Originally Posted By plpeters70 <<So no FPs at all to people who don't have Magic Bands?? This is the first time I've heard this. If this is true, then I can see why people are alarmed.>> It was my understanding that eventually all guests will be using some sort of "magic band" like entrance media. Whether it's an RFID ticket or an actual Magic Band, I thought the plan was for everyone visiting to have this functionality eventually. If that is so, I wonder if they will save some FP times for people who buy their tickets the day they get there. Or will all the FP times for an attraction sell-out months before that person gets to the park?
Originally Posted By FerretAfros >>At least with traditional FP, if you mess up and arrive at a park too late, you can "try again tomorrow" if your schedule allows.<< The traditional FP system also gives you the option to go to an attraction that does not use FP. However, with the NextGen system, all attractions (and many things that weren't considered attractions in the past, like character meet & greets, parades, and fireworks) will now be hooked into the system. In the past, if the line for Space Mountain was too long and the FPs were gone, you could go ride the teacups; now, the teacups will also have FP+ and its waits will be likewise affected >>So no FPs at all to people who don't have Magic Bands?? This is the first time I've heard this. If this is true, then I can see why people are alarmed.<< The goal is to have all guests use the MyMagic+ app to book their FPs (the tickets themselves may be on a wristband or RFID card), regardless of where they are staying. The details are not clear at this time what benefits will come with staying on property (earlier booking window, more FP+ allocations, etc), but everybody will have access to the FP+ system. That said, I highly doubt everybody will know that before they go to the parks (there are still folks who buy tickets at the entrance), and their vacations will likely be severely impacted as a result
Originally Posted By FerretAfros Oops! I didn't see Peter's post before I hit submit! Great minds think alike! >>If that is so, I wonder if they will save some FP times for people who buy their tickets the day they get there. Or will all the FP times for an attraction sell-out months before that person gets to the park?<< From my understanding, no FP times will be saved for people making same-day reservations. Riding Soarin' could become equivalent to eating dinner at Le Cellier, where you must make your reservations at 7am, 180 days in advance of your visit. This is where I suspect they will have the most difficulty with the rollout, since it will drastically change guest planning behavior, and will be tough to approach in a delicate manner, especially in WDW where guests visit infrequently and often save money/vacation time for years to visit.
Originally Posted By plpeters70 <<Riding Soarin' could become equivalent to eating dinner at Le Cellier, where you must make your reservations at 7am, 180 days in advance of your visit.>> This is the part that is so frustrating to me, as I rarely know that far in advance if I am going to be visiting Disney World. My trips usually happen at the last minute, or at the most, I know about a month in advance. I accept the fact that dining reservations may be booked up before I go - that's to be expected. (And there are always other options.) But to now expect that attractions might also be all booked up as well is really taking things too far in my opinion.
Originally Posted By hopemax >Interesting. So no FPs at all to people who don't have Magic Bands?? This is the first time I've heard this. If this is true, then I can see why people are alarmed. < The difference between no FPs at all and "available, but some miniscule number" isn't much. 0 is just one end of the scale. If you tick it up to 1 FP available for walkups per ride, per day, that would be just as alarming as if it was 0. So how far would Disney need to tick it up to not be alarming 100 per day, 1000, 10,000 per day? If resort guests are only 50% of total guests, you could say that half the spots are reserved for non-resort guests. But then is enough, to service the number of resort guests. Over on the DIS they are already freaking out over being limited to 1 Tier 1 attraction per park. This is what I mean that the math just does not work. And Disney's spent how much on Fastpass, and now Fastpass+ that is no longer available for actual capacity improvements? FP+ primary effect, when fully implemented, seems to be prevent multiple rides. But if Disney came out and said that, "You might be able to ride all the popular rides, but only ONCE each" could you imagine the uproar. Not even in the Ticket days were people so effectively limited to one ride per day. Your Dad might have told you, "one ride only," but not Disney.
Originally Posted By Dr Hans Reinhardt >>So no FPs at all to people who don't have Magic Bands?? This is the first time I've heard this. If this is true, then I can see why people are alarmed.<< "The goal is to have all guests use the MyMagic+ app to book their FPs (the tickets themselves may be on a wristband or RFID card), regardless of where they are staying." OK, I get it now. <<Riding Soarin' could become equivalent to eating dinner at Le Cellier, where you must make your reservations at 7am, 180 days in advance of your visit.>> This is the part that is so frustrating to me, as I rarely know that far in advance if I am going to be visiting Disney World. My trips usually happen at the last minute, or at the most, I know about a month in advance." True, but at least you'll know for sure that guaranteed a visit your favorite attractions during busy times. As it is now it's basically run to the FP machines at opening, stand in line or skip them altogether. "FP+ primary effect, when fully implemented, seems to be prevent multiple rides." On busy days I'm OK with that. I've said all along that if at minimum FP+ efficiently regulates the distribution of guests to all or most attractions during the day then it's a win. The way the system works now doesn't make the best use of their resources.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros >>My trips usually happen at the last minute, or at the most, I know about a month in advance.<< As it stands now, FP+ windows open 60 days in advance, so you may not be at that big of a disadvantage. You might have trouble with the most popular attractions during peak season, but there should still be options available at the 30 day mark >>Over on the DIS they are already freaking out over being limited to 1 Tier 1 attraction per park.<< Perhaps I'm mistaken, but wasn't a similar feature a part of the earliest NextGen tests? Guests were shown 2 lists of seemingly-random attractions (unlike the clearly 2-tier system that's testing now), and were told to pick 2 of each. The attractions were limited due to the availability of FP-type queues at the time (before all the FP+ queues were added), but it seemed like the 2 lists were roughly comparable in terms of 'quality' of attractions. I was actually surprised when they started testing without the restrictions >>This is what I mean that the math just does not work. And Disney's spent how much on Fastpass, and now Fastpass+ that is no longer available for actual capacity improvements?<< FP was never about capacity. The attractions themselves weren't modified, just your queuing experience. If anything, it reduced the overall capacity of a park, since it moved guests from the queues into the walkways, where they take up more space as they move around. >>FP+ primary effect, when fully implemented, seems to be prevent multiple rides.<< Depending how you look at it, the intent could be to allow as many people as possible to ride each attraction. Since you only take up 1 slot each day, that opens your additional slots for other guests. The ultimate purpose of the whole NextGen project is to completely manipulate guest flow through the parks. It's clear that they still don't know exactly what they want to do, or how they're going to implement it, but they certainly have the power to make some pretty impactful changes (for better or worse)
Originally Posted By FerretAfros Here's a link that discusses the first round of testing, from September 2012. The lists aren't quite as even as I remember, but they still have a pretty good mix of attractions. It will be interesting to see how these lists compare to the ones that may eventually be implemented in MK <a target="blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://www.disunplugged.com/2012/09/20/testing-the-next-generation-in-disney-fastpasses/">http://www.disunplugged.com/20...tpasses/</a> First group: The Barnstormer Celebrate a Dream Come True Parade Dumbo The Flying Elephant Haunted Mansion Jungle Cruise The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh Mickey's PhilharMagic Town Square Theater: Meet Mickey & Minnie Second group: Big Thunder Mountain Railroad Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin Main Street Electrical Parade Peter Pan's Flight Space Mountain Splash Mountain Town Square Theater: Meet the Disney Princesses Wishes
Originally Posted By sjhym333 I just want to be clear about the MagicBand /RFID ticket. My understanding at the moment is that Resort Guests, AP Holders and CM's will receive Magic Bands. Non-Disney resort guests will be able to use their RFID card at the kiosks to grab FP's on the day of arrival. Like the current system, they will be unable to get a FP without entering the park which then allows the RFID ticket to distribute a FP. They won't have pre-entry access. I believe the Swan and Dolphin guests are currently using this system where they can enter the parks and their ticket gets them access to the FP+ Kiosks
Originally Posted By sjhym333 Let me clarify my above statement. When a non-Disney hotel guest comes into the park, their ticket will then allow them access to the FP Kiosks. The machines at the attractions are going away. I spoke to a couple of people about the delay and no one really seems to know what is up. I have a call out to a friend who is currently working on implementation of FP+ property wide and I am waiting for them to call me back
Originally Posted By Dr Hans Reinhardt "When a non-Disney hotel guest comes into the park, their ticket will then allow them access to the FP Kiosks. The machines at the attractions are going away." Please let this be true. The most irritating thing about the current system is hiking from place to place to check wait times and secure FPs.
Originally Posted By dizneed The way the system seems to be now, I see the non-Disney hotel guest is at a disadvantage as resort guests get first dibs online through My Magic + for popular attractions. My question is, will there still be FP's available by the time the non-Disney hotel guest enters the park?
Originally Posted By FerretAfros >>I spoke to a couple of people about the delay and no one really seems to know what is up.<< One issue I've heard about is that the FP kiosks will recognize any RFID object. So I could walk up to one of them, tap my DC Metro pass on it, and use it to make FP+ reservations. I'm sure they'll want to crack down on that before the number of people relying on the FP kiosks balloons out of control Additionally, if day guests are only able to access FPs via the kiosks (no machines at individual attractions, no advance reservations), they'll need to add a lot more of them. As it stands now, there are about a half dozen in each park. When you consider that booking FPs for your entire day takes a lot longer than walking up to a machine and sticking your ticket in (which still creates backups), they'll need to greatly increase capacity to meet demand in the morning rush >>My question is, will there still be FP's available by the time the non-Disney hotel guest enters the park?<< With every attraction, show, or experience in the FP+ system, there will be *something* left for day guests. You may not like what you get (FP+ for Carousel of Progress, the teacups, and a parade hardly seems like the full experience), but there should be something. And if they have issues having enough FP+ reservations available, they can always adjust the numbers to take additional capacity away from the standby queue
Originally Posted By sjhym333 Just spoke to a friend who is working on the system for FP+ and I was told that the system has been put into a holding pattern while Disney makes some decision on how best to deal with some of the stress on the FP+ system that came with the addition of so many hotel rooms at once (value resorts). It looks like AP holders will need to wait until late January or February at the earliest to get onto FP+
Originally Posted By dizneed sjhym333, my family and I were at the Pop Century at the beginning of September this year and we were part of the program then. Were we the only resort of the value resorts that were part of the test at that time?
Originally Posted By sjhym333 I am not sure about that. I do know that Disney has been adding the last of the resorts not utilizing the MagicBands into the system and at this point every Disney resort guest has access to FP+. The Swan and Dolphin are getting to use the FP+ kiosks at this time but do not have access to MagicBands or pre-arranged FP times. Personally, I wouldn't be surprised if you see Disney do two things to FP+ over the next couple of months. The first is to add more attractions to the system to accomadate the number of guests using the system and the second is a system that will harken back to the old ticket books where there will be more categories to choose from but the most popular attractions will be restricted to one FP+ only.
Originally Posted By FerretAfros I believe that Pop Century and Art of Animation were added to the system a few weeks before the All Stars, but all of them were 'testing' during summer. It's been several months since additional resorts were added in (the Swan and Dolphin are up next) >>first is to add more attractions to the system to accomadate the number of guests using the system...<< How? Every attraction imaginable is on the FP+ system. Everything from meet & greets, to parades and fireworks, to 3D movies are already in the system. They're even starting to do some counterservice restaurants. What else could they possibly add?
Originally Posted By sjhym333 I am not sure what they can or will do. I am not sure they have it all figured out. The recent Mickey's Monitor has a 2 page spread touting FP+ and MagicBands to AP Holders beginning early 2014.
Originally Posted By dagobert MyMagic+ seems to be a failure. Micachat is taking a look at the system and its problems that delayed or cancelled many projects. <a target="blank" rel="nofollow" href="http://micechat.com/49401-my-magic-plus-failure/">http://micechat.com/49401-my-m...failure/</a>
Originally Posted By FerretAfros I read that article this morning, and it seems very fishy to me. For one thing, all the changes were made to WDI, when they have no input to the NextGen project (it's done by an operations group). Additionally, it seems convenient that all of the projects that sound like crazy rumors got cancelled in the process. There's a lot of sensationalized journalism (and creative editing by the author, inserting their own comments out of sequence into the comments below), so it's tough to say what's real and what's not. Hopefully another source will bring this information to light, but these updates are seeming more and more farfetched to me
