, and although I'm not even close to my goal r:r, I'm extremely happy with my performance in July. I've made back all of my donations, and then some, since starting this thread. My win% is hovering around 50%, and with more practice I'm hoping to break through the 50% resistance. But on average my winners are much more profitable than my losers. Focusing on only trading the first 30 minutes of open feels like I'm practicing the same kick 10,000 times.

Now that I no longer have an ATM profit target, I never know what my reward will be entering into a trade. I have hopes of where I want the price to go, but prior to entry I only know where my hard initial stop loss is. I know my risk, but the reward is unknown until after exit.

Here's another example from today for anyone following.
For scaling in/out, I'm considering rebuying into a position after a trail closes it out if the prices continues.

Another excellent day, feels like it's more natural now. I know it's easy to say that on winning days.

To anyone that's followed my last couple of posts, you already know about that 936 entry, 940 blast off, trail stop lock in profit, renter, more profit .

I don't have much else to post in terms of lessons. I no longer feel personal development from winning trades/days, and am looking forward to consecutive losing days.

Running on virtually no sleep for the last 4 consecutive nights, I've proven to myself that sleep is not necessary to trade well.
Truly internalizing emotion control and self discipline was the key. However I found reading about trading psychology was not too helpful. The more I read, the less I was able to do in practice. Analysis paralysis, including psychoanalysis.

It was only until staring down the barrel of a gun, metaphorically speaking, and seeing my own true reflection looking back at me, I was finally honest with myself and able to ditch everything that was holding me back.

Over the last 2 days broke out through my 50% win rate resistance, with a rr now over 2x. In another month I'll take a closer look at NT performance metrics.