I haven't studied trend vs range strategies in swing trading over multiple days/weeks, but I studied in GREAT detail how to avoid getting chopped when price ranges intraday. Everything I need to profitably day trade liquid instruments without getting chopped was found by tedious study of price action on the the 5-min and 1-min charts with a 20-period EMA on each chart. I promise you it's all right there. There's no magic indicator needed; just an understanding of how group psychology applies to levels that many eyes are watching.
I've asked a few times before if anyone could provide some examples of price action concepts changing over time and have yet to see an example of this.
So you don't care too much about one candle stick as a signal? You are more into patterns? Maybe a failed top or bottom?
Dennis, please understand this about playing in a game of chance. There "AIN'T" no indicator to replace your brain. Many have tried to drill that truism into newer traders that have a FALSE assumption about what indicators can and can not bring to the game. Here is a good example of a failed indicator: marketsurfer had an agenda babbling about what works and what did not work. Well, TA is alive and well after all. If you make money in trends and then "try to manufacture a new trend" in chop and lose not only money but also your mental advantage that is REQUIRED in a game of chance why would any sane person not grasp the SA of the moment and switch gears or sit tight as a bug and wait for the right CONDITIONS for the next trade? SA = SITUATION AWARENESS OK, done for today
forecasting regime change has been a hot topic for decades, it's as reliable as forecasting future interest rates techniques do exist to "measure" shit in regimes, but are they really reliable ?
One candlestick is not a signal for me in isolation. The behavior of the current bar-in-progress against the backdrop of previous price action may signal a trade. I look at the story leading into the hard right edge and I make note of levels that will be next in line to be defended if price gets there. If a trade is signaled and there's decent "airspace" to that next level, I look for an entry method that allows me to have a R:R of no less than 1:1 based on a technically reasonable stop loss placement.
How do you come up with these levels? What do you mean by the backdrop of previous price action ? And do you put your stop at the previous swing low/high?