In order to be a successful satellite player you need to understand at least basic poker strategy and basic tournament concepts. Specifically, if you do not know what “pot odds” or “implied odds” are, make sure to visit the “poker basics” section of our website. I’d also recommend buying “Winning Low Limit Hold’em” by Lee Jones and “Tournament Poker For Advanced Players” by David Sklansky.

For those of you who already know poker tournament basics, I hope you’re ready to enjoy a hobby that could lead you to the final table of the World Series of Poker main event. The key to being successful in satellites is understanding how the payout works. In most satellites (called super satellites), multiple places receive the same prize, typically entry into a larger poker tournament. Some satellites are winner-take-all affairs. Each type has its own correct strategy.

In a super-satellite, for example, you should play a normal strategy for most of the tournament, but then make strategy adjustments as you enter the final third of the tournament. If you have a small stack you should be aggressively pushing all-in when you think you have a chance to win a pot pre-flop. If you are a medium stack, you should be cautiously looking for opportunities to steal a few more than your fair share of pots pre-flop, but with normal raises, not all-ins. If you are among the chip leaders, you should only play big pairs, and sometimes fold even those hands if you think you can easily survive until the tournament ends. For more detailed strategy on these types of tournaments, see our “super-satellite strategy” section.

Some of your opponents will be making proper strategy adjustments at the end of a satellite, but many of them won’t. You will have to observe your opponent to decide who is making adjustments and who isn’t. Absorbing this information will allow you to make plays you wouldn’t be able to make in a normal tournament. You could push all in with 27-offsuit from the small blind late in a super-satellite, knowing the chip leader in the big blind who’s playing good satellite strategy is not going to call. Similarly, if you notice many players late in the tournament haven’t made strategy adjustments, you might try to wait for some of the bigger stacks to eliminate each other rather than try to push them around with a marginal hand.

There are a myriad of factors which must be considered when deciding what the best action to take on a particular poker hand is. With all else being equal, though, a good rule of thumb is to do the opposite of what your opponents are doing. Play aggressively when everyone else is folding. Play conservatively when your opponents are raising and re-raising each other on every hand. In super-satellites this should be done on a macro level as well. Try to figure out the overall strategy each player is using and exploit its weaknesses. Understand how the escalating blinds and flat payout structure should factor in to decisions you are making. Understand the degree to which those factors are or aren’t influencing your opponents’ strategies.

Constantly check your own motives when playing a satellite as well. Don’t necessarily call a raise or fold a hand just because it improves your chances of getting the most chips or knocking out a player who annoys you. Make the play you think is most likely to improve your chances of winning a seat into the target tournament. That’s why you entered the satellite, isn’t it?