If it's that easy, anyone can become a millionaire you know...... I recommend for algo trading beginners watching Kevin Davey's videos: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjTZtWVBchDTJuxy_7GjySQ/videos
my 2 centavos worth is that taking the effort to put together a decent backtest teaches the player enough in and of itself to make it worthwhile. recording any chart markups done into that infinite spreadsheet, same thing imho. Just putting the hours, days, weeks, months, preparation makes possible to hold those in mind at the bell and have a background touchstone to compare what the player sees and does in the ring to what they would have done in that backtest or that spreadsheet. Usually the live version is better after sufficient preparation. Everybody has a plan until they get punched in the face. Tyson. that's where the error log proves its worth to be more than backtests and stats, and so some have a better plan after that happens a few times, lol. Most businesses fail within a couple years so why should the trading business be any easier. players are up against a stacked deck, against the sharpest minds money can buy using the best equipment. this won't take long, this'll be easy prob won't get the player to the bank, but same for any business generally. exceptions to every rule. ps, watch out for that freakin minkey, those little fokken minkeys are some smart devious little shites, and do not give them darts, jarts, knives, guns, nothin. let them pick stocks with red crayon circles in the back of the newspaper like the rest of us.
Back testing can be useful but you must have an understanding of what you are testing or trying to test. For a given set of parameters you will get a return number but that number will also be associated with a degree of probability. A 45-65% strike rate is very wide and for me does not carry much meaning. Why such a variation? Also, if you are trading 8hr bars on an index you will sometimes be trading outside market hrs where the spreads can widen (sometimes significantly). Personally, I would be adjusting my exits and entries to see how much slippage your system can tolerate. My experience has shown me that back testing can hide marginal trades that would turn negative in the real world. That is why you need to test the limits and what effect that has on your P/L. Good luck!
checking your strategy has never meant a loss of time, in the end it will work out, you just have to try