Pre-Selection Advice

[JJ2017]

I'm not sure why, but I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed at planning out the DAS selections. Maybe b/c my type A planning mind, but also maybe b/c it's a new process and a bit confusing still for me. I'm also brand new to using Genie+ and purchasing ILL. Would anyone be willing to advise?

We are only going for one day, and hopping all around. There are four of us - two adults, two kids. We are starting at HS. DAS is for my son. And from my understanding, I can pre-select two DAS during the call. And then on day of, book another DAS at 7:00 am?? Or is that at park opening?

Wish List - don't expect to do this all......

We would like to ride together: Rise, Slinky, TSMM, Tower of Terror, Mickey and Minnie
Only my son (DAS user)/husband - Rock and Roller Coaster

Hopping to AK for - FoP and Everest

Hopping to EP for Guardians, Remy, TT and Soarin

 

[gap2368]

You can break day if DAS when the park opens not 7 am.

 

[theMoreDisneytheBetter]

I wonder if part of the reason why you are feeling overwhelmed is that you have a VERY ambitious schedule here, depending on crowd levels. Please someone correct me if I’m wrong but I don’t believe that you can buy 3 ILLs in a given day, which would mean that you are facing the same wait as the standby line for one of the headliners. You will need to be very thoughtful about the way you make your DAS and Genie+ reservations if you hope to get this much done. Pick slinky first and then hope for the best on the rest.

 

[lanejudy]

That is a VERY ambitious schedule. Probably do-able if your whole party is really motivated. Some notes that may help your planning:

• DAS Advanced Selections -- you must do the advanced registration by video chat 2-30 days before your first park day to qualify for the Advanced Selections. You may choose 2 attractions at the park where you have a theme park reservation (so your first park). Not all attractions are offered and availability varies so it may or may not align to your schedule with the hopping.
• Same-day DAS Return Times can be booked after your party enters the first park. It is based on the posted standby wait times. You may only book Return Times for that park through the app; YMMV as to whether a blue umbrella can schedule one for your next park on your way out to hop.
• Hopping only begins after 2pm.
• Genie+ ($15 per person for the day) may help you, but you'll need to watch the times. You can't book for the 2nd, 3rd, 4th parks until the times hit 2pm. Then you can stack a few for later in the day.
• ILL$ (individual paid attractions) has a max of 2 per day. I think there is still only 1 per park available. These can be booked at 7am if you are staying onsite, or at park opening if offsite.
• Guardians -- requires you to join a virtual queue OR buy ILL$. It cannot be scheduled as DAS Advanced Selection or regular DAS, though you can use DAS once your boarding group is called. To join the virtual queue at 7am you must have a theme park reservation for Epcot; I think the afternoon virtual queue drop does not require an Epcot reservation but you must have entered the park first.

 

[JJ2017]

That is a VERY ambitious schedule. Probably do-able if your whole party is really motivated. Some notes that may help your planning:

• DAS Advanced Selections -- you must do the advanced registration by video chat 2-30 days before your first park day to qualify for the Advanced Selections. You may choose 2 attractions at the park where you have a theme park reservation (so your first park). Not all attractions are offered and availability varies so it may or may not align to your schedule with the hopping.
• Same-day DAS Return Times can be booked after your party enters the first park. It is based on the posted standby wait times. You may only book Return Times for that park through the app; YMMV as to whether a blue umbrella can schedule one for your next park on your way out to hop.
• Hopping only begins after 2pm.
• Genie+ ($15 per person for the day) may help you, but you'll need to watch the times. You can't book for the 2nd, 3rd, 4th parks until the times hit 2pm. Then you can stack a few for later in the day.
• ILL$ (individual paid attractions) has a max of 2 per day. I think there is still only 1 per park available. These can be booked at 7am if you are staying onsite, or at park opening if offsite.
• Guardians -- requires you to join a virtual queue OR buy ILL$. It cannot be scheduled as DAS Advanced Selection or regular DAS, though you can use DAS once your boarding group is called. To join the virtual queue at 7am you must have a theme park reservation for Epcot; I think the afternoon virtual queue drop does not require an Epcot reservation but you must have entered the park first.

oh wow - these little details will REALLY help my understanding and planning. gonna research and come up with a plan. it's very possible we nix AK, but haven't been there in a couple of years and it's so darn pretty there!

 

[theMoreDisneytheBetter]

AK really empties out at the end of the day, so assuming you can make it over there you should have no problem getting on Everest and then doing FOP with a DAS return at park close.

It is beautiful at night.

If people are feeling ambitious you can always go back to Epcot (particularly if you have a car) to close the evening, but that’s a lot of running around. I know plenty of families that do it but there’s no way mine would be willing to, FWIW. Only you know what kind of limitations your son might have which necessitate the use of the DAS.

Good luck!

 

[JJ2017]

That is a VERY ambitious schedule. Probably do-able if your whole party is really motivated. Some notes that may help your planning:

• DAS Advanced Selections -- you must do the advanced registration by video chat 2-30 days before your first park day to qualify for the Advanced Selections. You may choose 2 attractions at the park where you have a theme park reservation (so your first park). Not all attractions are offered and availability varies so it may or may not align to your schedule with the hopping.
• Same-day DAS Return Times can be booked after your party enters the first park. It is based on the posted standby wait times. You may only book Return Times for that park through the app; YMMV as to whether a blue umbrella can schedule one for your next park on your way out to hop.
• Hopping only begins after 2pm.
• Genie+ ($15 per person for the day) may help you, but you'll need to watch the times. You can't book for the 2nd, 3rd, 4th parks until the times hit 2pm. Then you can stack a few for later in the day.
• ILL$ (individual paid attractions) has a max of 2 per day. I think there is still only 1 per park available. These can be booked at 7am if you are staying onsite, or at park opening if offsite.
• Guardians -- requires you to join a virtual queue OR buy ILL$. It cannot be scheduled as DAS Advanced Selection or regular DAS, though you can use DAS once your boarding group is called. To join the virtual queue at 7am you must have a theme park reservation for Epcot; I think the afternoon virtual queue drop does not require an Epcot reservation but you must have entered the park first.

Same Day DAS can be booked AFTER we enter the park. Does this mean that if we make it to HS during the early entry hours, we can book within that time frame??

 

[lanejudy]

Same Day DAS can be booked AFTER we enter the park. Does this mean that if we make it to HS during the early entry hours, we can book within that time frame??

You can book attractions that post a standby time during early entry. Not all attractions are open early.

 

[ajsamett]

For guardians, the drop for vq is 7am and 1pm (7am from anywhere and 1pm after you have tapped in). Since both of these are before 2pm hopping, the only way you can get in would be with a ILL (unless the crowds are so low that there is still availability after 2pm). I'd suggest getting that ILL and Rise if you can get it before 2pm hopping. Unless you are going on very low crowd times, you'll probably want to combine DAS with Genie+ to be able to ride everything

 

[lanejudy]

unless the crowds are so low that there is still availability after 2pm

There is a thread on the TPAS forum that I haven't been following super-closely, but last I knew -- YES the 1pm drop has remained open until well after 2pm. Guests hopping to Epcot have definitely been able to get evening BGs. The catch is that you do have to be in Epcot, or have entered and left in order to join the VQ from the afternoon drop. How well that would work for OP's plans of getting 4 parks squeezed into 1 day is probably somewhat questionable - so ILL$ may still be their best option for GotG. But VQ is a possibility for those hopping.

 

[SueM in MN]

I agree with the other posters that your plan is extremely ambitious for one day.
I don’t know how you plan to get from park to park, but plan each ‘hop‘ to take about one hour, including travel time, getting from your parking spot to the entry and going thru security. If you are planning to use WDW transportation, the times between buses are longer later in the day and you may miss the first bus and have to wait for a second.

I would suggest considering going to EPCOT for your second park for 2 reasons. The first would be getting a Boarding Group for Guardians of the Galaxy (if you don’t plan to do Individual Lightning Lane). The other reason is that the Studio and EPCOT are close together and you can take the Friendship Boats or it’s about a 20 minute walk.
Animal Kingdom is quite far away and your plan of visiting AK second means a long trip from the Studio to AK and another long trip from AK to EPCOT.
That may not work because AK closes early during The times of year when it gets dark early.

This link from the WDW website lists the attractions that may be available for DAS Advance Selections. It’s possible that none of the ones on the list that you would like to go on would be available on the day/time you are going. When making DAS Advance Selection, you can request early morning and the CMs will try to find ones that fit. As others mentioned, you can only schedule those for the park you have reservations for.

 

[SueM in MN]

Guests using DAS still wait, just outside of the regular line. Also keep in mind that when you come back for your DAS Return Time, you may still have a wait in line. When we were at WDW in May/June 2022, we still often waited for 15-20 minutes after entering into the line.

DAS Return Times are based on the current posted wait in the Standby Line, minus about 10 minutes. The Standby Wait varies up and down a bit during park hours, but I just pulled these screenshots about 2:30 Florida time. They are fairly typical for the non-busy times of year.

EPCOT: Test Track about 45 minutes, Soarin about 55 minutes and Remy about 100 minutes. If you are going at a busy time, all 3 can be close to 2 hr waits

STUDIO: Slinky Dog 60 minutes, Toy Story Mania 65 minutes, Mickey & Minnie RR 80 minutes, Tower of Terror 55 minutes and Ride of the Resistance 120 minutes. Rise can go over 3 hours in busy times with other near to 2 hours




ANIMAL KINGDOM: Flight of Passage was 65 minutes now, but it is frequently closer to 2 hours during the day, even fairly early. Expedition Everest was 50 minutes at this time, but close to closing, it’s can often be 10 minutes. My husband rode it like 3 times in a row in May is about 30 minutes one day at the end of the day.

 

[Maggie'sMom]

I think you are setting yourself up for a stressful day and will find that park hopping to 3 parks in one day is difficult since you can't enter the 2nd park until 2pm.

 

[JJ2017]

Hi everyone! Thank you for your feedback! I actually went out with my 12 and 10 year old for lunch today and we talked all this through. We are going to cut out AK unfortunately and just focus on Epcot and Hollywood and if we are up for it, we will go to MK extended hours.

Kids both voted to start at Epcot so we can ensure we get to do Guardians and Remy along with the food booths and the Remy scavenger hunt. We will try to squeeze in TT and Soarin before heading to HS. We will buy Rise, and utilize a combo of Genie+ and DAS to get in the other rides they like (they came up with a priority order). Then head back to Epcot to meet our friends for dinner at Biergarten. I'm actually quite pleased with the plan and happy that they actually opened my eyes to a new park order! I wouldn't have thought to start at Epcot thinking HS should have taken the focus.

So now my question is - how does DAS work during extended evening hours? And now I need to learn how to stack Genie+ rides at the hopping park.

Thanks!

 

[Maryrachel713]

Will you be eating at parks etc? And do you plan to rope drop?
We did not park hop but I did have pretty detailed schedules for each day including for DAS waits. We did everything we wanted to except at AK (because there is only so long a pair of 7 year olds can go), It sounds like you cut AK already, but remember you can tap in as soon as you enter the park--so if you want to go on Remy, you can tap in for a 25 minute line and then get there at which point you won't be waiting at all. We signed in for Guardians right at 7 am both days and were between 11-12:30 I think. I'd tap in for test track and go straight to Soarin (or vv) as soon as you get there. You should be able to walk on to the second one after the first and if you are there early enough it won't be that long of a wait. As soon as you tap for the second ride, select Remy. You'll be waiting the time you are in line + the ride + the walk there.

We also used shows or lines with short/no waits as spacers. We did not do Genie + and had very little wait/down time. We were there over the 4th.

 

[JJ2017]

Will you be eating at parks etc? And do you plan to rope drop?
We did not park hop but I did have pretty detailed schedules for each day including for DAS waits. We did everything we wanted to except at AK (because there is only so long a pair of 7 year olds can go), It sounds like you cut AK already, but remember you can tap in as soon as you enter the park--so if you want to go on Remy, you can tap in for a 25 minute line and then get there at which point you won't be waiting at all. We signed in for Guardians right at 7 am both days and were between 11-12:30 I think. I'd tap in for test track and go straight to Soarin (or vv) as soon as you get there. You should be able to walk on to the second one after the first and if you are there early enough it won't be that long of a wait. As soon as you tap for the second ride, select Remy. You'll be waiting the time you are in line + the ride + the walk there.

We also used shows or lines with short/no waits as spacers. We did not do Genie + and had very little wait/down time. We were there over the 4th.

When you say tap in - do you mean select the next DAS time on the app?

 

[Maryrachel713]

When you say tap in - do you mean select the next DAS time on the app?

Yes, as soon as you enter you make your first pick.

 

[NightGuardianAngel]

My advice for your son to make the most out of the DAS pass is to download the Magic Guide app and see what the wait times are usually to each ride. Ask your son what two ride with the longest wait times he wants to book and pre-book those rides, then this way, he can still have a return time for a third ride (allowed one active DAS return time at a time that is not pre-booked). This is my two cents.