Setting Up Your First Bot

Setting Up Your First Bot

Esta guia te lleva paso a paso por creating your first grid bot from start to finish. Al final, tendras un bot funcionando en modo demo, listo para probar antes de comprometer capital real.

Requisitos previos

Before starting, make sure tienes:

• A Gridera account with a connected Pacifica DEX wallet.
• Sufficient balance in your Pacifica account (if planning to go live later).
• A basic understanding of what grid trading does. If not, read What is Gridera? first.

Paso 1: Choose Your Trading Pair

Select the asset quieres to trade. For your first bot, pick an asset estas familiar with and that has good liquidity on Pacifica DEX. Popular choices include SOL-PERP and ETH-PERP.

Liquidity matters porque affects order fill quality. Altaer liquidity means tu ordens fill at the expected price with minimal slippage.

Paso 2: Determine Your Grid Range

The rango de grid defines el precio boundaries where tu bot operates. You need two values:

Grid low: The lowest price where el bot coloca ordenes de compra. Set this below the precio actual at a level you consider strong support.

Grid high: The highest price where take-profit orders execute. Set this above the precio actual at a level you consider resistance.

For your first bot, a moderate range of 15-25% total width se recomienda. Por ejemplo, if SOL is at $150:

• Grid low: $130 (about 13% below)
• Grid high: $170 (about 13% above)

This gives enough room for normal price fluctuations sin being so wide that tu capital is spread too thin.

Paso 3: Set Grid Levels

The number of nivel de grids determines how many price points el bot uses within your range. More levels mean tighter spacing and more frequent trades but smaller profit per trade.

For beginners, 15-25 levels is a good starting point. This provides a balance between trade frequency and per-trade profit.

Cuando enter “20 grids,” the system creates 20 equal segments with 21 nivel de precios (including ambos boundaries). With grid low $130 and grid high $170, the spacing is $2 per level. Each completed trade captures roughly $2 profit per unit minus fees.

Paso 4: Set Your Total Budget

Enter the Total Budget — the total amount of capital quieres to deploy. The system automatically divides this across your nivel de grids.

For your first bot, start conservatively:

• $100-200 for a small test account.
• $500-1,000 for moderate accounts.
• $2,000+ for serious trading.

The tamano de orden per nivel de grid se calcula automatically: Total Budget ÷ Grid Levels = Order per Grid. Por ejemplo, $200 budget with 10 levels = $20 per nivel de grid.

Your required balance is approximately Total Budget × 1.2. The 1.2 multiplier provides a safety margin.

Paso 4b: Use Strategy Presets (Optional)

Instead of configuring manually, puedes use Strategy Presets. Open the Strategy Presets panel — the system analyzes live market data (trend, volatility, support/resistance) and recommends the best strategy for current conditions.

Each preset shows a match percentage based on market analysis. Presets with 80%+ match are highlighted as recommended. Click “Apply” to auto-fill your grid settings.

Paso 4c: Run a Backtest (Recommended)

Before starting with real money, run a Backtest. Open the Backtest panel, enter your grid settings, select a time period (1 week, 1 month, etc.), and click “Run Backtest.”

The system simulates tu estrategia against real historical price data and shows: Net PnL, ROI, Win Rate, Total Trades, Fees, and Max Drawdown. This te ayuda a validate tu estrategia before risking capital.

Paso 5: Set Leverage

For your first bot, use 1x or 2x leverage. Altaer leverage amplifies ambos profits and risks, and until estas comfortable with how grid bots behave, conservative leverage protects you from unexpected losses.

At 1x leverage, hay effectively no riesgo de liquidacion. At 2x, the precio de liquidacion is roughly 45% below your average entry, which provides ample safety margin for most grid configurations.

Paso 6: Configure Safety Settings

Grid break mode: Set to shutdown. Esto significa el bot automatically stop and close positions si el precio exits tu rango de grid. This is your primary safety mechanism.

Grid break buffer: Set to 0.2% (default). This small buffer prevents false triggers from brief price wicks.

Grid break confirmation: Set to 30-60 seconds. El precio must stay outside the range for this duration before shutdown triggers. Esto previene shutdown on momentary spikes.

Stop loss: Set Stop Loss to 10-15% for your first bot. Este es un last-resort protection if el precio cae sharply through your range.

Bias Mode (optional): You can adjust el bot’s order sizing strategy in en tiempo real. The default is “Neutral” (equal orders). Advanced users can switch to “Long Biased” (heavier buys low), “Aggressive” (+50% orders), or “Conservative” (-30% orders). Leave this on Neutral for your first bot.

Step 7: Enable Paper Mode

For your first bot, always start in paper mode. Set dry_run: true in tu configuracion. This runs el bot with real market prices but sin placing actual orders on el exchange.

Paper mode lets you observe el bot’s behavior, verify your grid spacing generates trades, and check that safety settings work as expected, all sin risking capital.

Step 7b: Connect Telegram (Optional)

Go to Connect Telegram in the sidebar. Follow the 3-step setup to receive bot notifications on your Telegram — start/stop alerts, risk warnings, TP/SL triggers, and grid break notifications.

Step 8: Launch the Bot

With tu configuracion complete, start el bot from el dashboard. You should see:

• El bot status change to “running.”
• Grid levels appearing in el bot view.
• Buy orders being placed (simulated) below the precio actual.
• Log entries showing the cycle running every 15 seconds.

Step 9: Monitor and Learn

Let the paper mode bot run for at least 3-5 days. During this time, observe:

• How often trades complete (buy followed by TP sell).
• How el bot handles price drops (fills more buy levels).
• How el bot handles price rises (TP orders fill, levels free up).
• Whether el bot self-heals any issues through reconciliation.

Check el dashboard daily to review PnL, trade count, and bot health indicators.

Paso 10: Go Live

Cuando are satisfied with paper mode performance, transition to live trading:

1. Stop the paper mode bot.
2. Change dry_run: false in tu configuracion.
3. Verify tu cuenta balance covers the required capital.
4. Start el bot.

Keep el mismo configuration you tested. Changing parameters during the transition defeats the purpose of paper testing.

Resumen

• Start with a moderate rango de grid (15-25% width), 15-25 levels, conservative tamano de orden, and 1x-2x leverage.
• Siempre begin in paper mode to validate tu configuracion before risking real capital.
• Monitor paper mode for 3-5 days, then transition to live with the exact same settings.

Siguiente Paso

Learn more about paper mode testing in Paper Mode Testing.