master one first, add a second only with measured low correlation, not vibes.

forty is a hint, want hundreds across regimes, go live tiny until proven.

a middle path worth knowing about: systematic with discretionary veto, where the system generates the entries mechanically but youre allowed to skip a trade for a documented reason, never to add or modify one. it keeps the emotional discipline of mechanical entries while preserving a narrow, accountable slot for genuine situational judgement. just log every veto and review whether your skips actually helped, or youll quietly drift back to full discretion through the veto door.

few parameters, out-of-sample test, honest costs, systematise your interventions too.

this is exactly the spiral i was in, panic-wanting to kill the system mid-drawdown realising my current drawdown is actually still inside the backtested range and the setups are still firing. holding, per the framework. thank you, i was about to abandon a system on pure fear.