I'm going to be playing in an event with a buy-in that I've never come close to playing before. I usually play $10 and under events, and this is a $150 event. I won a satellite to it, so it's not like I'm blowing a big stack of my bankroll doing it.

I'm making the assumption that there's a difference between $10 tourney players and $150 ones. Is this a correct assumption to make? Are people tighter at higher buyins? Or are things about the same? Are people more apt to try and push out other people with a re-raise even with no hand?

I usually manage to survive well by not doing anything stupid, and not making any outrageous bluffs. I defend my BB when it looks like its trying to be stolen, and I steal blinds myself when the opportunity arises. I feel I play solid poker, and as such, the buy in shouldn't matter.

Sorry if this ends up looking like a stupid post, I'm just really looking to play well, and getting any advice I can will be helpful.

I dont think youll find a lot of difference, at least until the later stages. You are going to face a mix of players in from satellites who look like your usual competition and higher buyin players who either bought in or also made satellites. Plus a good number of your usual competition (and you presumably) are good players who havent yet built a bankroll.

When you get to the late stages you might find the lower buyin players tighten up in anticipation of a big payday and not wanting to blow it, so dont fall into that trap, and look for players who are autofolding almost every hand except there blinds.

I dont think you see much of people trying to buy pots with reraises until the late stages as well, primarily because of the players trying to see cheap flops with marginal hands who min-raise, hoping that some minor show of strength avoids a standard 3x bb raise.

The players seem the same despite the higher level buy-ins. Just play your game - I haven't noticed that big of a difference in skill level at the higher buy ins.

On the bubble, some players will tighten up, stall, just to make the money. Note who's defending their blinds and who's just hoping to blind off into the money. You can build up your chip stack during this time.