I am going to the Poly on 9/17 and have really enjoyed your trip report. Took me awhile to read it all but it was worth it. So entertaining.
I picked up my documents today, so it is even more real.
Would you please share your room info so that I might request it on my online check in?
Now I will begin reading your dining report.
Thanks again.
Thanks for taking the time to read my report.
Congrats on your upcoming trip to the Poly! You are in for a real treat!
The rooms that are on the 3rd floor, volcano pool side of Samoa are 3601-3610, with the lower numbers being closer to the GCH and the higher numbers being closer to the lagoon. This time we were in 3602 which had a great view, but last time we were in 3604 and I thought that one was slightly better, because we could see more of the lagoon and the beach over by Luau Cove. As a rule, I would think that the closer you get to 10, the better, however there are some tall palm trees over by 8, 9, 10 that might partially obstruct the view (at least it looks as though they might from the ground, I have not been on those balconies to say so for sure).
I don't recommend requesting a particular room, because if you do that and that room you requested is not available, the assignor doesn't know what it was about that room that you wanted, so they could place you anywhere.
Here is what I did. I called my
travel agent (you can do this directly through central reservations if you don't have a TA), and said I wanted to place a request on my reservation. I made my request like this "Third floor balcony, preferably in Samoa on the volcano side." This way the room assignor would know that my #1 request was for the third floor, and if I couldn't get a third floor, I'd be OK with a second floor with a balcony, and my preferred building was Samoa and that I'd ideally face the volcano. Since there are only 10 rooms in the whole resort that fit my exact requests, there was high likelihood that none of these rooms would be available. If that were the case, The room assignor might have perhaps thought to assign a 3rd floor on the opposite side of Samoa, a 3rd floor on the marina side of Fiji or a 2nd floor in Tokelau on the quiet pool side, and of which would have pleased us!
When you do online check-in, your choices for requests are very limited. You can request a building (check Samoa) but the only floor you can request is "ground floor."
Good luck!
But I guess they don't do 4 in a row! 
