Hello! I just finished a trip to WDW and was staying offsite. And it'd been 8.5 years since my last trip, so there was definitely a lot of new things to learn about and consider. We had 6 park days,
Genie+ for all of them, and we're committed to trying to get an ILL for all four rides that they were available for.
Our first day we were at Epcot when it opened and were able to knock out almost the entirety of Future World before a 12:15 dining reservation in Canada. Would've had it too if Test Track hadn't closed. The other days (day 2 & 3) we were trying to rope drop we failed (one day late start + broken monorail & contact lenses problems the other day).
One of those failed rope drop days included entering Epcot through the International Gateway via Skyliner from HS. It puts you in the park right near Remy. We got there at 30 mins after opening and waited a little over an hour. I'm convinced this would have been closer to 40 mins had we gotten there on time.
Since you're staying offsite, it'd be good to take into account how far away you'll be driving from and if you'll be wanting downtime back at your accommodation during the day or not. Our last three days we took things easier and didn't plan to arrive until an hour or so after opening.
Personally, I thought HS didn't seem worth trying to rope drop because the lines are long all morning and afternoon. It was much easier just to stack LLs for the evening for everything we wanted. Rather than do a full day there, we did two half days in the afternoon/evening where we stacked several LL for there.
At MK, we got there about an hour late. We hit Tomorrowland first and walked onto BLSS and had a LL to Space Mountain in the morning. From there, we just stacked LLs over the course of the day according to land and return time to keep back and forth to a minimum and worked in rides and shows that had short wait times.
AK is a mixed bag because everyone goes for FoP first and the line waits spread out from there. So if you plan to buy a FoP ILL, then it'll be great because you can hit everything else in the park with relative ease. The only thing that may end up having a long (60+ min) line is the other Pandora ride that is cool but not worth such a long wait. If you'll have Genie+ at AK (I know some say it isn't worthwhile), then try to get a LL for it near your FoP ILL.
Also, keep in mind that as an offsite guest, you'll be at a disadvantage for ILL because you can't buy until park opening whereas resort guests can buy at 7AM. For us, this led to all of our ILLs being in the evening.
Let me know if you have any questions. Feel free to PM if needed as well.
