Don’t refresh. Just hit join right at 10:00.
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I practiced from home this morning. Didn’t use a countdown just watched my phone clock. As soon as it turned seven there was no join button so I pulled down to refresh the page, hit join, party select page hit join again, then got this screen. Theoretically, did I get it?
Yes. I think that theoretically you would have gotten one.
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I have hit join twice before and not got it…but that was on a bad day for Rise where it was down much of the day. I’ll be trying on Sunday. Only one chance for success thus trip.
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…and one chance was successful today.
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Just got back from a trip - may or may not decide to write a trip report later. 
Wanted to share our success with ROTR - we did HS twice: 11/22 - got BG 20 the first time, second HS day 11/27 - BG 1 
, both from WBC (Wyndham Bonnet Creek) wifi.
Can’t recall where I read this, and whether it made any material difference, but for the second try where I got BG 1, a few minutes before 7:00:00am, I went into MDE’s My Plans screen, and loaded up the Park Reservations for HS, so that the app knew who was in my party and who had reservations. Perhaps the app caches this information - when the clock struck 7:00:00am, I just flew through the screens without any pauses and freezes.
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FYI my general technique is:
-
Open the MDE app and leave it on the main screen (with the AT-AT walkers). I even scroll the screen to align the white “Join” button from the main screen, with where the second blue “Join” button will appear on the “Join Virtual Queue” screen.
(look up Fitts’ Law for the science behind it; UI / UX related)
- Watch the clock (with seconds) from another device - I personally used https://www.timeanddate.com/ . During my practice runs before our trip, relying on the phone’s clock and/or switching between MDE and the clock app was just too dicey.
- At 7:00:00am, click “Join” from the main screen, then “Join” from the “Join Virtual Queue” screen. On a few practice runs I tried starting off from the “Join Virtual Queue” screen and doing a refresh, but that seemed to take longer for me.
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Thanks for these insights! Very helpful. The process is changing slightly all the time and it’s always good to hear the latest experiences.
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I have done this too during practice. It makes total sense! I considered giving this as a tip, but then thought Nah, people would really think I’m a total dork! 
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Indeed, and sub-seconds matter when trying to get BGs.
Heh, I had a similar thought when deciding whether to mention Fitts’ Law or not. However, I’ve learnt a bunch from this community, even on things non-Disney or TP related, so figured others might appreciate the pointer on why it makes sense.
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Does the system automatically select those on your friends list with park passes or do you have to manually do it?
Automatically. It allows everyone a fair chance without having to select manually which takes time. If for some reason they are not, just ignore it and continue to hit join. You can then see a CM and they will add the rest of the party.
I narrowed my friends list down to only the people we are vacationing with so at worst I’d just have to hit select all.
Yes that’s good. But if you want an earlier time BG, you are better off not even looking at who is checked as that can potentially take too long to not get a BG at all.
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Yes, the goal is to just keep clicking to get to the next screens as fast as possible.
For reference, I went back and looked at the timestamps from the screenshot image files on my device - for BG 20 it was 7:00:25am, for BG 1 it was 7:00:16am (note though that this also includes any delay after receiving a BG till when I invoked the screenshot function on my device).
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Will we definitely be able to add the rest of our group if they aren’t automatically added?
Yes, because that would be an error on Disney’s part. Many people have had no problem resolving.
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Starting Jan 1, 2021 the second BG drop will change to 1pm. Guests park hopping into DHS will not be able to get a BG
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I thought that Disney had already said that park hoppers would not be eligible for boarding groups?
Correct