Fastpass+ or Legacy Fastpass

[FLchick415]

We use a crowd calendar, but never 60 days out. I'd usually plan a week or two before going and it could change on what the kids wanted to do. Plus, we'd always park hop in the evening to a park we felt like going to, not planned 60 days earlier. Heck, we might not even end up in a park, maybe Downtown Disney.

That's fair. I was just curious.

 

[surferdave]

I have a question - I've seen many people say they don't like to pick what park they'll be at 60 days out, but...if you use a crowd calendar, wouldn't you be doing that anyway? I'm not trying to be a smart***, it's a genuine question.

Two answers to this from me:

1. I might make a tentative plan but I rarely follow it to the letter once I'm at WDW. If my wife or daughter doesn't get enough rest to get up and make EMH at MK, I might switch to AK that day if it's the recommended park.

2. Disney changes things frequently within my 60 days (EMH hours, show times, attractions or transportation taken out of service) that shoot holes in all the bases of my plans.

Being a planner to me never meant having a pre-planned schedule, it meant having a plan of action based on existing conditions. The Disney lock-them-in strategy has greatly diminished this ability.

 

[sabrecmc]

What I miss about the old system was that we often had 4 people in our party, 3 adults and 1 child. We could get 4 FPs for something like Peter Pan and then DD could ride with 1 adult and then ride again with another adult. This didn't increase the line for anyone, but DD got to ride the rides she loved multiple times. That was nice.

 

[wareagle57]

Didn't really notice that so I was unaware. Obviously if people are printing them it lessens it, but the old way it was printed 100% of the time. Now it is printed part of the time. So it may not be an absolute savings but even if less people do it it's a plus. Any system in this day and age that requires paper (I took a photo of the screen for my FP+, I wasn't even offered a print out so I didn't know it existed) is out of date.

Except now we are printing entire sheets of paper not just a little tiny movie ticket sized one. And like PP said, we could have kept the legacy system and converted it to a paperless version.

 

[FLchick415]

Two answers to this from me:

1. I might make a tentative plan but I rarely follow it to the letter once I'm at WDW. If my wife or daughter doesn't get enough rest to get up and make EMH at MK, I might switch to AK that day if it's the recommended park.

2. Disney changes things frequently within my 60 days (EMH hours, show times, attractions or transportation taken out of service) that shoot holes in all the bases of my plans.

Being a planner to me never meant having a pre-planned schedule, it meant having a plan of action based on existing conditions. The Disney lock-them-in strategy has greatly diminished this ability.

It's always interesting to hear other perspectives. I usually travel solo. But when I do go with my family, it's been a while since we've gone with small children (my nieces are 14 and 16 now). Usually, we pick a park, and that's it. lol

 

[CTDisneyfan816]

Except now we are printing entire sheets of paper not just a little tiny movie ticket sized one. And like PP said, we could have kept the legacy system and converted it to a paperless version.

If you have a smart phone you don't need a piece of paper. I just took a picture of the screen, there's my "sheet".

 

[CTDisneyfan816]

Another thing about the old system that I found inferior. You could only get one fast pass at a time. You had to wait until the window for your first fast pass to open (and if you are like most, you are at the ride you had the fast pass for anyway). And by that time the popular rides are often gone for the day (Toy Story I found to be gone long before noon) so you still only got one tier one ride anyway. I like knowing walking into the park that day that I have those three rides all set or if I waited for that day, got three rides set up at 9 am instead of one. I actually found in July I got more FP+ rides in a day (6) than I was able to get legacy (usually no more than 3-4).

 

[Zhaan]

I have a question - I've seen many people say they don't like to pick what park they'll be at 60 days out, but...if you use a crowd calendar, wouldn't you be doing that anyway? I'm not trying to be a smart***, it's a genuine question.

We always go at low attendance times of the year so we have no need for a crowd calendar for day today planning. We only use crowd calendars to determine which week to go not where to go on which day.

 

[surferdave]

Another thing about the old system that I found inferior. You could only get one fast pass at a time. You had to wait until the window for your first fast pass to open (and if you are like most, you are at the ride you had the fast pass for anyway). And by that time the popular rides are often gone for the day (Toy Story I found to be gone long before noon) so you still only got one tier one ride anyway. I like knowing walking into the park that day that I have those three rides all set or if I waited for that day, got three rides set up at 9 am instead of one. I actually found in July I got more FP+ rides in a day (6) than I was able to get legacy (usually no more than 3-4).

This is a myth, and TSMM was the exception to the rule (and has become the poster child for MDE). I never saw any other attraction run out of FP- prior to mid afternoon, at least not until they were performing FP+ testing and were drawing off the same pool.

 

[CTDisneyfan816]

This is a myth, and TSMM was the exception to the rule (and has become the poster child for MDE). I never saw any other attraction run out of FP- prior to mid afternoon, at least not until they were performing FP+ testing and were drawing off the same pool.

I have, Soarin' was more often than not gone shortly after noon, at least when I've gone, same with Space Mountain.

 

[CTDisneyfan816]

Another advantage of FP+ that I forgot to include. You don't have to walk to the actual ride to get it. So no more mad dashes and knocking past anyone you have to in order to do so, to run to TSM or the popular ride at each park to get it. Just at the comfort of your own home or even if you wait to get there, any kiosk to get the FP.

 

[cakebaker]

I have, Soarin' was more often than not gone shortly after noon, at least when I've gone, same with Space Mountain.

Absolutely true- and by early afternoon, forget TOT or Everest, just to name a few more. By early evening, the list included most all the headliners. It's not a myth, it's a fact.

And that's not even including the problem of being able to get one at noon, but the return time was late at night. Once they stopped allowing you to use them with expired times, it became even worse.

 

[CTDisneyfan816]

Absolutely true- and by early afternoon, forget TOT or Everest, just to name a few more. By early evening, the list included most all the headliners. It's not a myth, it's a fact.

And that's not even including the problem of being able to get one at noon, but the return time was late at night. Once they stopped allowing you to use them with expired times, it became even worse.

I still have an old Soarin' FP ticket that I never used. I get there at 9 am for rope drop. I got a FP and that was for somewhere around 11. I used it at 11 and went to get another, it was for 7:45 to 8:45 PM! When I get there at rope drop I don't stay until closing so needless to say it went unused. And if at 11:30 it is that close to closing I would think it's reasonable to say shortly thereafter it was done for the day.

 

[lugnut33]

If you want to make this a moot argument, then just pick a time when the parks are dead because both FP systems worked great during those times.

That said, we had been to WDW when FP were available for Soarin' well into the evening, and had also been there when they were gone by noon.

Guess my point is crowd levels are important under both systems.

 

[Angel Ariel]

If the same number of people that are using FP+ currently used legacy FP, every E ticket would be like TSMM and Soarin' were pre-FP+ and we'd have thread-after-thread here on how horrible it is.

TBH, I don't know that that would have bothered me. What I like about legacy is that each day was a new day, and I was *guaranteed* to get a FP if I showed up at Rope Drop. When that FP would be wasn't under my control, obviously, but we always managed that without huge changes to how we tour.

What I dislike about FP+ is the amount of preplanning necessary, and that even though I was online at 60 days at midnight, that I was shut out of FP+ for certain attractions simply because my trip is too short (4 days) and people whose windows opened before mine were able to take all the slots.

Under legacy we toured how we wanted and fit FP in as we desired, based on the situation we were experiencing in the parks that day (crowd/weather/etc). With FP+, it feels like the opposite...that I'm planning how we'll tour around the FP+...with the downside of not knowing what crowds will be like,what weather will be like, etc..

I'm withholding total judgment til our trip...maybe FP+ will work great in the park. But even if it does, I njust don't like this level of planning beforehand. It just isn't fun for me. ADRs were fun...what this was just wasn't.

 

[Angel Ariel]

You had to wait until the window for your first fast pass to open (and if you are like most, you are at the ride you had the fast pass for anyway).

Actually that's not entirely correct. You had to wait for either the window to open OR 2 hrs from when you pulled the FP - whichever came first.

So if you pulled an 8pm FP at 11am, you could pull another FP at 1pm, not 8pm.

Small difference, I know, but an important one IMO.

 

[Tarheel girl 1975]

Another advantage of FP+ that I forgot to include. You don't have to walk to the actual ride to get it. So no more mad dashes and knocking past anyone you have to in order to do so, to run to TSM or the popular ride at each park to get it. Just at the comfort of your own home or even if you wait to get there, any kiosk to get the FP.

BUt there are only 4 kiosks areas in MK. When I was there, I had to wait in a line just to find out what rides even had availability. With legacy FP, I was able to use the Disney app to check FP availability before walking to teh actual ride.

TBH, I don't know that that would have bothered me. What I like about legacy is that each day was a new day, and I was *guaranteed* to get a FP if I showed up at Rope Drop. When that FP would be wasn't under my control, obviously, but we always managed that without huge changes to how we tour.

What I dislike about FP+ is the amount of preplanning necessary, and that even though I was online at 60 days at midnight, that I was shut out of FP+ for certain attractions simply because my trip is too short (4 days) and people whose windows opened before mine were able to take all the slots.

Under legacy we toured how we wanted and fit FP in as we desired, based on the situation we were experiencing in the parks that day (crowd/weather/etc). With FP+, it feels like the opposite...that I'm planning how we'll tour around the FP+...with the downside of not knowing what crowds will be like,what weather will be like, etc..

I'm withholding total judgment til our trip...maybe FP+ will work great in the park. But even if it does, I njust don't like this level of planning beforehand. It just isn't fun for me. ADRs were fun...what this was just wasn't.

There are changes they could make to FP+, that would improve my opinion of it. Shortening the advance planning window. Decreasing the number of advanced FP+ slots to allow for more in park choices. Removing teirs and allowing re-rides.

 

[HM]

They both work fine for us so I voted no opinion. I am fine with either one.
I did like the aspect of FP+ that allows me to not feel like I have to be at park at opening.

 

[Suvadoo]

BUt there are only 4 kiosks areas in MK. When I was there, I had to wait in a line just to find out what rides even had availability. With legacy FP, I was able to use the Disney app to check FP availability before walking to teh actual ride.



There are changes they could make to FP+, that would improve my opinion of it. Shortening the advance planning window. Decreasing the number of advanced FP+ slots to allow for more in park choices. Removing teirs and allowing re-rides.

I would also add: lengthening the FP+ return time to 2 hours. I don't know if this is feasible, but I think it would help a lot.

 

[johde]

I have not used FP+ yet so I haven't voted. Under legacy FP, I had trips where they worked wonderfully and trips where there return times were too far away to be useful to me (I tend to hop frequently), or gone. My last trip New Years 2013, I maybe pulled at most 1 or 2 useful FP's a day. With FP+ having 3 useful ones going in would be a big plus.