The Genie Usage, Tips and Strategy ONLY Thread

[Disturbia]

Skyliner messed up our Epcot plans even though Mears was surprisingly just a 35+ min ride. We waited for 20+ mins at the CB around 4 pm. We just chose to eat around the WS and skip our first pass (Nemo; did standby with our infant (rest went on Soarin) and it broke down and took 20 mins). We couldn’t rider switch as Soarin and Test track each took 30 mins+. The walk from Test Track to Remy was a good 13 mins (budget 20+) and the LL itself was 10 mins to the scanner (ride was down in the am), we told a CM and she assured us that they would allow us on the ride (we had 3 mins of the 15 min grace period left when we got in). 19,300 steps on check in day. Skyliner back was told 40 min wait, actual was about 25 mins; the CB stop had no wait.

Today for Mk, I booked SDMT for the evening and Jungle cruise. I should have booked JC first as within the min it took me to book SDMT, JC was showing only 5 pm+. I kept refreshing and at 7:04 am got 11:35 (acceptable).

 

[twirly123]

Arriving next week (hopefully)! I was hoping to get a genie plus reservation for frozen for after dinner. We are at AK in the morning. Can anyone tell me when frozen passes usually run out - wondering if I can get a safari reservation at 7am and then get frozen after. Thanks

 

[The Foolish Mortal]

Maybe. I believe that reservation has been a tough one since the changes to $ILL. For example, its 9:15 in Orlando right now and its already showing FEA s not having any availaibility

 

[Brett Wyman]

There really isn't a truly ILL worthy ride at Epcot right now. Remy gets a pass just by being new. Once Guardians is there FEE will surely be dropped. But for now Frozen sells out quickly simply for lack of rides at Epcot that fit the ILL mold(I fell like Soarin' would have been a better placeholder choice untill Guardians opened). The Frozen ILL is usually a true walk-on.

 

[CaptainAmerica]

Once Guardians is there FEE will surely be dropped.

I'm not a fan of ILL in general, but this is my biggest complaint. It's just over-used. If you concede the premise that some attractions "need" ILL, the list is very short.

- Rise
- Rat (when it first opened, but not anymore)
- Flight of Passage maybe
- Guardians
- TRON

It should really be deployed as a way to soften the blow of brand new attractions when they first open, not arbitrarily applied to whatever happens to be the most popular two attractions in each park at a given time. I'd love to see them return 6 of the 8 current ILL attractions to Genie+, even if that meant a Genie+ price increase to $20.

 

[Westerner]

.

 

[twirly123]

Thanks everyone. That’s a really helpful chart Westerner. It’s Sunday I was hoping to get safari and frozen so might risk it and cancel
Safari if it’s looking like frozen may be gone by 930.

 

[Westerner]

Thanks everyone. That’s a really helpful chart Westerner. It’s Sunday I was hoping to get safari and frozen so might risk it and cancel
Safari if it’s looking like frozen may be gone by 930.

I hear you and get the sense that Frozen may be more important to you than Safari. The thing is, if your Sunday turns out like the past couple Sundays, Frozen return windows may not hit evening til 900a, thus you may not be gaining much by foregoing booking KS at 7. So I recommend the following to cover all bases:

• Pin Frozen and KS in Tip Board
• At 7am on your Sunday, look at return windows for Frozen and refresh for ~5 minutes.
• If return window for Frozen hits 7-8pm or whatever your desired afterdinner time is, book it. It's a sign that it's going quickly like weekdays.
• OTOH if Frozen return time stays earlier - say in afternoon - then put the phone away and check Frozen again at 725am. If return window is after dinner, book it. Again it's a sign it's going quickly.
• If Frozen return time is still in afternoon at 725am it's a sign that Frozen is going slowly like other Sundays, and you should be good to book KS - just do it by 730am so you don't fall behind on being able to book Frozen at 930am (730 + 2 hrs).
• Tradeoff if you book Frozen first is you can only book your next LL at 1030 (Epcot park open 830 + 2)

You can also practice this with a dry run beforehand.

Just like investments, past performance is no guarantee of future results so YMMV.

 

[jbish]

Friends - I have been working on a plan for our HS day in two weeks. I'd like to run this by you as I think I found an opportunity for stacking and being slightly ahead of the crowds while waiting out the 2 hour periods. Currently I have reservations at HS, but I'm thinking of switching to AK and hopping to HS later. Staying on site so I have access to Early Theme Park Entry. Also, very unusual, but this is the one day that HS has the Extra Evening Hours for the deluxe resorts instead of MK.

Date: Wednesday, April 13th - expected to be very busy (HS crowd level 9)
Park Hours: AK (7:30a-8:30p, 7am ETPE)
HS (8a-9p, 9p-11p EEH)
Of note: FOP and ROTR are NOT high priorities for us. We rode both several times last June so I'll save the money where I can!)

My idea is based on realizing that there is a little bit of "arbitrage" given the different times the parks open. Unfortunately, they just extended hours at all of the parks and so the difference between AK opening at 7:30 and HS at 8 isn't a huge advantage anymore. But given how difficult it is to stack at HS these days, I'll take whatever advantage I can get. Also, I know that we'll have those two extra hours at the end of the night so I anticipate we will get the most accomplished in those two hours.

Plan:

• 7:00 - book LL for It's Tough to be a Bug for 7:30 (no competition for this right at 7 am)
• 7:30 - arrive at AK for regular opening (come after the initial rush as I'm trying not to burn out the family with too early of a start with a planned late night)
  • As early as possible, tap in to ITTBAB (which is easy to get to since it's right at the front of the park. We may or may not actually go in. Haven't gone in years but the thought of the bugs crawling behind me already gives me the heebie jeebies.)
  • Book SDD for sometime around 5-7 pm (this has been available up until 8 am some days, so it's a calculated risk)
• Now my next LL booking time will be 9:30 vs. anyone that has a HS reservation who will be booking at 10 am (EP opens at 8:30 and MK opens at 9, so anyone that has a reservation there will be even further behind)

Please let me know if you think this will work. I'm hoping this could be helpful for someone else to use this same strategy on a day, ideally, when there's more time between the two parks opening. Poke holes in my strategy!!

 

[Disturbia]

Was able to get pirates (had to delete a 2 pm one which didn’t show up immediately and keep refreshing. Rode Magic Carpets standby in a hot 35 mins.





By 5:20 space was selling out or going into the 10-11pm range. I constantly refreshed to get it (12 mins) before 9:25 pm CRT dinner (app drains battery)




Dinner at CRT took almost 2 hours (boxed desserts as kids were ready to pass out), so we couldn’t use our last Haunted Mansion pass. Wanted to ride Winnie the Pooh but at 7:30 pm it wouldn’t give a time between 8-9 (Pooh more popular than HM and HM was down an hour or so before) Rode the Carousel and watched Mickey’s Philharmonic show before dinner.

 

[Westerner]

Friends - I have been working on a plan for our HS day in two weeks. I'd like to run this by you as I think I found an opportunity for stacking and being slightly ahead of the crowds while waiting out the 2 hour periods. Currently I have reservations at HS, but I'm thinking of switching to AK and hopping to HS later. Staying on site so I have access to Early Theme Park Entry. Also, very unusual, but this is the one day that HS has the Extra Evening Hours for the deluxe resorts instead of MK.

Date: Wednesday, April 13th - expected to be very busy (HS crowd level 9)
Park Hours: AK (7:30a-8:30p, 7am ETPE)
HS (8a-9p, 9p-11p EEH)
Of note: FOP and ROTR are NOT high priorities for us. We rode both several times last June so I'll save the money where I can!)

My idea is based on realizing that there is a little bit of "arbitrage" given the different times the parks open. Unfortunately, they just extended hours at all of the parks and so the difference between AK opening at 7:30 and HS at 8 isn't a huge advantage anymore. But given how difficult it is to stack at HS these days, I'll take whatever advantage I can get. Also, I know that we'll have those two extra hours at the end of the night so I anticipate we will get the most accomplished in those two hours.

Plan:

• 7:00 - book LL for It's Tough to be a Bug for 7:30 (no competition for this right at 7 am)
• 7:30 - arrive at AK for regular opening (come after the initial rush as I'm trying not to burn out the family with too early of a start with a planned late night)
  • As early as possible, tap in to ITTBAB (which is easy to get to since it's right at the front of the park. We may or may not actually go in. Haven't gone in years but the thought of the bugs crawling behind me already gives me the heebie jeebies.)
  • Book SDD for sometime around 5-7 pm (this has been available up until 8 am some days, so it's a calculated risk)
• Now my next LL booking time will be 9:30 vs. anyone that has a HS reservation who will be booking at 10 am (EP opens at 8:30 and MK opens at 9, so anyone that has a reservation there will be even further behind)

Please let me know if you think this will work. I'm hoping this could be helpful for someone else to use this same strategy on a day, ideally, when there's more time between the two parks opening. Poke holes in my strategy!!

Very clever park opening arbitrage idea jbish! If you can pull this off not only do you get SDD but you'll be booking the rest of your LL's 30 minutes ahead of the pack all day long (930, 1130, 130 instead of 10, 12, 2). As you requested I'll poke holes:

• You're assuming you can book a DHS ride after tapping in to ITTBAB at 730 despite it being prior to DHS park open at 8. Technically, I think this should be OK, tap-in generally trumps the 120 minute rule, but I've not seen reports of anyone who's tried this specific PH scenario.
• What if Bug doesn't open right at 730 for some reason, or you're delayed in getting to it and you can't tap in? I suppose you can always cancel the Bug LL and rebook SDD worst case.
• Internet access inside the Bug theater may not be so good. I guess you can always book it right after tap-in before going inside, just be ready.
• You're risking SDD being sold out at 730. It's probably the single most sought-after G+ LL in terms of wait time saved.

 

[holyrita]

Very clever park opening arbitrage idea jbish! If you can pull this off not only do you get SDD but you'll be booking the rest of your LL's 30 minutes ahead of the pack all day long (930, 1130, 130 instead of 10, 12, 2). As you requested I'll poke holes:

• You're assuming you can book a DHS ride after tapping in to ITTBAB at 730 despite it being prior to DHS park open at 8. Technically, I think this should be OK, tap-in generally trumps the 120 minute rule, but I've not seen reports of anyone who's tried this specific PH scenario.
• What if Bug doesn't open right at 730 for some reason, or you're delayed in getting to it and you can't tap in? I suppose you can always cancel the Bug LL and rebook SDD worst case.
• Internet access inside the Bug theater may not be so good. I guess you can always book it right after tap-in before going inside, just be ready.
• You're risking SDD being sold out at 730. It's probably the single most sought-after G+ LL in terms of wait time saved.
  • Based on recent thrill data, SDD has been available on most Wednesdays at 730-ish. YMMV.

Looking at thrill-data there's a high likelihood that even at 7am you could get an 8am return time which put you right in line with everyone else at HS.

 

[NYEmomma]

Planning our June trip, which is our first with the G+ system. I'm starting at the beginning of this thread and hope it doesn't take me all 190 page to figure out what the heck I'm doing but I'm not optimistic. Compared to the old FP system, this is crazy confusing and overwhelming.

 

[Tom_E_D]

Planning our June trip, which is our first with the G+ system. I'm starting at the beginning of this thread and hope it doesn't take me all 190 page to figure out what the heck I'm doing but I'm not optimistic. Compared to the old FP system, this is crazy confusing and overwhelming.

Beware! Much of what was written on this thread before Thanksgiving week is outdated. Disney made a major change to the Genie+ system that week. Don't get excited when reading about double stacks, triple stacks, etc. You can no longer get away with doing those. I think the first page of the Everything Genie thread is a better place to start.

 

[NYEmomma]

Beware! Much of what was written on this thread before Thanksgiving week is outdated. Disney made a major change to the Genie+ system that week. Don't get excited when reading about double stacks, triple stacks, etc. You can no longer get away with doing those. I think the first page of the Everything Genie thread is a better place to start.

I appreciate the advice. Any other sage wisdom? We have all prioritized our rides and know that things have changed (and that the parks are busier) and we're likely not going to be able to ride everything we want to like we usually do. I feel like I've got a handle on MK and EPCOT but HS is stressing me out.

 

[Westerner]

Looking at thrill-data there's a high likelihood that even at 7am you could get an 8am return time which put you right in line with everyone else at HS.

Sorry, not following. An 8am return time for what ride?

 

[Tom_E_D]

I appreciate the advice. Any other sage wisdom? We have all prioritized our rides and know that things have changed (and that the parks are busier) and we're likely not going to be able to ride everything we want to like we usually do. I feel like I've got a handle on MK and EPCOT but HS is stressing me out.

Sage wisdom . . . from ME??? I don't know about that. I never eat the stuff. I will recommend that you pack your patience and don't panic if it looks like everything you want is unavailable. If you know how the "refresh" method worked with Fastpass+, there are people who have had luck using it with Genie+. It may take longer to get something you want though. It'll be even harder with Individual Lightning Lane selections since those are supposedly non-cancelable. Good luck.

 

[holyrita]

Sorry, not following. An 8am return time for what ride?

Sorry! I quoted the wrong post. It looks like at 7AM the return times for ITTBAB are around 8AM.

 

[Westerner]

Sorry! I quoted the wrong post. It looks like at 7AM the return times for ITTBAB are around 8AM.

Oh, I see. Yes, the LL return times for ITTBAB at 7am are around 8AM or slightly before on thrilldata.

@jbish Suggest you check Tip Board in advance for Bug right at 7:00:00AM and check what return times are offered. You're in uncharted territory and I'm not sure if a return time of 7:30AM (right at AK park open) is actually offered.

 

[pens4821]

I appreciate the advice. Any other sage wisdom? We have all prioritized our rides and know that things have changed (and that the parks are busier) and we're likely not going to be able to ride everything we want to like we usually do. I feel like I've got a handle on MK and EPCOT but HS is stressing me out.

I think with a good plan you’ll ride pretty much all that you want. Im not sure how many park days you have or if you have hoppers, but even one day in each park I think you should be ok. Get there for early entry if on site (This is huge), get in a popular line at the end of the night or fireworks at MK, and use genie+ and I think you’ll be fine. If you have hoppers use ETPE at one park and stack for the other. Take a couple hour break in between.

We were fortunate with multiple days in each park so we got all we wanted multiple times. But even being there during sold out spring break we got a lot done in one day. We got enough accomplished that a couple times we’d go to a park and not really do much of anything.