Some wireless communications environments, such as Wi-Fi, may include inexpensive power amplifiers where the power adjustment may not be accurate, and may also include pathloss measurement errors that are high enough to degrade performance of a power control algorithm. To address this issue, an exemplary aspect is directed toward a finite state power control algorithm and technique that, while designed for next generation Wi-Fi standards, such as 802.11ax, can in general be used with any wireless communication protocol or standard.