I personally don't consider today's price action to be typical of a trend day, yes markets are up, but it's spiky.
Than wouldn't that be a 30mn bar? I used to use CQG also and the time frame bars are the same as everyone else's, Currently using TT,
Both of the spreads the diagonal Mon/Fri 4150/4160P and todays 4190/4200/4210 call fly have been blown out of the water thus far. Low risk, though. The fly still has a chance. Yeah, I sold a couple in the 29s and one in the 27s MES. All closed this minute. The only keeping me even in ES today. Will be looking to get long next.
I am not sure whether intraday bars have that much meaning to big volume traders, so whether hourly close on the hour or half-hour probably doesn't have a huge difference IMO. This is because I believe that how price reacts to an important level trumps intraday bar's OHLC. Pro traders monitor what is happening to supply/demand at various levels and trade accordingly.