Going live and what kills accounts

Going live happens in four stages, each with a quantified passing criterion, and none of them gets skipped. Replay teaches reading, simulation teaches the rules, micro contracts teach emotions, and size comes last. This lesson gives the four stages, then the three behaviors that kill accounts, always the same ones, with the rule that frames each of them.

The four stages

1. Replay. Deep Replay replays the session order by order, tick by tick, on the MBO history that DeepCharts stores locally. Hide the right side of the chart, make your decisions blind, write them down, then compare. Ten sessions per setup before moving on.
2. Live simulation. Thirty trades per setup on the simulation account, with the full journal and the daily rules. The day you break a rule, that setup's counter goes back to zero.
3. Live micro. One to two MES, the same rules, fifty trades. Live trading adds slippage, latency and emotions; the figures must stay within the simulation's range.