An automated strategy produces trades faster than most traders review them. Without a review routine, you end up changing settings on a feeling after a bad day. A short, regular review turns the strategy's own history into the evidence for any change.

Where the information lives in NinjaTrader 8

  • The chart. Executions are plotted where they happened, which is the fastest way to see each trade in context.
  • Trade Performance. Opened from the Control Center's New menu, it summarises trades for an account and period: totals, averages, drawdown and the list of individual trades.
  • Strategy Analyzer. For FlowPilot backtests with Tick Replay, the results tabs give the same kinds of statistics over history.
  • NinjaScript Output window. Both strategies write messages here: licensing, which daily limit was reached, and on BookPilot the bracket in ticks at start-up.
  • BookPilot's Blocked line. On the panel, it shows why a signal was not traded.

The numbers worth tracking

The FlowPilot guide lists the statistics to look at when testing settings, and they work just as well for a weekly review:

  • Number of trades. Results from a handful of trades say very little.
  • Profit factor. Gross profit divided by gross loss.
  • Max drawdown. The worst peak-to-trough fall. Compare it with your Daily Max Loss and any account limit.
  • Average trade. Net result per trade, after commission.

Add average win and average loss, and the win rate. Watching them together matters, because a higher win rate with smaller winners can leave you no better off.

Tag every trade

Totals hide the patterns. Add a couple of tags to each trade so you can split the results:

  • FlowPilot: the mode, and in Auto the regime the Mode button showed (Trend or Regression). Follow and Fade trades behave differently, and one may be carrying the other.
  • BookPilot: which engine fired, Pressure Break or Pulled Wall, and the risk preset in use.
  • Both: the time of day, and how the trade ended: target, stop, break-even or a manual exit.

Reading the patterns

FlowPilot

  • Many trades ending at break-even: the Break-Even Trigger may be early relative to your target.
  • Losses clustered in the first bars of the session: look at how the Open Warm-up Bars setting is shaping the opening rotation.
  • A lot of trades on noisy bars: review Imbalance Ratio and Stacked Requirement before anything else.

BookPilot

The BookPilot guide gives specific clues:

  • Many cancelled entries, by timeout or run-away: the limit offset is too deep or Entry Timeout too short.
  • Entries that fill and are stopped quickly: the offset may be too deep, so you only get filled when wrong, or Confirm is too short.
  • The Blocked line mostly says Forecast Confirm or against the bias: the filters are strict for current conditions.
  • Many trades that lose straight away: tighten the scanners, with higher ratios or a longer Confirm.

Turning a review into a change

  • Change one thing at a time, and write down what and why.
  • Re-test the change on the same data: Strategy Analyzer for FlowPilot, the same Market Replay days for BookPilot.
  • Prefer settings that hold up over a broad range of values to a single best number. A setting that only works with very few trades is usually overfitted.
  • Give a change enough sessions in SIM before judging it on live results.

A weekly rhythm

A simple cadence works for most traders: a two-minute look at the chart after each session, and a proper review once a week with the tags and numbers above. Daily totals swing too much to act on; weekly patterns are more useful.

The setting names mentioned here, with their ranges and effects, are in the FlowPilot guide and the BookPilot guide. The FlowPilot page covers what each plan includes.

Past trades do not predict future results, and futures trading can produce losses larger than any review anticipates. Trial each change in SIM, and Market Replay for BookPilot, before applying it to an evaluation, funded or live account.