Threepio · The Beginner's Guide

Every click, in order. With a picture of each one.

Written for someone who has never installed a trading program before. Follow it top to bottom. Nothing here needs you to know what any of the words mean in advance — where a word matters, it is explained the first time it appears. Budget an hour. You can stop at any point and pick up later; your progress is kept.

▶Prefer to watch?

The same walkthrough as a narrated video, 24 minutes, every click from the download to the first practice trade: watch the setup guide. Right-click to save it if you would rather keep a copy.

1What you need before you start

A Windows PC that can stay on. Windows 10 or 11. Threepio runs on your machine, not in the cloud, so the machine has to be awake while the markets are open. A laptop is fine if it is plugged in and not set to sleep. On a Mac, or if you would rather not leave a PC on, a small rented Windows machine (a "VPS") works — the Setup page covers that.

Your delivery email. It holds your licence key (a code you paste once, during install) and the download link. Keep it open in another window.

NinjaTrader 8, free. This is the trading platform Threepio talks to for futures. You do not need a funded account or a prop firm to start: NinjaTrader gives everyone a free practice account called Sim101, and that is exactly what Threepio practises on. Section 5 installs it.

The one idea worth knowing now. Threepio never trades real money by itself. It ships with live trading OFF, it practises on the Sim101 account, and only you can switch that. Everything below is safe to do at your own pace.

2Download and install

Click the download link in your delivery email. A file called MillenniumFalcon-Setup-<version>.exe downloads. It is large (about a quarter of a gigabyte), so give it a minute.

If your browser says the file "is not commonly downloaded and may be dangerous", keep it. Click the three dots beside the download, then Keep, then Keep anyway. Windows shows this for any program it has not seen many times before; it is not a virus warning.

Screenshot being added: the browser's download warning and the Keep button.

Open the downloaded file. A blue box says "Windows protected your PC" and shows only a Don't run button. Click the small More info link; a Run anyway button appears. Click that.

Screenshot being added: "Windows protected your PC" → More info → Run anyway.

The installer opens on the licence agreement. Read it, click I accept the agreement, then Next. The version and date at the top of the text are the agreement's own (it was last revised on 28 August), not the software's — every installer shows the same agreement.

Installer: the licence agreement page — The agreement page as it opens. Next stays grey until you choose "I accept".

Installer: agreement accepted, Next enabled — Accepted. Click Next.

Paste your licence key. Copy it from the delivery email and paste it into the box. No spaces before or after, no line break. Then Next. The key is checked on your computer; nothing is sent anywhere. If it is refused, the usual cause is a stray space picked up when copying — delete and paste again. (Updating over an existing install? This page is skipped; your key is already there.)

Installer: the licence key page — The licence key page. Paste, then Next.

Three quick pages you can leave as they are. Deep Market History is optional — leave it unticked for now (it is about a paid data subscription for decades of history; you can set it up later). Select Components: keep Full installation (with AI Copilot). Additional Tasks: keep the defaults. Click Next on each.

Installer: Deep Market History page — Deep Market History — optional; Next.

Installer: Select Components page — Select Components — keep Full installation; Next.

Installer: Additional Tasks page — Additional Tasks — keep the defaults; Next.

Click Install, then Finish. The Ready page shows what it is about to do; click Install and wait (a couple of minutes — it is a large program). On the last page leave Launch Millennium Falcon now ticked and click Finish. Threepio opens in its own window — no browser, no address bar.

Installer: Ready to Install page — Ready to Install — click Install.

Installer: finished, Launch ticked — Finished. Leave Launch ticked and click Finish.

Updating later? Same file, same clicks, straight over the top. Never uninstall first. Section 9.

3The first start and the tutorial

The first time Threepio opens, a guided tour starts by itself. It has 47 short cards. You read one, click NEXT, read the next. Until you have read all 47 the machine lets you look at everything and change nothing — that is deliberate, so that nobody trades with it untaught. It takes about ten minutes. The pictures below are the cards exactly as you will see them, in order, so you know what is coming.

Threepio's first start, with the first tutorial card open — What you see the first time Threepio opens: the first card of the tour. Click NEXT.

NEXT is greyed out for a second on each card. That is on purpose — a person reads faster than a script clicks, and the machine wants to be sure it is a person. Just wait a beat.

The 47 cards

Tutorial card 1 of 47: HELLO. I AM THREEPIO. — **1/47 · HELLO. I AM THREEPIO.** — the tour introduces itself. Click NEXT.

Tutorial card 2 of 47: WHAT THIS MACHINE IS — **2/47 · WHAT THIS MACHINE IS** — a research brain with a guard at the door; it never trades real money without you.

Tutorial card 3 of 47: PICK YOUR COLOURWAY — **3/47 · PICK YOUR COLOURWAY** — choose a colour scheme. Cosmetic only; change it any time from the top bar.

Tutorial card 4 of 47: THE VITAL SIGNS — **4/47 · THE VITAL SIGNS** — the pills at the top: engine on, gate armed, live OFF, incidents, mode.

Tutorial card 5 of 47: THE KILL SWITCH — **5/47 · THE KILL SWITCH** — the red button. One click stops all trading everywhere. Always safe to press.

Tutorial card 6 of 47: VISUAL PROTOCOL — **6/47 · VISUAL PROTOCOL** — four looks; green, amber and red always mean the same thing.

Tutorial card 7 of 47: THE EXCHANGE CLOCK — **7/47 · THE EXCHANGE CLOCK** — everything runs on New York time, the clock the markets use.

Tutorial card 8 of 47: FOUR MARKETS, ONE TEMPLATE — **8/47 · FOUR MARKETS, ONE TEMPLATE** — the tabs: FUTURES, FOREX, STOCKS, CRYPTO. Each is its own desk.

Tutorial card 9 of 47: FUTURES — via NinjaTrader 8 — **9/47 · FUTURES — via NinjaTrader 8** — your tab if you trade CME futures, including prop-firm evaluations.

Tutorial card 10 of 47: FOREX — via MetaTrader 5 — **10/47 · FOREX — via MetaTrader 5** — the FX desk.

Tutorial card 11 of 47: STOCKS — via MultiCharts — **11/47 · STOCKS — via MultiCharts** — the equities desk (no live order route yet).

Tutorial card 12 of 47: CRYPTO — via exchange APIs — **12/47 · CRYPTO — via exchange APIs** — the crypto desk; trade-only API keys, never withdrawal.

Tutorial card 13 of 47: RESEARCH — the shared brain — **13/47 · RESEARCH — the shared brain** — the tab that is not a market: where strategies come from.

Tutorial card 14 of 47: THE COMMAND CENTER — **14/47 · THE COMMAND CENTER** — the home screen of the research side: what the brain did lately.

Tutorial card 15 of 47: THE CONTROL PANEL — **15/47 · THE CONTROL PANEL** — pause or resume research, READ NOW, SUPERCHARGE.

Tutorial card 16 of 47: THE VAULT — THE LONG-TERM MEMORY — **16/47 · THE VAULT — THE LONG-TERM MEMORY** — every paper and note the machine has read, as linked notes.

Tutorial card 17 of 47: HOW TO ADD MATERIAL — **17/47 · HOW TO ADD MATERIAL** — drop a PDF into the inbox and it gets read. Legal sources only.

Tutorial card 18 of 47: THE 3D BRAIN — **18/47 · THE 3D BRAIN** — the same vault drawn as a galaxy.

Tutorial card 19 of 47: WHAT A DEEP READ IS — **19/47 · WHAT A DEEP READ IS** — reading a document page by page for testable claims.

Tutorial card 20 of 47: HOW TO START ONE — **20/47 · HOW TO START ONE** — READ NOW, or leave it to the nightly loop.

Tutorial card 21 of 47: LIFECYCLE — EVERY STRATEGY'S STORY — **21/47 · LIFECYCLE — EVERY STRATEGY'S STORY** — born, tested, promoted or killed. Most die; that is the point.

Tutorial card 22 of 47: THE STAR MAP — **22/47 · THE STAR MAP** — the strategy population drawn as a constellation.

Tutorial card 23 of 47: BREEDING — **23/47 · BREEDING** — winners cross their rules to make children, all counted honestly.

Tutorial card 24 of 47: FAMILY DRAFTS & BUILD REQUESTS — **24/47 · FAMILY DRAFTS & BUILD REQUESTS** — where brand-new strategy ideas are proposed and built.

Tutorial card 25 of 47: THE GAUNTLET — WHY A PASS MEANS SOMETHING — **25/47 · THE GAUNTLET — WHY A PASS MEANS SOMETHING** — unseen data, walk-forward, Monte Carlo, costs, a luck tax.

Tutorial card 26 of 47: REJECTION IS SUCCESS — **26/47 · REJECTION IS SUCCESS** — a 99% kill rate is the feature; the bar cannot be lowered.

Tutorial card 27 of 47: THE APPROVAL QUEUE — **27/47 · THE APPROVAL QUEUE** — promotion toward money always stops here for a human.

Tutorial card 28 of 47: THE REVIEW QUEUE — **28/47 · THE REVIEW QUEUE** — lighter confirmations: renames, calendar entries, batches.

Tutorial card 29 of 47: RISKGATE — THE GUARD AT THE DOOR — **29/47 · RISKGATE — THE GUARD AT THE DOOR** — every order, practice or real, passes this gate. No way round it.

Tutorial card 30 of 47: SETTING YOUR LIMITS — **30/47 · SETTING YOUR LIMITS** — limits live in per-account profiles; read-only on screen by design.

Tutorial card 31 of 47: PROP MODE VS LIVE MODE — **31/47 · PROP MODE VS LIVE MODE** — a prop account and a live account each get their own gate.

Tutorial card 32 of 47: YOUR LICENSE — **32/47 · YOUR LICENSE** — your key, tier and expiry. Verified offline; nothing phones home.

Tutorial card 33 of 47: CONNECTING A PLATFORM — **33/47 · CONNECTING A PLATFORM** — each connector card says what it needs; credentials never typed into the app.

Tutorial card 34 of 47: NINJATRADER 8 — THE ORDER MATTERS — **34/47 · NINJATRADER 8 — THE ORDER MATTERS** — start Threepio first; tick AT Interface, then RESTART NinjaTrader.

Tutorial card 35 of 47: POSITIONS & BROKER VIEW — **35/47 · POSITIONS & BROKER VIEW** — a read-only window onto the account.

Tutorial card 36 of 47: WHICH BOOK YOUR DESK TRADES — **36/47 · WHICH BOOK YOUR DESK TRADES** — Master Book (the vendor's, verified nightly) or Machine Book (your own brain's).

Tutorial card 37 of 47: THE BOOK — **37/47 · THE BOOK** — the team of strategies an account runs.

Tutorial card 38 of 47: ELECTIONS — HOW A BOOK IS CHOSEN — **38/47 · ELECTIONS — HOW A BOOK IS CHOSEN** — survivors stand for election as a team.

Tutorial card 39 of 47: BOOK SETTINGS — **39/47 · BOOK SETTINGS** — the book's envelope: account profile, cutoffs, portfolio rules.

Tutorial card 40 of 47: REPORTS & INCIDENTS — **40/47 · REPORTS & INCIDENTS** — the nightly report and anything that went wrong, until fixed.

Tutorial card 41 of 47: SESSIONS & LOGS — **41/47 · SESSIONS & LOGS** — the flight recorder.

Tutorial card 42 of 47: ARM THE RESEARCH ENGINE — **42/47 · ARM THE RESEARCH ENGINE** — the switch that runs research overnight. Not the money switch.

Tutorial card 43 of 47: PHONE ALERTS — SET UP IN 3 MINUTES — **43/47 · PHONE ALERTS — SET UP IN 3 MINUTES** — your own Telegram bot; every alert type has a switch.

Tutorial card 44 of 47: SAFEGUARDS — THE MACHINE'S REFLEXES — **44/47 · SAFEGUARDS — THE MACHINE'S REFLEXES** — connection lost → flatten; stale data → pause; loss near limit → tell you.

Tutorial card 45 of 47: GIVE THE MACHINE ITS OWN MIND — **45/47 · GIVE THE MACHINE ITS OWN MIND** — one optional download makes the copilot and the reading work offline.

Tutorial card 46 of 47: YOUR MACHINE — MOVING ME TO A NEW COMPUTER — **46/47 · YOUR MACHINE — MOVING ME TO A NEW COMPUTER** — release this machine, activate on the new one.

Tutorial card 47 of 47: THE SAFETY FINALE — **47/47 · THE SAFETY FINALE** — live ships OFF; every order passes the gate; promotions wait for you. Click FINISH.

When the last card says FINISH, click it. The tour closes and full access opens. Right after that, the setup wizard appears — section 4.

4The setup wizard (three questions)

Straight after the tutorial, and again after each update, Threepio asks the three things that decide whether anything can trade at all. It is three screens. Nothing here can turn real trading on.

Which NinjaTrader account should I trade? Type Sim101 — NinjaTrader's free practice account, spelled exactly like that. (If you later want it to trade a real or prop account, you come back here and type that account's name instead.) Click NEXT.

Setup step 1 of 3: which NinjaTrader account — Step 1 of 3 as it appears.

Setup step 1 with Sim101 typed in — Sim101 typed in. Any account whose name starts with "Sim" is treated as practice money.

How much to risk per trade, in money. This is the most a single trade may lose if its stop is hit. Threepio works the number of contracts out from this figure every time, and drops to the smaller "micro" contract when the full-size one is too big for it. Type a figure you would be comfortable losing on one trade — on the practice account it is only practice money — and click NEXT. It is a money amount (250, or $1,250), not a percentage; if you type something it cannot read it says so under the box and will not go on.

Setup step 2 of 3: risk per trade — Step 2 of 3.

Setup step 2 with an example figure typed in — An example figure. Use your own.

The NinjaTrader steps. The third screen lists what to do in NinjaTrader, in the right order. You do not need to do them this minute — click DONE and follow section 5 below, which is the same list with a picture of each step. The list also lives on the FUTURES → ACCOUNT screen, and the copilot knows it.

Setup step 3 of 3: the NinjaTrader steps — Step 3 of 3. DONE closes the wizard.

Not trading futures at all? NOT ON FUTURES closes the wizard and changes nothing. You can come back to it any time from SETTINGS → SETUP.

5NinjaTrader, step by step

NinjaTrader 8 is the free program that shows the market and places the orders. Threepio does two things through it: it reads prices from it (through a small add-on you paste in once), and it sends orders to it (through a setting you tick once). The order of these steps matters; do them in this order.

Install NinjaTrader 8 and log in. Download it from NinjaTrader's website, create their free account, install, open it and log in. On the connection screen, connect to their free simulation feed if you have no broker yet. You now have the Sim101 practice account.

NinjaTrader's Control Center menu bar: New, Tools, Workspaces, Connections, Help — NinjaTrader's Control Center once you are logged in. Everything below starts from its New and Tools menus.

Turn on the order pipe: Tools → Options → Automated trading interface → tick "AT Interface" → OK. Then close NinjaTrader completely and open it again. The tick does nothing until NinjaTrader restarts, and Threepio's connection test fails without it. This is the step almost everyone misses.

NinjaTrader's Tools menu with Settings at the bottom — Tools → Settings (the last entry).

NinjaTrader Settings: Automated trading interface, AT Interface ticked — In Settings, choose Automated trading interface on the left and tick AT Interface. Click OK. Then close NinjaTrader completely and open it again.

Find the add-on file. Open your Threepio folder. It is not called Threepio on disk and Windows search will not find it: paste %LOCALAPPDATA%\MillenniumFalcon into the address bar of any File Explorer window and press Enter (or right-click the Millennium Falcon desktop icon and choose Open file location). SETTINGS in the app shows the same path. Inside it is a folder called NinjaTrader 8. It holds a file named JarvisBarLogger.cs. Open that file in Notepad, select all, copy.

Put it into NinjaTrader. There are two ways, and the first is the one that cannot go wrong.

Easiest — drop the file in. Close NinjaTrader. Copy JarvisBarLogger.cs into Documents\NinjaTrader 8\bin\Custom\Indicators\ — just the file, as it is. Start NinjaTrader, open New → NinjaScript Editor, and press F5 (compile). It builds from the file on disk, so there is no template to clash with and nothing to select or replace.

Or paste it. New → NinjaScript Editor, right-click → New Indicator, click through the wizard with its defaults, and when a page of code appears press Ctrl+A to select every line of it — including the using lines at the very top — then paste over it and press F5. If you leave those top lines in place the compile fails with errors like The type or namespace name ‘StringBuilder’ could not be found; that is the usual cause.

Either way the bottom of the editor says it compiled with no errors. You only do this once — and again after an update that changes it (section 9).

NinjaTrader's New menu with Chart and NinjaScript Editor — New → NinjaScript Editor (near the bottom). The same menu has Chart, used in the next step.

The NinjaScript Editor, empty, with the Indicators and Strategies folders on the right — The NinjaScript Editor. Right-click → New Indicator, click through the small wizard, paste the whole file over the code it shows, press F5.

Open one chart per instrument and put the add-on on it. In NinjaTrader: New → Chart, pick the instrument, set the type to Minute and the value to 1, OK. Right-click the chart → Indicators, find JarvisBarLogger in the list, Add, OK. Do this for five instruments: NQ, ES and YM (the Master Book trades these) and MNQ and MGC (the Machine Book). Pick the current front-month contract when NinjaTrader asks.

NinjaTrader's Data Series dialog: NQ 09-26, Minute, 1, Days to load — New → Chart opens Data Series: type the instrument (here NQ 09-26), Type Minute, Value 1. Days to load is on this same page — set it to 400 now and save a step.

An NQ 1-minute chart in NinjaTrader — The chart. Right-click anywhere on it for the menu below.

The chart's right-click menu: Data Series, Indicators, Strategies, Reload All Historical Data — The chart menu: Indicators… adds the logger; Data Series… changes Days to load; Reload All Historical Data is the one to press after updating the logger.

The Indicators dialog with JarvisBarLogger found by the search box — Indicators: type Jarvis in the search box, select JarvisBarLogger, click add, then OK.

Load history on each chart. Right-click the chart → Data Series → set Days to load to 400 → OK. The add-on writes every bar the chart loads, so this hands Threepio a year of history at once. Back in Threepio, the FUTURES → ACCOUNT screen counts the sessions as they arrive.

Leave NinjaTrader open while Threepio runs. The charts are where the prices come from and the orders go. If NinjaTrader is closed, nothing can trade — Threepio will say so, not fail quietly.

6Connecting and testing

In Threepio, click FUTURES at the top, then ACCOUNT CONNECTION on the left. The NinjaTrader 8 card shows the state of the two links: the data feed (the add-on's bars) and the order route.

The FUTURES › ACCOUNT CONNECTION screen — FUTURES › ACCOUNT CONNECTION. The card lists the same NinjaTrader steps as section 5.

Click TEST CONNECTION. Green means NinjaTrader answered on the order pipe. If it says the interface is not answering, go back to section 5 step 2: the AT Interface tick and, above all, the restart.

Watch the sessions counter. After the add-on has been on a chart with Days to load at 400, the card shows how many trading sessions of bars it has. It climbs as NinjaTrader loads; a year of history takes a few minutes per chart.

7Your risk figure

You already gave Threepio the one number it needs (section 4, step 2). The RISKGATE screen shows what stands between any strategy and an order: the risk per trade, the daily loss limit, position caps, the news blackout and the kill switch. Every order — practice or real — passes through this gate; nothing goes round it.

The FUTURES › RISKGATE screen — FUTURES › RISKGATE. The limits are read-only here on purpose — changing them is deliberate, never one click away.

Prop firm? Check its rules allow automated trading before you connect a prop account, and put the firm's daily loss limit into the account's profile so the gate enforces it.

8Day one: what you will see

FUTURES → BOOK OVERVIEW opens with LIVE ROUTE at the top. This is what the order route is doing right now: whether NinjaTrader is answering, the state of each market's bars, and every order it refused with the reason in plain words. Below it, the book — the strategies this desk runs — and, for each one that cannot run yet, why.

The FUTURES › BOOK OVERVIEW screen with LIVE ROUTE — FUTURES › BOOK OVERVIEW.

A quiet first day is normal. The strategies trade specific windows of the New York session, sit out days blocked by scheduled news, and need the bars from section 5 first. Futures do not trade at the weekend (they open Sunday 6 pm New York time). No trades is a decision the machine made, and LIVE ROUTE says which.

Positions, Journal, Sessions. POSITIONS mirrors the account; JOURNAL records every practice trade; SESSIONS & LOGS is the flight recorder when you want to know why it did something.

The FUTURES › POSITIONS screen — FUTURES › POSITIONS.

FUTURES: Journal — FUTURES › JOURNAL. Every practice trade it makes, with its entry, exit and R multiple. This is the record to watch while it practises on Sim101.

The research side runs by itself. RESEARCH → COMMAND CENTER is where the machine's overnight work shows: what it read, built, tested and killed. You do not have to touch it. If you want it to read your own PDFs, drop them into the VAULT inbox.

The RESEARCH › COMMAND CENTER screen — RESEARCH › COMMAND CENTER.

Live trading stays OFF until you switch it. Watch it practise on Sim101 for as long as you like. When you decide to trade a real account, the switch is a line in the settings file the READ ME names — a deliberate act, never a click.

9Updates (and the one thing to redo after each)

Threepio checks for a new version once a day. When there is one, an update button appears. To ask right now: SETTINGS → VERSION → CHECK NOW.

The SETTINGS screen — SETTINGS: CHECK NOW, SETUP (replay the wizard), YOUR MACHINE.

Run the new installer over the top. Same clicks as section 2. Do not uninstall first, and do not work through versions one at a time — the newest one contains everything.

If the release notes say the add-on changed, paste it again. The add-on lives inside NinjaTrader, so an update to Threepio cannot touch it. Open the new JarvisBarLogger.cs from the NinjaTrader 8 folder, paste it over the old one in the NinjaScript Editor, press F5, then right-click each chart → Reload All Historical Data.

If the window looks like the old version afterwards — errors about a "dynamically imported module", or the tutorial saying it is one card short — click inside the Threepio window and press Ctrl+F5 once. Recent versions do this by themselves.

10Run the ORB inside NinjaTrader — this is what trades

The Master Book's three ORB strategies also exist as one NinjaTrader Strategy file, ORBV19Multi_Threepio.cs, in the same NinjaTrader 8 folder. It runs inside NinjaTrader but asks Threepio's RiskGate before every entry and trades only on a yes, so Threepio must be running. It is optional — Threepio trades the same strategies through the normal route without it.

Paste it like the add-on, but as a Strategy. New → NinjaScript Editor → right-click → New Strategy, defaults, paste over the code, F5. It appears under Strategies, not Indicators.

Add it to an NQ 5-minute chart. Right-click the chart → Strategies → add it. In its inputs set the front-month names for NQ, ES and YM, leave Ask Threepio's RiskGate on, choose the account (Sim101 to practise), tick Enabled, OK. That one instance trades all three legs from the one chart. Strategy Analyzer backtests never ask the gate. The three legs carry no daily trade limit: they take every signal their rules produce, and RiskGate still checks each one.

The Strategies dialog's list with the ORBV19Multi entries — Right-click the NQ 5-minute chart → Strategies…: the ORB strategy appears in the list once it has compiled (the shipped file is named ORBV19Multi_Threepio).

The Strategies dialog's properties: Account, Enabled and the order settings — Its properties on the right: choose the Account (Sim101 to practise), set the front-month names in its inputs, leave Ask Threepio's RiskGate on, tick Enabled, OK.

11If something looks wrong

The FAQ has the short answers, the docs have the troubleshooting list, and the copilot inside the app (the drawer at the right edge) knows every step on this page and answers on your machine. In the Discord, say what you see on screen — a screenshot is worth more than a description — and it gets looked at.

RESEARCH: Reports and Incidents — RESEARCH › REPORTS & INCIDENTS. Anything that went wrong stays on this page until it is genuinely fixed, with the detail in full — the first place to look, and the best thing to paste into the Discord.

Nothing is trading, not even on Sim101

Check in this order: NinjaTrader open and logged in; AT Interface ticked and NinjaTrader restarted; the add-on on each 1-minute chart with Days to load at 400; the account name set (section 4); the market open (weekdays, New York session). LIVE ROUTE on the BOOK screen names the one that is missing.

TEST CONNECTION fails

Nine times out of ten: the restart after ticking AT Interface. Close NinjaTrader completely, open it, log in, test again.

The sessions counter is stuck

Set Days to load to 400 on the chart (section 5, step 6). If you set it after the first load and the counter did not move, paste the newest add-on (section 9, step 3) and Reload All Historical Data.