A ribbon of five or six averages looks authoritative. It also covers the candles you need to read for confirmation. In class we cap ribbons at three periods unless a student can name the question each line answers.
A lean ribbon example
- Short period: context for pullbacks inside a trend
- Middle period: bias for the holding horizon
- Long period: regime filter — are we even in a trend worth trading?
Colour alone is not a rule. Write when a stacked, expanding ribbon permits notes and when a compressed ribbon means flat conditions.
Housekeeping
If two periods in your ribbon always sit on top of each other, delete one. Redundancy is not confirmation.