Curious how FP+ has changed your touring style, if at all?

[jtowntoflorida]

How are you able to ride Soarin and TSMM multiple times under FP+ if you don't want to wait? You can't officially get multiple FP+ for the same ride and there is no way those are going to be 4th FP choices.

Maybe the poster means multiple times per trip?

 

[mom2rtk]

Maybe the poster means multiple times per trip?

More than likely.

Because if you weren't the type to get to the parks before legacy FPs ran out, you are likely not the sort to get there in time to get a headliner as a 4th FP at DHS or Epcot.

 

[mom2rtk]

Not an annual pass holder to WDW here. We go on 4 day Military Salute park hoppers.

I completely disagree with you, not about the less TS reservation part, but about the three rides and out part. I wholeheartedly believe that that is EXACTLY what they want, no matter what they say. It's a crowd control measure. They want you to arrive around the time of your first scheduled FP, do your three rides, eat in between or after, buy a bunch of souvineers, then leave to make room for the next family. I don't think they want people waiting 75 minutes in a standby line at the Jungle Cruise, taking up space and not spending any money, I think they want you out of the park and back at your resort, dropping dough on resort merchandise and spending $14 per cup on a specialty drink at the pool bar.

Eating our meal CS, at our leisure, is about the only spontaneity we have left at WDW.

I agree with the previous poster who commented on the "boredom factor". We are not willing to wait 45 minutes to an hour in standby for any ride. Because of this, I schedule our FP's to run consecutively, and once we use them we just leave. Because we are only able to go in high season, the lines just never go away. The only exception to this is when we can go at the MK on a non-EMH night, and arrive during Wishes. You can get a lot done in that last hour the park is still open, when the masses are heading for the exits, particularly in Frontierland and Adventureland. For some reason Tomorrowland seems to stay packed, and don't even think about still getting on the 7DMT.

I think they want you to buy your tickets early in the process (you have to in order to link them for FPs, right?) so you forget you have already paid for your entertainment. That way you'll do your 3 and leave, hopefully paying for an additional form of entertainment instead of maximizing your use of the park tickets you already paid for.

 

[mom2rtk]

A question for the people who are saying that you pop in to ride your FP+ rides then leave are you pass holders or do people paying "full price" really come in for a few hours to ride 3 things then leave?

Less TS and less time going around the parks seems to result in the opposite effect of what Disney said this process would accomplish.

I do think the propensity to do this probably varies with the sort of ticket one has. With an AP I can see maybe being OK with this. But we paid $105 each (3 of us) to be in the MK on our last trip. No way would we have been even close to happy with 3 and out. Or 6 and out. Or 9 and out.

 

[mickeyluv'r]

Just my humble opinion but ... the OP, @PeasandCarrots requested not to turn this into a FP+ debate, and for the most part I feel it has been really nice to see a spectrum of people's reactions without a huge amount of discussion.

However, that seems to be breaking down ... I'm not going to name any names, but I am going to suggest that if you have made more than 3 posts in this thread you are probably discussing and not just answering the OP's question.

I took op to mean that he didn't want this to unravel into another thread where folks just call each other names. I agree the DIS has had plenty of those already. My interest is exploring the last question of the original post, "What have you learned that makes the system work for you?"

Fastpass is only a small part of the WDW system.

I want to understand how the combination of all the factors has changed the way folks visit Orlando, so we can improve the experience we have.

It seems to me, that it was only when we broadened the discussion a bit, for example, that the following ideas were shared: more US, different dining choices, and taking more taxis enter the discussion.

Those are the creative ideas I want to hear! In my opinion, it takes follow up questions to extract those ideas, because the connections aren't obvious.

 

[crostorfer]

Just my humble opinion but ... the OP, @PeasandCarrots requested not to turn this into a FP+ debate, and for the most part I feel it has been really nice to see a spectrum of people's reactions without a huge amount of discussion.

However, that seems to be breaking down ... I'm not going to name any names, but I am going to suggest that if you have made more than 3 posts in this thread you are probably discussing and not just answering the OP's question.

Who is debating? This thread is quite amicable. No one said anything about not turning anything into a discussion.

The only comment here that I find debatable is the one I quoted here.

 

[3DisneyFanz]

Maybe the poster means multiple times per trip?

Ok and for Soarin I could get that because I can see how you'd want to spend multiple days in EPCOT. For TSMM though would anyone really not get FP+ for another park and potentially leave there just to go ride TSMM or even spend multiple days in HS for that one attraction? Don't get me wrong I love TSMM but not enough to sacrifice other things for it.

 

[casperthegm]

We aren't able to go on quite as many rides as with the old system. We used to gather fp's, beginning first thing in the morning (didn't need them then, just walk on 1st thing) and have a small stack by later in the afternoon and evening when lines were longer. It was perfect.

Now, we schedule our fp's for as early as possible in the morning, so that way we can start scheduling our next ones as soon as possible and keep going from there, giving us maybe a total of 5-7 fp's per day, depending on the park. Combine that with maybe two hours of very low to low lines first thing in the mornings, and we can still easily get in all of our favorite rides at least once at every park, often 2x or more. So, even though we can't quite do as much as we once did, we still manage quite well and do try to experience some things that we might have missed in the past due to our almost fanatical mission to collect fp's for later.

 

[Davey Jones II]

We aren't able to go on quite as many rides as with the old system. We used to gather fp's, beginning first thing in the morning (didn't need them then, just walk on 1st thing) and have a small stack by later in the afternoon and evening when lines were longer. It was perfect.

Now, we schedule our fp's for as early as possible in the morning, so that way we can start scheduling our next ones as soon as possible and keep going from there, giving us maybe a total of 5-7 fp's per day, depending on the park. Combine that with maybe two hours of very low to low lines first thing in the mornings, and we can still easily get in all of our favorite rides at least once at every park, often 2x or more. So, even though we can't quite do as much as we once did, we still manage quite well and do try to experience some things that we might have missed in the past due to our almost fanatical mission to collect fp's for later.

Do you feel that this strategy works better than arriving at rope drop, doing all the rides you can at that time, then scheduling your FPs for later in the day, when the park is more crowded?

Can you still get headliners if you are going to the FP+ kiosk in the morning?

 

[mickeyluv'r]

Do you feel that this strategy works better than arriving at rope drop, doing all the rides you can at that time, then scheduling your FPs for later in the day, when the park is more crowded?

Can you still get headliners if you are going to the FP+ kiosk in the morning?

We wondered about this approach as well.
We most often planned our 3FP approx.: 10am, 11am, and noon.

One small technique we devised was to hold off on using the first FP until the END of our time window, to max out the early a.m advantage. That also enabled us to use the 2nd FP just AFTER our first.

On departure day in 2014, we tried early FP. I don't think it was an advantage to book them so early, because all the good FP were gone by the time we finished using our 3. Using our 9:20-10:20 FP at 10:15am = Space Mtn both standby and our first FP. At 9am, the FP wasn't much of a plus, but at 10:15am it was. I think we managed 3 Space Mtn total including FP. Then buzz, and our 2nd FP BTMRR, our 3rd was Splash. (That was not so good plan because there was a big gap to fill. I'm not sure how we checked...I think we used the gap between 2nd and 3rd FP usage to look up alternatives, or to make Splash earlier. I recall though that all the mtns were gone by then, so we kept Splash.

To your second question...it depends on kiosk lines- I think. As FP+ progresses kiosk lines have been greatly reduced. When FP+ was new- the kiosk lines themselves were over an hour long. On our last visit in January, some kiosks still had healthy waits in the 10am hour. By noon no line, but down to tier 2 options in MK, like JC. Going for 4th FP in other parks not worthwhile, IMO.

One more experiment. That trip, we changed plans. One day we'd planned mostly non park day with later PM FP in MK, including 7D. We added HS, but didn't want to give up our primo MK FP. The night before I looked up HS FP options and not much available.

Just for info, we checked again in the morning via kiosk. By then, pickings in HS were very slim! Best options was late GMR. No RNRC, no TSMM, no Frozen sing a-long. Even GMR almost gone! About noon, the Animation class had 2+ hour wait!!!! YIKES! That's the worst I've ever seen! At that point, we gave up.

 

[itchin2go]

How are you able to ride Soarin and TSMM multiple times under FP+ if you don't want to wait? You can't officially get multiple FP+ for the same ride and there is no way those are going to be 4th FP choices.

Wondering the same thing myself. That one has eluded me, but I'm all ears! No pun intended.

 

[Planogirl]

I took op to mean that he didn't want this to unravel into another thread where folks just call each other names. I agree the DIS has had plenty of those already. My interest is exploring the last question of the original post, "What have you learned that makes the system work for you?"

Fastpass is only a small part of the WDW system.

I want to understand how the combination of all the factors has changed the way folks visit Orlando, so we can improve the experience we have.

It seems to me, that it was only when we broadened the discussion a bit, for example, that the following ideas were shared: more US, different dining choices, and taking more taxis enter the discussion.

Those are the creative ideas I want to hear! In my opinion, it takes follow up questions to extract those ideas, because the connections aren't obvious.

I'm interested in some of this too. I see nothing wrong with exploring the topic and definitely don't plan to limit myself to a certain number of posts.

 

[kaybird]

How are you able to ride Soarin and TSMM multiple times under FP+ if you don't want to wait? You can't officially get multiple FP+ for the same ride and there is no way those are going to be 4th FP choices.

If we do those rides first, then the fast pass+; that works. We can still ride TSMM or Soarin' at park opening. We usually do EMH, ride the biggies, then Hop for the biggies in another park. Before FP+, there were MANY times they were sold out before we could get one, so knowing we will get to ride our favorites is way better. We do not always ride all the headliners at each park everyday, but are usually able to get the headliners in for 2 parks now.

 

[Planogirl]

Ok and for Soarin I could get that because I can see how you'd want to spend multiple days in EPCOT. For TSMM though would anyone really not get FP+ for another park and potentially leave there just to go ride TSMM or even spend multiple days in HS for that one attraction? Don't get me wrong I love TSMM but not enough to sacrifice other things for it.

I would because DHS is such a mess right now. I would go to it before Epcot though. For us it's ride Soarin', TT and Spaceship Earth (and once is plenty) and we're done with rides at Epcot.

 

[Planogirl]

We wondered about this approach as well.
We most often planned our 3FP approx.: 10am, 11am, and noon.

One small technique we devised was to hold off on using the first FP until the END of our time window, to max out the early a.m advantage. That also enabled us to use the 2nd FP just AFTER our first.

On departure day in 2014, we tried early FP. I don't think it was an advantage to book them so early, because all the good FP were gone by the time we finished using our 3. Using our 9:20-10:20 FP at 10:15am = Space Mtn both standby and our first FP. At 9am, the FP wasn't much of a plus, but at 10:15am it was. I think we managed 3 Space Mtn total including FP. Then buzz, and our 2nd FP BTMRR, our 3rd was Splash. (That was not so good plan because there was a big gap to fill. I'm not sure how we checked...I think we used the gap between 2nd and 3rd FP usage to look up alternatives, or to make Splash earlier. I recall though that all the mtns were gone by then, so we kept Splash.

To your second question...it depends on kiosk lines- I think. As FP+ progresses kiosk lines have been greatly reduced. When FP+ was new- the kiosk lines themselves were over an hour long. On our last visit in January, some kiosks still had healthy waits in the 10am hour. By noon no line, but down to tier 2 options in MK, like JC. Going for 4th FP in other parks not worthwhile, IMO.

One more experiment. That trip, we changed plans. One day we'd planned mostly non park day with later PM FP in MK, including 7D. We added HS, but didn't want to give up our primo MK FP. The night before I looked up HS FP options and not much available.

Just for info, we checked again in the morning via kiosk. By then, pickings in HS were very slim! Best options was late GMR. No RNRC, no TSMM, no Frozen sing a-long. Even GMR almost gone! About noon, the Animation class had 2+ hour wait!!!! YIKES! That's the worst I've ever seen! At that point, we gave up.

That's a good idea. I tend to be too eager to ride whatever we have fastpasses for but a little discipline could be useful.

As for the rest of your post, we have the same trouble at Epcot that you had at DHS. There was very little left.

 

[itchin2go]

More than 3 trips before FP+, we had been unable to ride TSMM and Soarin' because of the lines and that FP- were always gone. Now we know we will get multiple rides on those, and 7DMT! This gives us lots of time to ride, eat shop, and wander about. Not having to wait to see when the FP- return time might be makes it much easier for us to get in our Lazy River time.

If we do those rides first, then the fast pass+; that works. We can still ride TSMM or Soarin' at park opening. We usually do EMH, ride the biggies, then Hop for the biggies in another park. Before FP+, there were MANY times they were sold out before we could get one, so knowing we will get to ride our favorites is way better. We do not always ride all the headliners at each park everyday, but are usually able to get the headliners in for 2 parks now.

Did you change and start going to rope drop after the advent of FP+?

 

[Jennytoon]

I'm interested in some of this too. I see nothing wrong with exploring the topic and definitely don't plan to limit myself to a certain number of posts.

Fair enough. But when members are responding to posters who write [my old experience was] and [my new experience is] by asking what they did that led to that old experience, and then describing their old experience without any nod to what they actually do now, that is not discussing the best way to tour using FP+, and it is at least bordering on being yet another rehashing of the "FP+ is better" or "FP+ is worse" debate. Similarly the posts speculating on where it is that Disney wants you to spend your money and whether or not lots of other people are doing that; the question is about your personal experience, not general speculation about the product. It is my perception -- possibly incorrect -- that there were an increasing number of posts of this type in the thread, and most of them were coming from people who had posted multiple times. As I said, I would really not like to see the thread go in that direction because I was enjoying the opportunity to see multiple perspectives / tips on the original topic without having to wade through pages of laments for "what we used to be able to do" etc.

 

[WillAustin]

Fair enough. But when members are responding to posters who write [my old experience was] and [my new experience is] by asking what they did that led to that old experience, and then describing their old experience without any nod to what they actually do now, that is not discussing the best way to tour using FP+, and it is at least bordering on being yet another rehashing of the "FP+ is better" or "FP+ is worse" debate. Similarly the posts speculating on where it is that Disney wants you to spend your money and whether or not lots of other people are doing that; the question is about your personal experience, not general speculation about the product. It is my perception -- possibly incorrect -- that there were an increasing number of posts of this type in the thread, and most of them were coming from people who had posted multiple times. As I said, I would really not like to see the thread go in that direction because I was enjoying the opportunity to see multiple perspectives / tips on the original topic without having to wade through pages of laments for "what we used to be able to do" etc.

The specific question was how does FP+ change what you used to be able to do, if at all. It couldn't be more clear.

 

[Planogirl]

Fair enough. But when members are responding to posters who write [my old experience was] and [my new experience is] by asking what they did that led to that old experience, and then describing their old experience without any nod to what they actually do now, that is not discussing the best way to tour using FP+, and it is at least bordering on being yet another rehashing of the "FP+ is better" or "FP+ is worse" debate. Similarly the posts speculating on where it is that Disney wants you to spend your money and whether or not lots of other people are doing that; the question is about your personal experience, not general speculation about the product. It is my perception -- possibly incorrect -- that there were an increasing number of posts of this type in the thread, and most of them were coming from people who had posted multiple times. As I said, I would really not like to see the thread go in that direction because I was enjoying the opportunity to see multiple perspectives / tips on the original topic without having to wade through pages of laments for "what we used to be able to do" etc.

To comment on how FP+ has changed your touring style, you'd have to comment on why it is different from what you did before and that, by its very nature, includes mention of the previous version. I do agree that the bickering hopefully won't start along with the comments about why people are doing things incorrectly and all of that.

 

[CdnKayDee]

We find it really helps plan other things like going shopping or just sleeping in. Biggest change is we do not need to run down to Studios before open then run down to Toy Story Mania. Then get in line for a fast pass then go ride then come back and do the ride again and then feel sorry for everyone else when Fast Past are sold out and it is only 10. I guess some would say you snooze you lose but we are on vacation.