After years of planning, I'm kinda terrified of G+/LL

I’m going at a typically low crowd level time (second week of September), but I still keep second-guessing literally every choice I make. I’m driving myself crazy. Please tell me it gets easier once I actually get to use it. :grimacing: :rofl: :cold_sweat: :sweat_smile:

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I was in your shoes in early June. The new system is complicated and doesn’t allow us to plan – which is what I like to do! I wouldn’t say we mastered it over the course of our trip, but we made good use of it and rode what we wanted even if not when we wanted to ride. I’m sure the BG1 experts could help you make the most of it. Are you staying onsite? That seems to make a lot of difference.

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Did you find the what toy see is what you get on return times. I’m monitoring obsessively and feel pretty confident about general windows.

We didn’t try to use the BG1 system when we went, so maybe they have better luck. At 7am, we would get a LL for whatever TP said was our top priority for that park. With how fast LL go at that point of the day, we would just grab what we saw since it would frequently change the return time as we were getting it. (Not by much, but it would change.) If the return was early enough, we’d get the next one when we tapped in to that ride. If it was for a little later in the morning or in the afternoon, we would set our alarms for just shy of 2h after park opening or when the daily drops were supposed to happen for that park. We could refresh G+ to get slightly different return times but it only offers one return time slot option at a time. (In the FPP system it would give you a few options for the return and G+ doesn’t.)

We were able to stack LL returns for the afternoons and we kept optimizing our TP to make the best use of our time.

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It gets easier :blush: i felt the same way! all I did was think about genie+ before our trip. I was so worried about everything going well. Once I started using it it was fine. We were there with crowd levels of 7 and 8 and rode everything we wanted. Honestly I felt a little more relaxed beacause we ended up not needing to rope drop everyday.

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On chat I just read a fantastic report of stacking LLs for MK last night.

Cooler temps, no waiting in line, stacking for the evening is as pre-plannned as us planners can get it these days.

They highly recommended this method- especially until temps drop.

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It does get easier in terms of knowing how to do it. But it remains a part time job. Also it was really on the third day of use that I felt like a pro. Made some errors on day 1 and 2 but nothing that completely wrecked our plans. Definitely felt that stacking for evening was the best way to go overall.

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I had friends there during 4th of July week with a group a 12. They had never been but had no problem using Genie+ and got tons of LLs. I had given them a list of the order to book. On July 4 the rope dropped MK and rode Space and Buzz and used G+ in the morning for Splash, Peter Pan then started booking DHS for a 5:00 arrival and had Slinky, Smugglers Run, Rockin Roller Coaster, Runaway Railway. They did’t have any complaints about using it. The scored tons of LLs that week each day.

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That’s not helpful for morning people like my family no also like to be done at the parks for good by 3 or 4. This system really favors those who stay late.

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I do agree that G+ does favor those who are arrive late and will stay late in the day, especially for the most popular rides at MK and DHS or the ones that really need an LL to save time.

We did open to close at MK and HS and open to almost close at EP. And 7A-1P at AK.

BG1 was amazing. Yes. I’d prefer not looking at my phone all vacation. But that was a problem in FP years, too. The only time I used MDE was one LL and to look up times for my ADRs. BG1 was almost effortless.

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I was pretty successful in the mornings with BG1. DHS is the hardest part but with some refreshing we were able to make it work. The other parks were fine getting stuff in the mornings.

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I’ve been monitoring DHS and it seems it’s improved. We’re not interested in about half the rides there, actually just TSL and MMRR.

If that’s the case I’d recommend getting SDD for an LL at opening. Are you staying onsite and using ETPE?

If so you can probably rope drop MMRR, head to TSL and ride TSM and ASS standby, and then SDD on LL.

Alternatively you can get an LL for MMRR, rope drop SDD, and then hit TSM and ASS. You probably could get second rides on LL for those two as well.

If you’re off-site, I’d pick Slinky first, then MMRR, then circle back to TSL to pick up LLs for TSM and ASS.

Onsite planning on arriving between 830-845. I was actually thinking of doing ASS first since wait is short and my kids love it. 7LL for SDD and it looks like I should be able to grab TSM and MMRR without issues all before 3:30 or so.

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That should work nicely.

Guess I need to add ADRs to BG1!

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We loved BG1! Just returned from a 7 day trip and we rode everything we wanted multiple times. Our best trip in years. On our MK days we would get an early JC for 9 to 10 and a 7DMT for around 1 PM. We RD Space and Buzz, then ride JC. If something was available right away we would get it. Did POtC IaSw and Wtp. Otherwise we would eat ( Sleepy Holliow one day and Kona Cafe the other). We would stack LL’s while we ate, then do them after. Splash,HM and BTMRR. Rode 7DMT with ILL…We put Tiki room, CBJ , HOP , COP, PM, and Philharmagic in depending on how LL times worked out and we like to do those when it is hottest and busiest. Then it was time for early dinner BOG one day and Steakhouse 71 the other. We had PP, Space and Buzz LL for after dinner and did MILF in between. One day we did the after dessert party for FW and the other we had to stake out a spot. It waa like the old school paper FP days without the running!

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:smirk:

Sounds great! Are you going to do a trip report?