Has Genie + changed your touring philosophy away from rope dropping???

[Mr. Baloo]

Heading down in a couple of weeks and it cannot get here fast enough. However, I am curious.

We have traditionally been rope droppers but are questioning that theory. We like to beat everyone to the parks and enjoy the first couple of hours while no one is there. Then head on back to the villa or pool for some down time in the afternoon. Then, back out for a nice dinner. No kids, so the meals are almost the main part of the vacation.

Has Genie+ changed that?

Is it better to get up early and just start collecting LL's? Will we be able to collect enough LL's to make Genie worth it if we do not go back to a park in the evening?

Wondering if the LL's will be in the way of our dinner reservations.....

Thanks in advance for the advice....

 

[mom2rtk]

I think with everyone up to book LLs at 7 AM, more people are going to rope drop. It's very disappointing as those used to be the best hours to be in the parks.

 

[ofcabbagesandkings]

We've always been rope droppers, especially back when Extra Magic Hours were actually a full hour. The only way to get more than 2 Genie+ rides per day (especially at HS, Epcot, and AK) is to rope drop. With FP+, we were able to have one lazy pool morning in the middle of our trip with either a MK evening party ticket or 3 FP+ booked for an evening at Epcot. I haven't tried to replicate that with Genie+, but I don't think it will ever be as easy as it was when I was booking at 60 days out for the whole trip and could pick the times that suited my schedule and dining reservations. The main way Genie+ has changed my touring philosophy is to push me to finally take a trip to WDW's main competitor. Unlimited Express pass with our deluxe room was amazing.

 

[3gr8boys]

My attempt at a concise answer (based our our recent trip and the preceding research):
There is likely no "quiet" morning to be had these days (at least not at MK and HS). A lot of people rope drop and lines for headliners build quickly, even during ETPE. BUT if you prefer to get up and get to the parks, you can get A LOT done without a lot of standing in line with RD lines and Genie+. I would think that Genie+ would mean getting more attractions in before your afternoon downtime. Then, IF you wanted, you could book some after-dinner LLs. Of course, you could also take the other approach that you mention, start booking LLs during a leisurely morning and then head to the park in the afternoon knowing you have several no-line (practically) attractions lined up. I felt that Genie+ gave us some control- we approached each park day a little differently and were able to use Genie+ to our advantage each day. We had great success getting LLs early in the day when we wanted and in getting LLs for attractions in parks we would be hopping to. We had six park days- we rope dropped 4. We only waited in two real lines (40 and 45 minutes) all week. We had at least one ADR each day and I didn't feel it was difficult to work LLs around them.

 

[Mr. Baloo]

Thinking we will LL as we go in MK, and wait and stack at DHS… maybe go back after dinner…..

 

[scrappinginontario]

For us we were rope droppers but this past trip we rope dropped a few morning and the other half we took things much slower…and it was wonderful! We stacked LLs for both DHS and MK.

This was one change that Genie+ brought about that we quite enjoyed.

 

[DisneySyd]

We went in March and never entered the parks before noon. I was up early anyway so stacked $ILL/Genie+ for afternoon/evening (starting booking at 7am). My girls slept in, we had a leisurely breakfast, hit the pool/relaxed at the resort then entered the park with 4/5 rides lined up. We were there for 2 weeks so had the opportunity to go back another day if a ride was down or weather wasn’t ideal (looking at you => crazy flood on March 7th).
I did note that it appeared a lot more people were rope dropping (vs pre Covid trips)…assuming it was since they either were up anyway due to 7am booking or were trying to avoid using Genie+ …this was more observation of the number of people leaving resort in the morning vs previous trips, comments from fellow guests, and looking at ride times on MDE (we never rope dropped).
As @3gr8boys mentioned, Genie+ gave us the flexibility to do each day based on how we were feeling (although we did make a game plan the night before so I was ready to book at 7am). I originally went into the trip not happy about losing FP+, but was pleasantly surprised by how well Genie+/$ILL worked for us.

 

[3gr8boys]

As @3gr8boys mentioned, Genie+ gave us the flexibility to do each day based on how we were feeling (although we did make a game plan the night before so I was ready to book at 7am). I originally went into the trip not happy about losing FP+, but was pleasantly surprised by how well Genie+/$ILL worked for us.

We used a similar game-plan approach. We gathered each night (usually with treats from Karamell Kuce ) to discuss goals, decide when to meet at the bus stop the next morning and pick the LL I would prioritize at 7:00. It was rather a nice way to end each day.

 

[Mr. Baloo]

Seems like you now have an option, hit it early, or stay in and have a leisure morning then hit it in the afternoon… that def would make us feel better about a late night/ after dinner LL since we were not up at the crack of dawn to rope drop.

couldn’t do that before…

 

[snikki]

Prior to FP+ we RD every single day since we mostly rode standby because it was too much of a pain to run all over the park with small kids and collect FP.

Now we RD half the trip and started doing that with FP+. Each park gets a RD and then after that we do sleep in days. We loved booking our FP+ in the late afternoon and hitting a park starting mid afternoon or early evening.

We will continue our strategy next trip. 9 park days with 4 RD days. The other days we will stack G+. With G+ we will actually be able to switch things up if we want. If we decide we want to do RD an extra day we can start G+ early in the day. If we decide to sleep in on a day I thought we would RD then we can start stacking for the PM. It will give us some flexibility. We will make these decisions the night before.

 

[loves to dive]

Or, you could not get Genie + at all. I've been twice since it's been in effect and not used it either time. Both times as a solo adult but you say you are two adults as well. I did sort of do early entry a few times, I just can't seem to get motivated even though I'm always up way early to get myself to the bus stop or walk to the park to get there before early entry. If you are better at it then me, you could get the park before early entry and get in line and knock out one or two or even 3 rides before the park opens for regular guests. Then you could wait in any shorter rides. Go back to your resort and go to the parks a little later. I found that after say 5 or 5:30, most of the rides were fairly short waits (for me a short wait is 1/2 hour or less). There are a few exceptions, RoTR is always going to be long though I did only wait 1/2 hour one night when I got there around 8:20 on a 9pm park close night. Remy is pretty much going to be at least a half hour wait, even early park entry. You are either going to have to GoTG or virtual que it.

 

[DebLovesPooh]

We rope dropped every day. I think that’s what allowed us to take the early afternoon pool break. Then stacked LL for before and after dinner at the park we hopped to.

 

[rpmaill]

For us we were rope droppers but this past trip we rope dropped a few morning and the other half we took things much slower…and it was wonderful! We stacked LLs for both DHS and MK.

This was one change that Genie+ brought about that we quite enjoyed.

Hi im new so forgive me, but what do you mean you stacked Genie plusses? i thought you could only make 1 at a time until its used or 120 mins pass?

 

[rpmaill]

We rope dropped every day. I think that’s what allowed us to take the early afternoon pool break. Then stacked LL for before and after dinner at the park we hopped to.

Hi im new so forgive me, but what do you mean you stacked Genie plusses? i thought you could only make 1 at a time until its used or 120 mins pass?

 

[Mr. Baloo]

Stacking is when you use the 120 min rule to your favor. Choosing return times for the evening every 2 hours so the you end up with 2 or 3 LL rides in the evening.

 

[triciambe]

For us we were rope droppers but this past trip we rope dropped a few morning and the other half we took things much slower…and it was wonderful! We stacked LLs for both DHS and MK.

This was one change that Genie+ brought about that we quite enjoyed.

We are going this summer and it's our first time using the new Genie+ system (we've pre-purchased for all days). I'm curious about your strategy stacking for DHS and MK. Could you say more about why those parks over AK and EP? I would love to take a slow morning on a few days of our vacation and was thinking that AK and EP would be better, so I'd love to hear how it could work with DHS and MK!

 

[FreeCA]

We just got back from a 8 day trip. We mixed Rope Drop & Sleeping in.

Most days we hit the parks early for Rope Drop, left around noon, had lunch and took a nap, then went back into the parks after 5PM.

For our next trip I think Hollywood Studios will be our ONLY Rope Drop park. We found that with Genie+ and Rope Drop we could hit everything we wanted in Hollywood Studios and be done by 1pm (one day by 11 AM!). This made it worth Rope Drop as the park gets crowded quickly.

For the other parks I plan to get up at 7AM and start stacking Genie + while the kids sleep in. I can always go back to sleep, and we can have a leisurely morning.

A lot of it may depend on what you want out of your trip. For our last trip we wanted to maximize every moment and hit as many big rides/shows as we could. For our next trip we decided to take a more relaxing pace, and to enjoy not just the more popular rides, but all the little things that disneyworld has to offer.

 

[nw6675]

We never were specifically rope droppers, but were early birds. However, this past week we just stacked for the early evening/night time so it would be cooler. We had no issues getting everything we wanted and we only did standby for a handful of rides - never waited more than 30 minutes for anything. We really liked Genie + and never felt like I was constantly on my phone or anything.

ETA: only negative for this approach is the afternoon thunderstorms shutting rides down - while you can still use your LL after they reopen, we did not always feel like being at that park or at the reopening time.

 

[georgina]

We are going this summer and it's our first time using the new Genie+ system (we've pre-purchased for all days). I'm curious about your strategy stacking for DHS and MK. Could you say more about why those parks over AK and EP? I would love to take a slow morning on a few days of our vacation and was thinking that AK and EP would be better, so I'd love to hear how it could work with DHS and MK!

The only park I bought G+ for was our HS day, and I feel it would have been much better to do the stacking for the afternoon/evening because of how spread out our LL times were. We had a lot of hour or 2 gaps with nothing we wanted to do. So we roped dropped for ToT but it was closed all morning. We did Smugglers Run instead. My SDD LL was for 9:40, then I got a LL for TSMM, we did RotR at 11:40 and ST by LL after that. Then Tot LL were sold out, but I eventually got one for late afternoon. I just think it would have been more efficient to have them lined up one after the other like eksmama mentioned above.

 

[DisneySyd]

We are going this summer and it's our first time using the new Genie+ system (we've pre-purchased for all days). I'm curious about your strategy stacking for DHS and MK. Could you say more about why those parks over AK and EP? I would love to take a slow morning on a few days of our vacation and was thinking that AK and EP would be better, so I'd love to hear how it could work with DHS and MK!

Afternoon stacking was our preferred way of doing the parks. I was up early anyway so booked the rides. My girls slept in, then we relaxed at the resort or hit the pool (we were at YC). By the time we went to the parks we had 4/5 rides lined up. Here’s an example at HS on March 8th (8:30am opening):
7am - booked SDD for 2:40pm
7:17am - booked RoTR for 2:55pm
(I originally planned to book at 7, after SDD, but my screen spun and by the time I logged back in all the times were gone. Thankfully I had been following things here so knew there would likely be another drop)
10:30am - booked TSM for 4:20pm (wanted MFSM or MMRR but nothing available)
12:30pm - booked Alien for 4:30pm
2:32pm - booked MMRR for 5:15pm (had to refresh a lot but had time on the boat to HS)
This is what we had walking into HS at 2:35pm
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Edit: added date

Hi! Thought I’d give you an example of stacking that we did back in March