Today I would like to talk about satellites, a type of tournament that often gets overlooked or even ignored by some players. While it is true that you usually won’t win any cash (there are a few exceptions that add some money) you should nonetheless consider taking the time to play them. Why? Well, the so called satellites (or qualifiers) are an excellent opportunity to qualify for bigger poker tournaments (possibly big live tournaments like the WSOP, EPT or Aussie Millions) without straining your bankroll too much. If you want to play in a tournament with a $500 buy-in this can really hurt your bankroll (depending on its size of course). In most online poker rooms you will find satellites for bigger tournaments which allows you to spend only a fragment of the otherwise required buy-in.
Let’s stay at our example of the $500 buy-in tournament. A typical satellite for this tournament would be a $50 buy-in. Now the poker room will wait to see how many players sign up for the satellite and then determine how many seats for the $500 buy-in tournament will be made available. In our case you would normally get 1 seat per 10 particpants as this would equal a buy-in of $500 (10 x $50). Let’s assume at our satellite there are 100 participants, therefore we are playing for 10 seats in the big tournament.
But why did I call this blog post Satellite Strategy? Does the strategy for a satellite really differ from a regular multi table tournament strategy? And if so, how? Well, you can argue that you should play a satellite just like any other tournament up until a certain point. The main difference is that in our fictitious satellite tournament 10 people will receive a seat for the tournament that we want to qualify for. And it doesn’t matter at all whether you finish first, third or tenth! Therefore you will want to play it very safe as soon as you are getting close to the bubble and have a decent stack as opposed to a regular tournament where you will still want to increase your stack.
In our example, if you are currently placed 4th and there are only 12 players left, do try to avoid showdowns for big stakes. What good is an all-in with KK or even AA if your opponent with a bigger stack makes a call and hits a straight or flush? The result: You ended up outside of the top ten and failed to qualify (which was your only goal for that satellite to begin with). Better let others make that mistake and wait patiently for them to exit the satellite until there are only 10 players remaining. That is definitely the biggest difference between a satellite and a regular multi table tournament.
Personally I play aggressively at the beginning of a satellite in order to build my stack quickly so I can live off it in the final phase of the tournament. So from the start up until the middle of the tournament I play as I would in any other tournament – but the longer the satellite lasts and the better my current overall place in the tournament, the more careful and conservative my game. With the tournament reaching the final stages I weigh my position at the table more and more and usually will try to play only out of late position and usually avoid trying to steal the pot.
In short: At the beginning of a satellite simply play your normal game that you are comfortable with but the further the tournament proceeds the more you have to keep in mind that it really doesn’t matter whether you end up winning it or ending up at the last position that still qualifies. Your only goal when playing a satellite is to end up winning a seat for the next tournament and preserve your bankroll doing so.
I wish you the best of luck!