Early on in most low limit or re-buy tourney, I play just about any 2 cards that I hit a flop with.. Suited connectors 56+, 1 gappers 6-8+, any 2 paint... Phil's strategy is a huge flaw early in most online tourney play where your MAIN objective is to accumulate chips, and you dont do that waiting for monsters.. I'm better off being aggressive in the first 2 levels and gaining 500-1000 chips when I can get them 50-100 at a time and go in the later levels with at least 800-1K if not more chips ahead of the average. It gives you much more maneuverability, and allows you to play more poker.

Ex raising 89s in the CO in an un-opened pot and making a continuation bet on a flop might have missed you. 9/10 times it will get you the blinds+raise which may be 5-600 chips. But, if your opps only have 12-1300 chips and you have them covered 2-1 they are much less inclined to play back at you and let that 100 or 200 chips go..

If you want real tourney strategy that is more applicable to online play, read Kill Phil and leave PPLTP on the nightstand. It is much more suited to live play IMHO. It does apply somewhat to online play, but telling you to only play the top 10 hands is BS, because guys like me that are SLAA are going to have a big advantage when we see more flops, and have good post flop play. It's not really playing poker when you see AA and hit ALL-IN. Playing poker is seeing 78s in mp, raising to isolate, and getting people to lay down better hands by outplaying them. You'll be MUCH further ahead when you do that! You can use Phils strategy and play airtight until you open up your game, but waiting for top 10 hands in online play is going to generally leave you short stacked and up against the wall..

One of the Sats I played yesterday I had T15K at the break, and had a 4200 spread on the field... I had exactly one hand where I had one of those top ten hands, and it was #10.