Playing with a short stack can be a trying and frustrating experience. In tournaments where the blinds go up frequently and quickly, being a short stack can be the kiss of death. You are severely limited in your playing power when you have few chips making it easier for your opponents to exploit you. If you are a short stack, the first rule is to not panic. This is easy enough; you just do not play a hand incorrectly because you don’t have a lot of chips. Sticking to basic poker strategy will help you here more than it will hurt you.
The second rule of playing with a short stack at PokerStars.com is to avoid being blinded out. This is a bit more difficult since it sometimes requires a good deal of action on your part. You need to be able to read your opponents much better than they need to read you. It is much harder to bluff an opponent when they have considerably more chips than you do. Even if they have a worse hand, it is often correct for them to value bet their hands if it will knock you out of the tournament. To compensate for this you need to play only premium hands. This is much easier said than done. When blinds are looming near, you need to make a quick decision of whether a seemingly mediocre hand is the best shot you have of winning more chips. Unfortunately, this is something that you can only guess at. A mediocre hand can win big for you, but it can just as easily wipe you out of the tournament.