The strategy needed to thrive in satellites is totally different from that which you need to adopt in regular tournaments, I recently wrote a piece for 888poker which explained this in further detail.
People who have a vague understanding of satellites think they are a straightforward form of poker, but there a surprising amount of nuance to them. We cover all of this in my book Poker Satellite Strategy but just to highlight how much there is to learn, let’s just look at game selection.
There are lots of things you need to consider when choosing a satellite, and to demonstrate that I am going to break down the $109 direct satellites to the 888poker LIVE Barcelona Main Event.
What You Get for Your Satellite Buy-in
For your $109 buy-in, you can win a $2,050 package which includes a $1,250 buy-in, $300 for travel and three nights in a hotel. The target event takes place from May 22 at Casino Barcelona, one of the best card rooms in Europe in one of the most luxurious capital cities in the world, at a great time of year.
The first thing to note is this is a ‘Must Play’ satellite. This fact means that you cannot take the cash value of the package instead, nor can you win multiple packages (and take the cash for the second one onwards).
This situation is actually a bigger deal than it first sounds. It means everyone in the satellite wants to go to the event. These players are not grinders who are just good at satellites, playing them because they are profitable. Therefore, you can make a reasonably safe assumption it will be a bit softer than the average $109 satellite.
This target event occurs during the World Series of Poker, another reason to safely assume there will not be many sharks in this satellite as they will all be in Vegas.
What Should Your Satellite Tournament Strategy Be?
Assuming the satellites meet their guarantee, one in twenty players will win a ticket in each one of them. Most satellites qualify between one in five and one in twenty. The strategic difference between them is the more people who win a seat, the tighter you should play.
You should be playing tight anyway in a satellite as I detailed in my previous article. However, you can play a bit more aggressive in these Barcelona satellites because you need to accumulate a big target of chips.
You start with 5,000 chips, and if one in twenty wins a seat, then the average stack on the bubble will be 100,000. You can also reliably estimate that the blind level will be around 5,000/10,000 on the bubble. So, if you get your stack to 100,000 you should be avoiding any further confrontations as this usually will get you over the line (in fact, closer to 70,000 might do it).
You have to be fluid and prepared to switch gears depending on the dynamics at your table. But you don’t need to keep accumulating chips once you are near this average.
You can late register for up to 120 minutes, which would get you to the 250/500 blind level or ten big blinds. If you are a good deep-stack player, you should register at the start because we have made a reasonable assumption this will be a soft satellite. So, you can win a lot of chips early.
However, if you are good at shortstack play and don’t mind variance, registering late is instantly profitable in terms of your equity. We detail why in more detail in Poker Satellite Strategy, but in simple terms, the name of the game is outlasting X amount of players. When you register at the last minute, half the field has already been eliminated.
Finally, the closer the satellite is to the target event, the softer it will be. Not only do the ‘Last Chance’ satellites attract more weekend warriors taking a punt, because this is a ‘Must Play’ satellite you can fairly assume that a lot of the better satellite grinders will have taken themselves out of the running because they’ve already won a seat.
There are so many nuances in satellites that even good players do not know about which we cover in Poker Satellite Strategy.
Good luck qualifying for 888poker LIVE Barcelona!
