The big G+ rides at HS gone by 1:07!

[DizneyMommy]

I think it’s a good strategy going in. But unfortunately it’s so darn inconsistent. Yes there may be a drop, yes things pop up, so it’s theoretically feasible. Haven’t heard recent posts of people reporting their trials of this for hopping to HS.

I’m willing to give it a go for one morning. Our AK reservation, since we wouldn’t bother using G+ in that park anyways and we always take a midday break. We are staying offsite so not likely to be able to snag a FOP ILL. We don’t ride KS, no one likes Dinosaur, and EE will be down. So that leaves like 3 rides. Plus AK opens so early so we get a head start. I’m game to try it once and see what happens!

I will say we aren’t aiming for anything in GE though. We have an identical version here at home, we’ve done RotR several times, and there is no reason to waste time on that.

 

[snikki]

I’m willing to give it a go for one morning. Our AK reservation, since we wouldn’t bother using G+ in that park anyways and we always take a midday break. We are staying offsite so not likely to be able to snag a FOP ILL. We don’t ride KS, no one likes Dinosaur, and EE will be down. So that leaves like 3 rides. Plus AK opens so early so we get a head start. I’m game to try it once and see what happens!

I will say we aren’t aiming for anything in GE though. We have an identical version here at home, we’ve done RotR several times, and there is no reason to waste time on that.

We are going for it when we go in November (if it’s still allowed) but I’ve read reports that it’s much easier to refresh and secure LL at DHS, or any park, when it’s a smaller group. It’ll just be myself and daughter so I’m hoping it works for us.

 

[Pirate1+Princess4]

So this whole "gone by 1PM" thing concerns me. This is our 2nd trip to WDW as a family and we are really just making up for the COVID cancelled band trip for our four 19s. It might as well be considered a "once in a lifetime" trip. We last went to WDW in 2009. I was relieved when their spring breaks lined up AND it was the week before seasonal rates kicked in. Originally looking at 6/7s on the crowd calendars and now they are 9s/10s with greatly expanded hours. Now I feel we need to buy G+ for each of our 4 park days at an additional $90/day. We will RD the ILL$ offerings and hope to get on.

Our HS day is our last on 3/11. We then grab our bags from POP, get our private van to take us to an airport hotel. After reading the All Things G+ thread, I felt comfortable with the concept of stacking and getting the biggies for later in the day.

Here are my questions:
1. Is it safe to assume that none of the G+ will come back with an AM return time?
2. If ROTR goes down early, then our only chance of riding is close to park closing- is that correct?
3. If we end up in the park until close to get it all in (using the "last hour" strategy), to what time do you think I should change our transportation from POP to airport hotel? When does Skyliner start backing up?
4. If we get lucky and SB SDD after reserving it on G+, what is the strategy for releasing it and grabbing something else? Do we still have to wait until 10:30 for next G+?

The tentative plan

7 AM- G+ SDD for whatever time we can grab
8 AM ETPE RD ROTR then grab a standby on MFSR, MMRR, TSMM, or SDD depending on lines.
8:30 Park Opens
10:30 Book G+2
12:30 Book G+3
2:30 pray to the Disney Gods and hope to book G+4
4:30 take what we can get

We have done TSMM, ToT (@ WDW and DLR), RnR (they were kissing the height req last time so not all of them), so these are the rides *I* think we'll consider lower priority.
Thanks!!!

 

[pixiedust2u]

So this whole "gone by 1PM" thing concerns me. This is our 2nd trip to WDW as a family and we are really just making up for the COVID cancelled band trip for our four 19s. It might as well be considered a "once in a lifetime" trip. We last went to WDW in 2009. I was relieved when their spring breaks lined up AND it was the week before seasonal rates kicked in. Originally looking at 6/7s on the crowd calendars and now they are 9s/10s with greatly expanded hours. Now I feel we need to buy G+ for each of our 4 park days at an additional $90/day. We will RD the ILL$ offerings and hope to get on.

Our HS day is our last on 3/11. We then grab our bags from POP, get our private van to take us to an airport hotel. After reading the All Things G+ thread, I felt comfortable with the concept of stacking and getting the biggies for later in the day.

Here are my questions:
1. Is it safe to assume that none of the G+ will come back with an AM return time?
2. If ROTR goes down early, then our only chance of riding is close to park closing- is that correct?
3. If we end up in the park until close to get it all in (using the "last hour" strategy), to what time do you think I should change our transportation from POP to airport hotel? When does Skyliner start backing up?
4. If we get lucky and SB SDD after reserving it on G+, what is the strategy for releasing it and grabbing something else? Do we still have to wait until 10:30 for next G+?

The tentative plan

7 AM- G+ SDD for whatever time we can grab
8 AM ETPE RD ROTR then grab a standby on MFSR, MMRR, TSMM, or SDD depending on lines.
8:30 Park Opens
10:30 Book G+2
12:30 Book G+3
2:30 pray to the Disney Gods and hope to book G+4
4:30 take what we can get

We have done TSMM, ToT (@ WDW and DLR), RnR (they were kissing the height req last time so not all of them), so these are the rides *I* think we'll consider lower priority.
Thanks!!!

Hello. I hope you have a great trip.
The take home with Genie+ is it's a gamble. You have a good plan, but all it takes is one circumstance to set the whole plan off track. Is your priority rides? Or reducing line time? Remember although not ideal, it's not genie+ or nothing. You can wait in standby lines. I suggest going with your tentative plan, then whatever you aren't able to secure with genie+ you just decide if it's worth standby or not. Your kiddos sound older, so though again not ideal, could probably tolerate longer lines. What time is best for you to leave to head back to Pop? If your planning on say 8am- 5pm I think that is more than a reasonable amount of time to use RD, Genie+ and standby to get on 4-5 rides.

It's good to have a plan, but set your expectations low, prep your party and be mentally prepared that you might very well have to wait in lines topping 60-100 minutes. Decide in advance what rides the wait is worth and what rides it's not.

 

[leeniewdw]

Yeah, have a plan (maybe write it down -- I did this because our first experience with grabbing LLs was on our arrival day before and after flying, etc. It just helped to have a little paper that guided me.) Also, I did something stupid and set my phone alarm for every 2 hours ahead of time. That worked fine on 1 day, but the next day, the times we wanted were not yet available. So at 11am the return times were too soon (we were going back to room for a break) -- tough problem I know, lol. Anyway, the better strategy is to have a countdown alarm on your phone for 2 hours. Just start it once you make a reservation. (Of course, this is only if your return times are going to be > 2 hours in the future.)

 

[pens4821]

I was just looking around 11. TOT had times but when I refreshed at 11 there were none. I refreshed for about 5 minutes and twice a time popped up. MFSM ran out at 1102, MMRR 1103, RNRC 1104. Now like TOT they did have a time or two pop up, but not constant like before those times.

In a couple weeks I’ll be aiming for SDD, RNRC, TOT. More if I can through refresh but those are my major wants. I think ill do RNRC second even though TOT has longer waits now as I don’t want to waste time trying for TOT and lose both. I’ll be refreshing a lot starting around 1230 (park opens at 830).

Now at 1110 RNRC stayed on a few refreshes. 1112 they all had times available multiple refreshes. Now I don’t know what to do haha. 1114 all but TOT multiple refreshes.

I wasn’t paying much attention but I don’t think I noticed SDD at all pop up with a time.

 

[wdwwdw]

So this whole "gone by 1PM" thing concerns me. This is our 2nd trip to WDW as a family and we are really just making up for the COVID cancelled band trip for our four 19s. It might as well be considered a "once in a lifetime" trip. We last went to WDW in 2009. I was relieved when their spring breaks lined up AND it was the week before seasonal rates kicked in. Originally looking at 6/7s on the crowd calendars and now they are 9s/10s with greatly expanded hours. Now I feel we need to buy G+ for each of our 4 park days at an additional $90/day. We will RD the ILL$ offerings and hope to get on.

Our HS day is our last on 3/11. We then grab our bags from POP, get our private van to take us to an airport hotel. After reading the All Things G+ thread, I felt comfortable with the concept of stacking and getting the biggies for later in the day.

Here are my questions:
1. Is it safe to assume that none of the G+ will come back with an AM return time?
2. If ROTR goes down early, then our only chance of riding is close to park closing- is that correct?
3. If we end up in the park until close to get it all in (using the "last hour" strategy), to what time do you think I should change our transportation from POP to airport hotel? When does Skyliner start backing up?
4. If we get lucky and SB SDD after reserving it on G+, what is the strategy for releasing it and grabbing something else? Do we still have to wait until 10:30 for next G+?

The tentative plan

7 AM- G+ SDD for whatever time we can grab
8 AM ETPE RD ROTR then grab a standby on MFSR, MMRR, TSMM, or SDD depending on lines.
8:30 Park Opens
10:30 Book G+2
12:30 Book G+3
2:30 pray to the Disney Gods and hope to book G+4
4:30 take what we can get

We have done TSMM, ToT (@ WDW and DLR), RnR (they were kissing the height req last time so not all of them), so these are the rides *I* think we'll consider lower priority.
Thanks!!!

I was there Presidents Day weekend and here was my morning when DHS had an 830 early entry:

At POP Skyliner station 6:45, was approximately 10th in line
Grabbed SDD G+ at 7 (I forget what time it was for exactly, but based on my pictures we were on it at 11:20)
Skyliner started at 7:30 - couldn't see the end of the line at this point
No line at all at the transfer station
By the time we got to DHS they had already let people in to the park, but after shuffling through the whole ROTR queue, only waited around 10 minutes. Ride was starting around 8:07
Went to MFSR with almost no line, off at 8:56
On MMRR at 9:50 - this line was way out into the extended queue and was the longest line of our trip but IMO it moved the whole time.

So by 10 we had done three headliners with SDD booked. Also was able to get G+ for ST, RnR, TSMM, and AlienSS that day as well.

ETA - regarding Skyliner after closing, on another night I got on RnR right at closing and was walking out around 9:20 and there were probably 5 cabins worth of people in line., aka not a long line at all.

 

[Meglen]

When trying to secure g+ and $ll I'm assuming paying with loaded cc is the best. Is using a gift card even possible?

 

[leeniewdw]

We're headed down on Friday and our DHS day is Saturday. We plan to do RD and don't need to mess with RotR (have done it twice). My DH is obsessed with MFSR (lol) so I'm thinking maybe we can grab an early MFSR at 7am and RD some rides, hit our MFSR return time and grab our next LL before 11am?

Anyone know how quickly MFSR has been going? I suppose the addition of MMRR to the standard G+ will help us here.

 

[Meglen]

We're headed down on Friday and our DHS day is Saturday. We plan to do RD and don't need to mess with RotR (have done it twice). My DH is obsessed with MFSR (lol) so I'm thinking maybe we can grab an early MFSR at 7am and RD some rides, hit our MFSR return time and grab our next LL before 11am?

Anyone know how quickly MFSR has been going? I suppose the addition of MMRR to the standard G+ will help us here.

Worst case just do singlet rider since it's just 2 of you. Might even get on the same ride. But your plan sounds good to me. I don't think mfsr goes very fast.

 

[leeniewdw]

Is the single rider line obvious? We've only done this ride with FP+ or LL, so have no idea.

 

[Mrs~Incredible]

We're headed down on Friday and our DHS day is Saturday. We plan to do RD and don't need to mess with RotR (have done it twice). My DH is obsessed with MFSR (lol) so I'm thinking maybe we can grab an early MFSR at 7am and RD some rides, hit our MFSR return time and grab our next LL before 11am?

Anyone know how quickly MFSR has been going? I suppose the addition of MMRR to the standard G+ will help us here.

You can watch the tip board in the morning, but I think your chances are good to get an early MFSR if that is your priority at 7.

 

[Mrs~Incredible]

When trying to secure g+ and $ll I'm assuming paying with loaded cc is the best. Is using a gift card even possible?

I’m not sure, maybe check out the everything genie plus thread. Good luck!

 

[Meglen]

Is the single rider line obvious? We've only done this ride with FP+ or LL, so have no idea.

yup its to the left of the main entrance. If its open the sign will say single rider.

 

[Westerner]

My DH is obsessed with MFSR (lol)

Fellow Star Wars nerd here. Recommend requesting the right hand pilot seat, you get to pull the hyperspace lever. Don't forget to say "Punch it Chewie!" when making the jump to lightspeed .

MFSR has significant reride value as it's also a video game, I think you get feedback at the end on how well you did, how well you pilot affects the smoothness of the ride, and each role has different responsibilities.

It's not hard to get an LL for it if you book early.

 

[abtahime]

Okay I’m wondering if one of these is a better strategy for navigating HS with 3 kids who will need a midday break by 1ish (we will then hop to Epcot in the evening for an ADR and hopefully a ride or two there). Our goals are ROR, MMRR, TSMM, MFSM, and SDD. Anything else we will consider an unlikely bonus.

We plan on purchasing ROR and genie+ for the day as well as doing RD for on sight guests.

the most common strategy seems to be to get SDD right at 7 for whatever time we get and then hitting up hopefully 2 of the other 3 during early hours and maybe waiting in one long line for the third. Unless we hit the SDD lottery it seems unlikely to get a return time that will allow us to make another genie+ earlier than the two hours after park opening which seems like all of the other return times for rides we want to hit will be pushed for out and/or gone. This is the strategy I have been considering most.

however, would there be value in RD SDD instead, and trying to get an earlier return window on a MMRR or MFSR in order to activate your second genie+ selection sooner? We will be there over what appears to be a very busy 3 week of March, a lot of parks already sold out.

 

[jbish]

Okay I’m wondering if one of these is a better strategy for navigating HS with 3 kids who will need a midday break by 1ish (we will then hop to Epcot in the evening for an ADR and hopefully a ride or two there). Our goals are ROR, MMRR, TSMM, MFSM, and SDD. Anything else we will consider an unlikely bonus.

We plan on purchasing ROR and genie+ for the day as well as doing RD for on sight guests.

the most common strategy seems to be to get SDD right at 7 for whatever time we get and then hitting up hopefully 2 of the other 3 during early hours and maybe waiting in one long line for the third. Unless we hit the SDD lottery it seems unlikely to get a return time that will allow us to make another genie+ earlier than the two hours after park opening which seems like all of the other return times for rides we want to hit will be pushed for out and/or gone. This is the strategy I have been considering most.

however, would there be value in RD SDD instead, and trying to get an earlier return window on a MMRR or MFSR in order to activate your second genie+ selection sooner? We will be there over what appears to be a very busy 3 week of March, a lot of parks already sold out.

I am in a very similar boat as SDD is a high priority ride for us but who can count on a lottery??? So I'm very interested in hearing some feedback on this scenario. We will be there the week leading up to Easter, so I can't expect there to be many options left at 11, let alone 1. The tap-and-book method would be great, if you can get it going early enough.

 

[snikki]

Okay I’m wondering if one of these is a better strategy for navigating HS with 3 kids who will need a midday break by 1ish (we will then hop to Epcot in the evening for an ADR and hopefully a ride or two there). Our goals are ROR, MMRR, TSMM, MFSM, and SDD. Anything else we will consider an unlikely bonus.

We plan on purchasing ROR and genie+ for the day as well as doing RD for on sight guests.

the most common strategy seems to be to get SDD right at 7 for whatever time we get and then hitting up hopefully 2 of the other 3 during early hours and maybe waiting in one long line for the third. Unless we hit the SDD lottery it seems unlikely to get a return time that will allow us to make another genie+ earlier than the two hours after park opening which seems like all of the other return times for rides we want to hit will be pushed for out and/or gone. This is the strategy I have been considering most.

however, would there be value in RD SDD instead, and trying to get an earlier return window on a MMRR or MFSR in order to activate your second genie+ selection sooner? We will be there over what appears to be a very busy 3 week of March, a lot of parks already sold out.

IF you are positive you and your kids can be in line at DHS by 7:45 am I would go for RD at SDD and getting an earlier G+ ride for another ride. That way you can hopefully pull a second LL before 11 am and you should get a decent second LL. Most people will be picking at 11 am for their second LL and then everything good is gone.

The fact that you can’t lock in your time is annoying and terrible. It’s why we won’t be trying for SDD until our afternoon at DHS.

 

[SLThomas318]

Okay I’m wondering if one of these is a better strategy for navigating HS with 3 kids who will need a midday break by 1ish (we will then hop to Epcot in the evening for an ADR and hopefully a ride or two there). Our goals are ROR, MMRR, TSMM, MFSM, and SDD. Anything else we will consider an unlikely bonus.

We plan on purchasing ROR and genie+ for the day as well as doing RD for on sight guests.

the most common strategy seems to be to get SDD right at 7 for whatever time we get and then hitting up hopefully 2 of the other 3 during early hours and maybe waiting in one long line for the third. Unless we hit the SDD lottery it seems unlikely to get a return time that will allow us to make another genie+ earlier than the two hours after park opening which seems like all of the other return times for rides we want to hit will be pushed for out and/or gone. This is the strategy I have been considering most.

however, would there be value in RD SDD instead, and trying to get an earlier return window on a MMRR or MFSR in order to activate your second genie+ selection sooner? We will be there over what appears to be a very busy 3 week of March, a lot of parks already sold out.

My experience with Genie+ is that you are more likely to get later return times at a park like Hollywood... even when purchasing ROR. We wanted an early ROR, but when I realized that would be unlikely we made HS our pm park. The chances of purchasing an early ROR and getting an early return time for SDD would require a lot of luck. I would probably rope drop the Toy Story rides, try for an early MMRR, and then maybe rely on single rider for MFSR or hope to pull it via genie+ depending on your kids ages... and then cross my fingers/toes that I could buy ROR for the morning.

As a family with kids who also need breaks we find Genie+ super frustrating for making morning plans in a park

 

[abtahime]

IF you are positive you and your kids can be in line at DHS by 7:45 am I would go for RD at SDD and getting an earlier G+ ride for another ride. That way you can hopefully pull a second LL before 11 am and you should get a decent second LL. Most people will be picking at 11 am for their second LL and then everything good is gone.

The fact that you can’t lock in your time is annoying and terrible. It’s why we won’t be trying for SDD until our afternoon at DHS.

my two year old is up at 6 each day and since we are all in the same room figure early is doable. We are staying at the Poly, do you have any advice on when we need to be at the bus to get there that early?