READ POST 1 & 2 FIRST-Rise of the Resistance Boarding Group Planning and Information-*No Spoilers*

[Jax1023]

Don't let him get too used to it. I know from experience that little brothers grow up!

Lucky for him he’s 5 years older and little sis is a shortie lol. But yeah it’s gonna be a shock once she’s tall enough. I’ll be happy- it takes a long time to do rides like FoP or RotR twice in a row,

 

[goofyrabbit]

I’ve read many times over the years that they do not actively track locations. Locations are tracked every time you tap in for something. If you have a magicband with a functioning battery, your location is also tracked when you pass beacons (if that’s the right word)- like the ones on rides that will automatically add photos/videos to your account. But there is nothing tracking where you are every second. This is why magicband data can not be used to find a missing There could be a beacon at the exit to track those with magicbands with functioning batteries who leave; I have no idea.



Only one boarding group can be booked for each person per day. Multiple people can attempt to book bg for the same people at the same time, and this is the best strategy. Some people are able to grt to the boarding group reservation page and finish booking before others in their group can even get the boarding group page to open. Sometimes one or more members of the group don’t show up as being in the park. In this case, it’s best for that person to book everyone they can while others in the group attempt to book the rest. If only part of the group was able to get a bg, or the group ends up with two numbers far apart due to a second person booking for the group members who could not be booked at first, then go to a guest experience team member to have everyone put in the same group. If you can’t book at all, also go to a guest experience cast member. They are the ones in blue; most are at blue kiosks with a blue umbrella. There’s several on the first street at park opening but they usually have long lines. It can be faster to find one elsewhere in the park. I think there’s one on the way to the main Galaxy’s Edge entrance and one in Toy Story Land.

Thank you

 

[goofyrabbit]

Do you think that DHS will adjust hours or make any changes because it will be marathon week coming up in January. Will there be runners in the park or will they have all the runners out by then and do you think it will affect any travel time to the parks with roads closed at all?

 

[yulilin3]

Do you think that DHS will adjust hours or make any changes because it will be marathon week coming up in January. Will there be runners in the park or will they have all the runners out by then and do you think it will affect any travel time to the parks with roads closed at all?

Runners will go through until around 11am, yes definitely give yourself extra time as roads will be partially closed

 

[rteetz]

Do you think that DHS will adjust hours or make any changes because it will be marathon week coming up in January. Will there be runners in the park or will they have all the runners out by then and do you think it will affect any travel time to the parks with roads closed at all?

They have already adjusted hours until January 11th. There are races from Jan. 9th-12th. I wouldn't expect extended morning hours on the 12th because the marathon runs through the park that day.

 

[xeiaryxzorhpbwmq]

I used to provide technical support for iPhones at Apple. This advice likely won't help at all (and can actually have the reverse effect.) Early iPhones/smartphones did have issues with multitasking and multiple apps open at the same time. That is when people suggested to "kill" unused apps. This changed maybe 3-4 years after the first iPhone launched, and there is no longer any need to "kill" or "close" apps unless the app is frozen. The software is designed to put unused apps in a saved state - and when you end an app, it has reload the app from scratch vs pulling it up in a saved state. I still hear people telling their friends to remove running apps in the background, but it is outdated information and only makes your phone work harder in the long-run.

From my playing around with the Disney app - if I keep the RoTR status page open, it does not auto-refresh. But if I tap the back button in the upper left hand corner and then click on "Find out more" - it immediately refreshes. This would be my recommended technique at open time. You don't need to reboot your phone, or kill the app, or exit out of the app. You just need to tap the back button and click on Find out more.

As for LTE vs WiFi...it's really impossible to tell which will give you better results. Towers and Wifi Nodes can only provide so much bandwidth in a given second. If there are multiple people in a group, I'd probably have one person on wifi and the other on LTE, just for a backup.

You do bring up a good point about iPhones but in general memory leaks are an issue for every device out there. It's less likely an issue on the iOS side given how good Apple has in terms of control of its hardware and software. Every Android version has at least had some memory issues and devices tend to be a hit or miss with certain updates. It won't hurt to do a shut down and reboot although it shouldn't really matter for most flagship devices, and if your device usually doesn't struggle with apps getting kicked out of RAM, it really shouldn't matter.

With that said I found your strategy for refreshing interesting. I actually used this strategy for my SO and I, except we are Android users (Pixel 3 and 4). One of us would go back between the main page and find out more to see if the join button would appear. I actually used the My status page where you could pull to refresh hoping the join button would appear when it was time to join.

Both of us had stellar LTE performance before 6am and at 6am our strategy yielded nothing. I'm also on AT&T while my SO is on Verizon so in some ways we had each other's backs. It wasn't until I heard boarding groups being shouted out I peered over my SO's device and asked why it showed nothing yet. We both simultaneously closed our apps and reopened them and voila saw the ability to join after clicking "Find out more."

This may be a difference between how the iOS and Android apps are coded, but perhaps on Android going back between the front page of the app and "Find out more" doesn't actually refresh your ability to join a BG or not. We ended up with BG65 and we were still done before 6:01am.

With only 1 data point, I don't want to jump to conclusions, but it could be perhaps our devices and networks were lagged, but I suspect it's more that our refreshing strategy maybe was the problem. While in theory you would think the app is refreshing everything as you go back and forth, it might only refresh the current BG status or your status, but not your ability to join a BG. It also could be the theory that some have suggested that there is some level of randomness in the BG assignments. People who finished AFTER us were still able to get BGs in the 30s.

All in all was super happy with the ride itself. BG65 was just an inconvenient spot because the ride got stuck around 61 for a LONG time in the morning and then broke down shortly after our BG got called again (Dec 28th)

 

[rteetz]

 

[Zia100]

Hi, I’m sorry if this topic has been already covered, but I was wondering if it’s possible to have 1 person come to HS early to try and get a boarding group for the whole party. I ask cause my kids are not early risers, but if I came early, while the hubby wrangled them up! I could get a boarding group for us - we are all connected on the app/ fast passes, same hotel room etc.
Thank you!

 

[SouthFayetteFan]

Hi, I’m sorry if this topic has been already covered, but I was wondering if it’s possible to have 1 person come to HS early to try and get a boarding group for the whole party. I ask cause my kids are not early risers, but if I came early, while the hubby wrangled them up! I could get a boarding group for us - we are all connected on the app/ fast passes, same hotel room etc.
Thank you!

No, you all will have to go to the park in the morning, and enter the park, each of you using your own respective magic bands. If you go early alone, you will only be able to get yourself a BG. The app specifically checks to see if people are in the park before allowing them to join a BG.

 

[TDSAXX]

Hi, I’m sorry if this topic has been already covered, but I was wondering if it’s possible to have 1 person come to HS early to try and get a boarding group for the whole party. I ask cause my kids are not early risers, but if I came early, while the hubby wrangled them up! I could get a boarding group for us - we are all connected on the app/ fast passes, same hotel room etc.
Thank you!

Yes, it’s been covered at least a dozen times; but I see SouthFayetteFan was kind enough to cover it one more time.

 

[midnight star]

We are going to Hollywood Studios on January 22. The hours still show 8am opening. If they do change them to open earlier, would it be wise to skip the bus transportation and just use uber for that day? I've heard about the buses having long lines.

 

[AngiTN]

We are going to Hollywood Studios on January 22. The hours still show 8am opening. If they do change them to open earlier, would it be wise to skip the bus transportation and just use uber for that day? I've heard about the buses having long lines.

I am of the opinion it’s always wise for openings. The reason is you are in more control of when you leave. Yeah you can wait on a vehicle but if you call within 5 min of your being ready to meet them you will typically have a much shorter wait and you remove the doubt of how long the wait for a bus will be. When you are talking about an early morning that’s at least 30 more min of sleep

 

[midnight star]

I am of the opinion it’s always wise for openings. The reason is you are in more control of when you leave. Yeah you can wait on a vehicle but if you call within 5 min of your being ready to meet them you will typically have a much shorter wait and you remove the doubt of how long the wait for a bus will be. When you are talking about an early morning that’s at least 30 more min of sleep

That's what I was thinking. We only have one day in HS so trying to get into a boarding group is a goal

 

[dina444444]

At it again this morning for ROTR. Will post our times once we get boarding groups.

 

[xApril]

Here again at the tickets booths. Closer than I was on the 19th and got here about the same time as I did then.

 

[xApril]

Group 16 and my friend near me got group 11

 

[dina444444]

5:08 left boardwalk to walk over
5:20 through security and in line against the construction wall. Closer then we were Sunday morning around the same time
5:34 in park, tap and go no finger
6:00 boarding group 13!!

 

[Sajchinook2015]

They are now boarding group 8

 

[dina444444]

Boarding group was called at 6:21. We were in line by 6:27 and off at 6:50. They sent us up the fastpass queue this morning.

 

[dina444444]

They are on to backup groups distribution now.