A lot of years spent trading and some other projects so time to give some advice to newbies.
Advice on buying alt coins, just remember you will be swimming with a lot of sharks once you get into altcoins so build some defence and protect you investment wisely, because these people i referred to as sharks are the scum of the earth.
"Read the whole ANN thread of a coin (even if its a 100 page) don't just buy cause you feel you have a hunch or based on hype. Hype is created by shill accounts and cheap paid news editorial , you can usually tell you will see a lot of fake hype from newbie accounts posting crap like " to the moon" or screenshot of price going up"
Make sure the dev is active and has not left the project, if the dev is less than full member account walk away.
Crowdsale and ICO walk away, only people making money will be the dev and his associates. ICO and Crowdsale are bullshiet. Don't believe in that marketing crap has the reason for the ICO or crowdsale.
Inactive dev walk away, a dev that randomly disappear for weeks is a bad sign. If you hear excuse such as family or medical / holidays etc expedite your exit.
A dev that has worked on several other alt coins that have failed is usually a good sign to avoid any of his project, its not a coincidence history repeats itself.
Coin with high supply like 100 millions are less successful than coin coins in the mid range like 30-40 mill.
If a dev claims high % of coins will be used as bounty walk away, this could just be a ruse to pay the coin to himself unless there is proof each bounty has been verified and checked thoroughly.
Avoid buying coins that are too expansive.
Trust no one and avoid trollbox.
Do not become a bag holder , if you feel the coin is going nowhere cut your losses and it least exit with some of your money and stop day dreaming.
Don't invest money you cannot afford to loose.
Do not get caught in the dream state where you think the coin you pick will make you rich ,usually be realistic.
Do not automatically assume if you invest in the top 10 coin it automatically means you will make money, you will be surprised of the results and realise your mistake far too late.
Do not get greedy , if you have a coin that has made some profit it least get 50% of the profit based on your investment.
Using the above guidelines will make you more prepared for the altcoin scene.
Extremely informative guide.
I would recommend that every single newbie that is planning on investing into altcoins to see this post before they do.
There are a ton of scam ICOs out there, and there is no shortage of people wanting to rob you of your hard earned bitcoins. Often a scam dev will be very very vague about the roadmap and stay anonymous - never invest in coins that seem to be generic/cloned.