Really you should not be using the BOT if you do not understand that it is not 'willy nilly', the whole point is that over time you will see an increase over a 'normal' human trader, but that may include taking it in the ass once in a while....
There is a 'run test' function and whilst it is a bit basic, it will give you an idea.
For example the recommended settings would have made a significant loss on Mtgox over the past few days.
It gave me enough of an idea to understand the functionality is not suitable for trading in such a market at the moment, as it stands the BOT is not quite polished enough, and yep I know it makes money, but is also takes rather more 'hits' than it should.
Personally I'm of the mind that the product is in need of significantly more 'safety mechanisms', but I also do not think that a simple 'stop loss' is the answer, specifically because it can be exploited by other traders and in some cases may well be a significant contributing factor to a 'flash crash'.
That said and despite the BOT going mad and clearing out all my FIAT, I have still managed to manually trade the account to a significantly better position that the BOT over the last two days.
There are some rather 'shitty' patterns emerging from gox at the moment indicating some very rough BOT trading algorithms.
I agree with your assessment.
It takes more hits than it really should. Which like it or not, deducts from future gains.
Right now I am almost finished writing my own arbitrage bot and testing it through it's paces. I too would like Butter Bot to add certain
real time simulation features. I think a simulation feature is better than turning on the bot and letting it do trading. This will help you get an idea of the decisions the bot makes in different situations without risking BTC or USD.
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I would love it if they made a "secure-bot" to "get you out" of the market in the event of a flash crash. Just that feature alone is very useful if you don't intend to do actual EMA based trading. If you do want a bot to watch the current market conditions on a continual basis butter bot would be a good start if you understand the settings.
I think they should package this separate from the normal butter bot set of features.
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There are also other types of already coded software based on ADX that don't take anywhere near "the number of hits" that butter bot takes. (not butter bots fault as ADX is just a better indicator IMO)
There is one publicly available but someone decided the neuter the public code so that it didn't do anything other than prevent losses. I back tested the public version and while it wasn't written to make a profit, it back tested to the beginning of the year and retained 99% value of the currency traded. Had someone with experience redone it to actually "make a profit" it would have no doubt been better than the EMA based bots.
Future version of butter bot will come with different strategies so that people can choose whatever type they prefer.