Quote from wrbtrader:
That prompt me to asked NoDoji a more specific question. I then asked if there's anything on Al's charts besides just price. The pause and reply was there was. I asked what it was that Al puts on his charts and the reply was "price moving average". I then responded that "he does use indicators". The reply I was then given from NoDoji was that he doesn't consider "moving averages" as an indicator. 
The next reply I received from NoDoji and a few others was that the use of one moving average is ONLY as a "visual aid or to help put the price action within a framework".
Hi Mark, I haven't dropped in on this thread for a long time, so sorry for not addressing this. I keep a 20-period moving average on my charts in every time frame, but it's not an indicator; in other words, it doesn't indicate anything in particular. Stochastics and RSI indicate "overbought/oversold" conditions, which are meaningless in a strong trend; Bollinger bands are an indicator of volatility. These are rather nebulous concepts.
A moving average is a mobile support/resistance zone that can be useful because of the sheer number of traders/trading systems that use it for with-trend support/resistance pullback entries. During stable market conditions, the 20-period moving average serves as a reasonable S/R zone to enter a position in the direction of a defined trend. In a range, the 20-period MA is flat. Again, you don't need the moving average displayed to tell you that price is in a range and a flat moving average is useless as a S/R level; the boundaries of the range or channel define S/R until a breakout finally occurs.
I imagine you could say the moving average is an "indicator" in that the direction of its slope indicates whether a trend is in progress in your time frame, but you can look at price bars or a line chart alone and recognize a trend without a moving average to tell you.
Just as I use previous swing highs/swing lows or trend lines as S/R levels, I also use the 20-period MA as a high probability S/R level in a trending move.
Quote from wrbtrader:
1) Traders that use charts...sometimes this is refer to as chart reading of price patterns or key price areas without indicators.
2) Traders that use time & sales/bid & ask screens...sometimes this is refer to as tape reading involving order flow without charts.
I myself fall primarily in the category of 1) even though I use time & sales info to help a little with my position size management. Thus, technically there's a 3rd group of price action traders that use both 1) and 2) like me although for different reasons.
Mark
I've traded strictly from the DOM (bid/ask price ladder) and found that it limits my ability to let a winning trade run. Trading from charts using S/R levels gives me the ability to target the pivot points with great precision, and I sometimes can string together back to back trades in opposite directions this way. I can't imagine how I could do that without charts to paint the price road map for me. I also found that using the charts, and not the DOM, for trade management to be ideal.
I recently picked up Al Brooks' book after a long absence and found easy to read and completely comprehensible. Through nearly two years of live trading experience and post-market analysis I've learned to recognize and trade off of everything he describes in his book.
I found it be an amazing book from the moment I first started reading it, though it was the most difficult trading book I've ever read, and it took me months to get through most of it. But now everything in that book makes perfect sense to me. It's a superb price action bible and it contains many "keys to the kingdom" for those willing to master the price action concepts described.
