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That seems like 110% backwards to me

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I thought so too, at first, but found it much easier to accept lower finishes (usually 4th-5th place) when I knew, at the least, I'd get another freeroll into the same step. Granted, I found that I had to take a much different approach to each game than I would a normal SNG, but that wasn't all too bad.

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Don't bother reading the rest, he lucksacked not busting his roll.

But it's not necessarily a bad thing to do...just ridiculously time consuming and high variance.

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I'm not really sure about the first statement. With the finishing structure above level 1, ensuring a "second chance" is fairly easy.

To Quickly summarize:

<u>Mini-Step 2</u>
Place - 1,2 - Entry to Mini-Step 3
Place - 3-5 - Entry to Mini-Step 2
Place - 6-9 - Entry to Mini-Step 1 *This is the most critical finishing spot to avoid
Place - 10 - Thanks for Playing

<u>Mini-Step 3</u>
Place - 1,2 - Entry to Mini-Step 4
Place - 3,4 - Entry to Mini-Step 3
Place - 5,6 - Entry to Mini-Step 2
Place - 7,8 - Entry to Mini-Step 1 *
Place - 9,10 - Thanks for Playing

<u>Mini-Step 4</u>
Place - 1,2 - Entry to Mini-Step 5
Place - 3-5 - Entry to Mini-Step 4
Place - 6,7 - Entry to Mini-Step 3
Place - 8 - Entry to Mini-Step 2
Place - 9 - Entry to Mini-Step 1 *
Place - 10 - Thanks for Playing

<u>Mini-Step 5</u>
Place 1-5 - $$$
Place 6-10 - Thanks for playing

Again, I had a two-fold reason for trying this, the main being that I simply didn't want to grind out the micros for bonus money and 2-4BB an hour. Sure, it would've probably been easier to just buy into 20 $11's and hope for a positive return, but I figured it was a lot safer to work on ensuring a top-5 finish and try to outplay a small table for 2 spots than it is to consistantly outplay an entire table for 3 spots.

FWIW, I don't claim to be any kind of expert on the subject. It was an experiment that turned profitable and got me back on my feet, so I thought I'd share the story. I'd be really interested to read more about the research into these structures, though, to see why all the negative press.

I'll never claim I wasn't lucky during my run, but I'd like to think I had a little skill and a good gameplan.