Support and resistance as zones, not pencil lines
Single-pixel horizontal lines create false precision. Pattern work improves when you draw bands that price can breathe inside.
Classical patterns sit on top of structure. If your support is a hairline, every wick becomes a crisis. We teach zones built from clusters of closes and wicks, then hang pattern geometry on those bands.
A double bottom that rests on a thin line often fails the second touch by a few ticks — enough to stop out a rigid plan, not enough to break the idea. Widen the zone, and the second touch becomes information rather than noise.
In the Intensive, students redraw the same chart three ways: hairline, moderate zone, and wide weekly band. They compare how each choice changes invalidation and position size. The pattern itself does not change; the risk framing does.
Carry this into live work: before naming a pattern, ask whether the surrounding structure is clear enough to host it. If not, wait. Naming a pattern on ambiguous structure is how overconfidence enters a journal.