Systems
Rule-Based Trading Plan Checklist
A rule you only remember when you're calm isn't a system, it's a preference. Score the setup instead of vibing it.
Check the boxes, watch the score move
Each item below carries its own weight toward a 100-point score. Check off what's actually true about the setup in front of you right now, not what's usually true, and watch the gauge move from Not Ready through Marginal to Cleared to Trade.
How it works
- Every item carries a different weight because not every rule matters equally. Whether a stop-loss is defined before entry is worth more than whether the setup would survive being explained out loud, both matter, but not the same amount.
- The score is a gate, not a suggestion. A setup sitting at 45 out of 100 isn't "close enough," it's genuinely missing enough of what makes a trade defensible that the honest read is not yet.
- The checklist is only as good as answering it honestly. It's trivially easy to check every box after the fact to justify a trade that's already been decided on emotionally. The tool only works run before the entry, not as a rationalization exercise after.
- A weighted checklist beats a mental one specifically because it's external. Under real pressure (a fast setup, a string of recent losses, a position already open and moving against plan) memory and self-assessment are exactly the things that degrade first. A list sitting outside the trader's own head doesn't have that problem.
Where this breaks
Gaming the checklist instead of using it
Any scoring system built by the same person using it can be quietly reverse-engineered: check the boxes that are easy to check, skip the ones that don't apply "this time," and arrive at a score that clears the bar for a trade that was never actually well-formed. The checklist doesn't stop this on its own, it only works if the items are specific enough to be answered honestly with a clear yes or no, and if crossing the threshold is treated as a real gate rather than a formality to clear on the way to a decision that was already made.