We cruised on the 2/5 Magic, this was our second cruise with
DCL. Both times were on the Eastern Itinerary and both times were in the Winter. I agree with the poster that these boards and all of the other sites out there on DCL are a double edged sword - some folks tend to have way too high of an expectation. And there are no more secrets anymore - deck 7 is no longer a secret, it is hard to get into palos these days, and most cruises are full so there are no at port upgrades - but that is the internet & the nature of the beast.
Because of the double edged sword and folks with very, very high expectations alot of the blame tends to fall on DCL.
The seas on the 2/5 cruise were very rocky and alot of folks were sick - I could not get over all of the folks I heard commenting on DCL and the weather, hey it is mother nature not DCL - and this can be the price you pay to travel this time of year. As far as not docking at CC, even after the first attempt you could not believe the line at guest services with people complaining, yes it is unfortunate, however being on a ship wearing shorts, even though it was cool is better than being at home shoveling snow. Yes, several excursions on St Thomas were cancelled but it could have been worse - it could have been raining.
It can be a double edged sword thought for those who have cruised before. On our first DCL cruise (2002), DCL really exceeded our expectations however I think because of this we had quite a few letdowns. First of all, we booked an inside last time - we were on a upper deck. This time we opted for a porthole on deck 2 - would rather be inside minus a window than under beatstreet. Last trip our serving team and stateroom hostess were great, I was disappointed this time - we commented to our headserver that we don't eat seafood, however every night he continued to tell us about the great seafood specials. Last cruise, only had to tell the head server once he remembered. I agree with the post about the assistant server doing most of the work, it does seem that way. And yes, on "tip" night everyone does seem a bit more friendly. On our first cruise our stateroom hostess knew we had late seating and would not come to the room until after 8:30, however this trip the stateroom hostess knocked every night about 7:50 to 8pm trying to come in, she obviously didn't get it.
I think that Disney seems to somewhat be slipping in their customer service, the CM's are being spread way too thin. On our last cruise the CM's seemed to go out of their way to make sure you were happy or that there were no kids in the quiet pool - this time at the quiet pool there were only about 2 CM's roaming around to make sure this happened and it did happen but 2 people taking drink orders speaking to guests can't control everything. And as far as Capt Tom stating that they never miss CC - I for one don't believe that is true, I may be wrong but our Happy Limo driver mentioned to us that the seas have been very rough this late fall/winter and the ship has missed. I don't think disney has to go out of there way for customers anymore - they only have 2 ships and tons & tons of disney followers willing to pay to take a DCL.
Before I am flamed though it was a great trip and we will do it again, why because it is wonderful family time in a nice atmosphere with in my opinion a great kids club.
I could go on and on about the ups and downs but people are going to form their own opinions and some will take it personally. All, I can say is try it - go and spend time with your family, hopefully the weather will be beautiful, someone else is doing the cooking, the cleaning and the driving. The trip is what you make of it, just have fun!
I just read a thread about the ship being boring and really not worth it, I am really afraid that I made a mistake in booking this cruise. We are going on the Feb 25th 2006 Western Carib. on the Magic. This trip is costing over $5000 and I know we could go to a lot of place with that money and we could go RCCL and ahve a suite with concierge service.
If you want to have a good time, you will. Sometimes you just have to be a part of the fun and enjoy it more. 
Happy Valentines Day to all, let me just tell you that it is what you make it, my DH and I are very fussy and have a friend who is very fussy and told us do it you will love it and we did. If you go in with pre-conceived notions or expectations you are bound to find fault, we had a blast and I had been on this board for at least six months so I definately had some thoughts about what it would be like. I cannot tell you how wonderful it was. Yes there are issues I think with the kids programming but in fairness to them I saw a lot of parents who just dropped their kids off with drinks in hand at 10:00 in the morning and left them all day. The kids programming is safe and clean. Is it school, no I don't think so. They definately have a challenge there. The wait servers were awesome they become like family, the room stewards well we just wished we could have taken ours home with us. He (Ary) was so kind and gentle to us and our DS. We just loved it give it a try.
We were next to the serving station and he would yell at another server often. The head server was called over several times during the week. We made jokes with our servers about it to ease the tension. We could tell that they were embarrassed that we had witnessed any of it.
