Live trading is where mistakes cost money. VelaDeck is deliberately biased toward paper by default and asks you to opt in explicitly.
The default: paper, always
When you connect Alpaca, we probe both paper and live account access with the same OAuth token, then show you a picker screen. Paper is pre-selected. This is the same account you'll get if you skip the question.
Step 1 — verify signals fire
Assign a small USD amount ($100–$500) to one strategy in paper. Wait for the next monthly rebalance (or trigger the ingester manually if you're testing). Confirm you see the planned orders appear on the dashboard.
Step 2 — verify fills
Turn on live trading (still on your paper account). The next signal that fires will POST to Alpaca. Check Positions — the shares should appear at the price Alpaca gave you. Check the dashboard order row — the status should say `sent` and `filled_avg_price` should get populated.
Step 3 — verify P/L tracking
Wait a day. The portfolio snapshot cron records your Alpaca portfolio value. On the second snapshot the dashboard chart appears. Now you have a real-time P/L view.
Step 4 — flip to live
Only now: connect a live Alpaca account (with actual funds), assign USD to the strategies you want, and flip the same toggle in Settings. The pipeline is identical — only the API base changes.
Monthly cap: your circuit breaker
Set a monthly cap per strategy. If a strategy fires 20 BUY signals in a single month at $500 each, the naïve total is $10k. A cap of $3k executes the first six and skips the rest with a clear `skipped_over_cap` status on the planned orders. You always know why a signal didn't fill.