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

[jrsharp21]

This is exactly what happened to my DH on boarding group day. He was pulling down to refresh on the status page and his Join Boarding Group button never activated.

We are headed to WDW tonight and to DHS tomorrow morning. So I gave it a test run this morning. This is what I ran into also doing it from home. The pull down never activitated the join button. But when I went back to the main screen the button was red.

 

[yulilin3]

Post 1 has been edited to add the procedure on how to get into the VQ and a BG. To help people lets please try and keep this thread laser focused on BG, your personal experiences getting into the VQ, any details you might find helpful to what your experience was like and any changes in park opening schedule.
The rest of the parks operations has little to do with how to get a into the VQ and a BG. The basics are get to the park at least an hour before opening times, at busier times, then allow for more time
By keeping this thread focused we will minimize the countless of pages that are devoted to other subjects and will help future visitors to plan easier.
On this subforum we have a thread for
SWGE food and drink
SWGE attractions
SWGE ineteractivity
SWGE general information
SWGE Just Back thread
RotR spoiler and non spoiler thread
thank you

 

[MariaCPA]

I have been following along so only fair I share my info. Left Movies at 6;01, parked at 6:10. Through security by 6:20, stayed to right and gates opened soon after I got in line. One hiccup I had renewed my annual pass but didn’t release I needed to activate it. A cast member walked me to the long guest relations. While having minor freak out , another cast member came through line and told us you could go to much shorter ticket line. Jumped over there and had ticket sorted by 6:36. Since I had already been in line they had given me a pass to go through a specific line to entry. In park by 6:40. Decided to head towards ToT and crowd not bad, was stopped by bathroom. Got BG30 right at 7, using LTE with iPhone 11 and AT&T. Walked on ToT, off by 7:15, did single rider for rocking roller coaster, off by 7:45. BG called at 7:50, got in line at 8:01 and off by 8:30! It is amazing and worth it!

 

[elmoandzoey]

Sorry if I don't scroll past 172 pages to find this info (I am pretty sure it probably was already answered somewhere...) but I have a bit of a problem understanding the chart in the first post. So let's look at Jan 5th. They let you into the park at 6:20am, the park opens at 07:00am which is also when they allow you to sign up for a boarding group and at 07:01am all boarding groups are gone? Which indicates there is only a 60 seconds window to sign up for a boarding group? You get another 20 minutes or so to sign up for a backup boarding group which may or may not get called at the end of the day. Is this for real? Just looking at this it seriously makes me reconsider even trying to get onto the ride at all during out upcoming trip. If you have to rely on Disney wifi for getting a boarding group (we're from out of country, we do not have cell service in the US), I guess the chances are pretty much zero to snag an boarding group at all.

 

[yulilin3]

Sorry if I don't scroll past 172 pages to find this info (I am pretty sure it probably was already answered somewhere...) but I have a bit of a problem understanding the chart in the first post. So let's look at Jan 5th. They let you into the park at 6:20am, the park opens at 07:00am which is also when they allow you to sign up for a boarding group and at 07:01am all boarding groups are gone? Which indicates there is only a 60 seconds window to sign up for a boarding group? You get another 20 minutes or so to sign up for a backup boarding group which may or may not get called at the end of the day. Is this for real? Just looking at this it seriously makes me reconsider even trying to get onto the ride at all during out upcoming trip!

as you can see from the chart the times vary from day to day. We had 4 days where all bg were gone in less than 5 min. but for the most part the process has been opened longer. It depends on a lot of things: performance of the ride, guest recovery from the day before, the big one is obviously demand.
For example for today all the bg were gone by 7:20am and they are still taking backup bg at this time

 

[DavidNYC]

Sorry if I don't scroll past 172 pages to find this info (I am pretty sure it probably was already answered somewhere...) but I have a bit of a problem understanding the chart in the first post. So let's look at Jan 5th. They let you into the park at 6:20am, the park opens at 07:00am which is also when they allow you to sign up for a boarding group and at 07:01am all boarding groups are gone? Which indicates there is only a 60 seconds window to sign up for a boarding group? You get another 20 minutes or so to sign up for a backup boarding group which may or may not get called at the end of the day. Is this for real? Just looking at this it seriously makes me reconsider even trying to get onto the ride at all during out upcoming trip. If you have to rely on Disney wifi for getting a boarding group (we're from out of country, we do not have cell service in the US), I guess the chances are pretty much zero to snag an boarding group at all.

If your trip isn’t New Years weekend, I wouldn’t pick the worst day of the year in the chart to compare to your experience. You don’t need to review 172 pages - if you scroll back just a few pages you’ll get many reports giving you what you need to know.

 

[nkosiek]

Sorry if I don't scroll past 172 pages to find this info (I am pretty sure it probably was already answered somewhere...) but I have a bit of a problem understanding the chart in the first post. So let's look at Jan 5th. They let you into the park at 6:20am, the park opens at 07:00am which is also when they allow you to sign up for a boarding group and at 07:01am all boarding groups are gone? Which indicates there is only a 60 seconds window to sign up for a boarding group? You get another 20 minutes or so to sign up for a backup boarding group which may or may not get called at the end of the day. Is this for real? Just looking at this it seriously makes me reconsider even trying to get onto the ride at all during out upcoming trip!

You read it correctly. That said, everything with regards to this ride/experience is fluid. If you look at "The Chart" there aren't any trends that one can spot with regards to the whole month the ride has been open, short of, get there before park opens, scan in, and at the moment BGs start, try to get in. Now, since the past weekend is over and holiday crowds have started to disperse, it "appears" as though the BGs are lasting a bit longer, but the trend still holds true.

I'm not going until July and love checking this thread just because I think it is fascinating. I am sure things will change 5 or 10 more times between now and when I get there, but man, this is real life drama (and thankfully not life or death) and I find it fascinating.

 

[bryana]

I fell pretty far behind on the thread after not getting a chance to catch up at all yesterday, so forgive me if it has been mentioned.

Woke up to an email from Touring Plans that there was an hours change for my DHS day on March 2. Looks like they’re still getting rid of AM EMH further out. It was changed to PM EMH for that day.

 

[TheMaxRebo]

I fell pretty far behind on the thread after not getting a chance to catch up at all yesterday, so forgive me if it has been mentioned.

Woke up to an email from Touring Plans that there was an hours change for my DHS day on March 2. Looks like they’re still getting rid of AM EMH further out. It was changed to PM EMH for that day.

yeah, I just posted this in the News thread but looks like EMH for all of March was changed from morning to PM ones

NEWS

EMH hours for DHS in March changed from morning to Evening (just like has been done recently, so not a surprise)

https://twitter.com/x/status/1215271663689965568

 

[GADisneyDad14]

Sorry if I don't scroll past 172 pages to find this info (I am pretty sure it probably was already answered somewhere...) but I have a bit of a problem understanding the chart in the first post. So let's look at Jan 5th. They let you into the park at 6:20am, the park opens at 07:00am which is also when they allow you to sign up for a boarding group and at 07:01am all boarding groups are gone? Which indicates there is only a 60 seconds window to sign up for a boarding group? You get another 20 minutes or so to sign up for a backup boarding group which may or may not get called at the end of the day. Is this for real? Just looking at this it seriously makes me reconsider even trying to get onto the ride at all during out upcoming trip. If you have to rely on Disney wifi for getting a boarding group (we're from out of country, we do not have cell service in the US), I guess the chances are pretty much zero to snag an boarding group at all.

5 others already answered in the time it took to write this, but what you are pointing out is exactly how it transpired - on that day. Looking back it turned out that period from roughly 1/2 - 1/5 turned out to be peak crowd and peak BG fill-up days over the holiday season, much more so than Christmas week. My day was 1/2, the first which saw lighting fast BG fill-up, and it kind of stunk. Things have since relaxed a bit, the only ongoing challenge being just when or if we may see 1/2-1/5 conditions again. Will it happen over MLK weekend? Pres weekend? Easter? Some random Sunday? Maybe it won’t happen again, hard to tell given the number of variables involved.

 

[yulilin3]

yeah, I just posted this in the News thread but looks like EMH for all of March was changed from morning to PM ones

NEWS

EMH hours for DHS in March changed from morning to Evening (just like has been done recently, so not a surprise)

https://twitter.com/x/status/1215271663689965568

yes this was posted here yesterday, along with extension of hours through almost the end of the month

 

[CaliforniaGirl09]

Reporting back after a morning that went better than I dared hope. Here's the lowdown:

5:30 am wakeup call
5:45 left BLT room (we are quick!)
Called UBER. Said 6 minutes but guy was turned around by cops due to construction/race set up so he arrived a little before 6.
6:15 drop off and hear announcement that opening the park
6:28 through tapstiles
Found a seat on the concrete benches on road that leads to Tower of Terror. Thirty minutes sped by pretty quickly. A couple announcements about BGs that made us laugh--why else would anyone be there that early?
4 phones on my ME account and one on another. We had Verizon, three ATT and one T-mobile. DD20 got through pretty much right away on one of her phones--the one with ATT. My friend had hers light up red a few seconds after DD but she was already through the party selecting.
Boarding Group #23!!!
We decided to grab food at Starbucks to give a little time to see whether the ride was going to start on time or not. Good decision. We realized pretty quickly our group would be up soon so once we grabbed food/drinks we started walking toward SWGE figuring that we would just eat around there. Instead we received notification that our BG had been called at 7:32 so we ate quickly and headed right to the line (even without a bathroom stop!).
Tapped in ride at 7:40
We still had our coffees but were told we'd have to dispose of them at some point. Thinking we might be in line for a while, I sipped mine. Mistake! We breezed through the line and I ended up having to toss about 1/3 of my latte.
We were held in one room for a little bit and saw guys with work belts walk by. Uh oh.
About ten minutes later though we were led onto the ride and I'm pretty sure we saw all of it. I'll be checking out the spoiler threads later to make sure.
Off ride at 8:11
Back at hotel by 8:40.
EPIC ride. So fun and so worth the early wake up. Thank so much for all the prior posters/reports. I was so prepared, and it was great that we got lucky and everything went so seamlessly. We have the whole day to enjoy now. Feel like I won the lottery

 

[elmoandzoey]

I guess I am a bit panicky about all this. Every single ride my kids have pointed out as their favorite rides requires some kind of early morning pre-opening dash to the park. My kids are NOT morning persons... LOL We are also not staying on property so we can't take advantage of the 60 day FP+ booking window for the other rides. Anyways - I guess we'll just see what happens. It could be worse in that Disney is getting rid of the boarding groups when we get there which would probably result in insanely long lines. But I guess since morning EMH hours for DHS are not happening when we are going and seeing that they have also moved them for March, I am assuming they will most probably hold on to the boarding groups for some time to come.

 

[elaine amj]

Wow....reading all these reports it sounds like going to DHS during Christmas week was way better than the craziness of the week after Christmas!! I am generally impressed with how smoothly my two experiences went with getting BGs. Will continue following along to see how this week goes.

 

[SouthFayetteFan]

9:35 and backups are still available.

Also - now boarding up to BG 48.

 

[mandis77]

Today's reports have made me SO Happy!

I'll be at DHS in 22 days and just started playing at home in the AM. I have a Samsung S10 with Verizon. It looks like the refresh doesn't work right at 7 so I need to back out of the app and start over to get the red button.

 

[Lacrymosa156]

Does anyone know how busy the Tuesday is after MLK day? I plan to be at HS on 21st at 7am. Really hoping the crowds will be lower as I've read it is typically the weekend prior to it that is busy. Fingers crossed. This will be our only early start at the park so only chance at grabbing a BG!

 

[sghokie]

can you have 2 people signed in to 1 MDE account? I have an account in my name and my daughter is a member that shows up.

 

[TheMaxRebo]

Wow....reading all these reports it sounds like going to DHS during Christmas week was way better than the craziness of the week after Christmas!! I am generally impressed with how smoothly my two experiences went with getting BGs. Will continue following along to see how this week goes.

Yeah, it seems like right after the New Year there was the combination of word getting out about how to get a BG (just be there prior to park opening and get right on the app that second) and then you had some Passholder blackouts life, so that was the first chance for some locals to get on the ride

I think this week is more representative for how things should work on "normal" days ... though we do have MLK day/weekend coming up and then my trip is Presidents Day/Week so those might be back to the BGs being gone crazy quick (and then MMRR will open on march 4th which will change things again .... always gotta stay on your toes with a trip to WDW!)

 

[ThistleMae]

It sounds like those with a "quick draw" approach will be the winners. Should I time myself on the app to see how fast I can go?