It’s a good idea to work with someone who knows what he is doing. Ideally he will guarantee you against losses that may occur while working together. Such a person will not let you waste his time. He will pre-screen you to determine if you are capable of learning and following instructions. Not everyone is capable of following instructions it turns out. Simple reasoning will tell you a trading educator’s goal is misaligned with that of his customers, many of whom are desperate or naive. This is not to say you cannot learn anything useful from a vendor, but you have to discern the useful from the not useful. In other words, you are self-learning and need to determine if you are learning correctly.
That's not specific. What do you mean by reliable ? How do you define a box ? a triangle ? a breakout ? I could see a box breakout where you wouldn't see a valid pattern. If you want rigorous answers to your specific questions then ask your own data. From my own experience, a box is more reliable than a triangle. A triangle provides earlier signals, entries but way more false positives. Simply because the price has to provides more efforts to break a box makes it more reliable. I have traded bullish stock breakouts in a weak 2022 tape, Most triangles failed while the box ones stood the test of time. In a roaring bull market I would have bought early triangle breakouts Because literally anything, works in a roaring bull market. https://thepatternsite.com/id75.html & Al Brooks is a waste of time. Sure ... Snake oil is better than poison.
Honest question: you think if I asked SimpleLikeMe a more specific question I would've gotten a more specific answer? I was just asking him a token question to show he'd spin his semantic wheels as usual. Now that we got that outta the way, agree 100% on your assessment of the value of boxes vs triangles. I'm still a relative rookie, only been trading a couple years, but I've come to the conclusion that triangles are my kryptonite, and I'm personally much better off sticking to boxes for all the reasons you mention. Agree on Al Brooks overall, though slogging through a couple of his books taught me a few important albeit obvious tips mainly due to the bluntness with which he put them.
Followup question if I may, since you actually seem to post substantive answers. Any pointers on the art of drawing boxes? I've been experimenting with them a lot lately for daytrading entries: drawing the widest/tightest reasonable box, ignoring wicks altogether and boxing only the candle bodies, etc. Yes I'm backtesting all of this too, but I don't feel like I've hit on a solid approach yet. Any thoughts?