Guests Scored Star Wars: Rise of Resistance Boarding Groups Outside Disney World
In a curious development, several readers contacted us indicating that they were able to secure Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance boarding groups from outside Walt Disney World this morning. In this post, we’ll cover the details and offer some commentary.
Normally, the My Disney Experience app validates that you’ve entered Disney’s Hollywood Studios for the day before allowing you to join the virtual queue. If you haven’t tapped in, you can go through the initial motions of joining a boarding group, but receive an error message instead of the confirmation screen.
Because milliseconds matter, we’ve been advising readers in our FAQ & Ride Guide for Star Wars Rise of the Resistance to practice at home. We are far from alone in offering this tip–it’s good advice! As a result, we’d estimate that tons of people outside of Disney’s Hollywood Studios are attempting to score a boarding pass on a daily basis…
Well, today there was no validation that guests had entered Disney’s Hollywood Studios when attempting the boarding pass dash in the My Disney Experience app. People were able to obtain boarding groups from anywhere. Not just in another theme park at Walt Disney World, but literally anywhere in the world.
Here are a some of the anecdotes we’ve received from readers:
“HELP! I just got boarding group 13! Only problem: I’m sitting in my bedroom in Minnesota!! I tried the timing out at 7am CST just to see if it would work (I’ve got time date screen shots to prove this). I have tickets linked to my account, but we don’t leave for Disney for another 3 weeks. What should I do? I feel like I need to tell someone. How could this happen?” –Gabe
Gabe was also gracious enough to share a screenshot reflecting the boarding group he obtained while sitting at home in Minnesota:
An hour or so later (presumably while he was still in Minnesota), Gabe was called back to ride. Here are a couple more comments we’ve received thus far…
“We’re headed to WDW next week and have been practicing the process to score a ride on ROTR while we’re there. I’m writing to share my experience from this morning.. Today, moments before the crack of 8 AM, from my home here in the Maine woods, I launched the WDW app, hit ROTR Find Out More, hit Join a Boarding Group, checked in our party of two and, lo and behold… the next screen declared I had scored (back up) group 89!! What??
How could that possibly have happened?!? They’re calling for heavy wet snow today in my neck of the woods, so I doubt we’ll get to Orlando in time to ride .. but we’ll be there next week!! Have you heard of this surprising result happening before? Has someone, from hundreds of miles away, managed to scale the WDW ROTR wall and score a boarding group? Would love to hear your thoughts on this. (Note: I do have a screen shot of this apparition). Lastly, I thank you and Sarah for your valuable, insightful (well written) blog, as I’ve learned so much from you both.” –Cynde
“Tom….Big problem with ROTR today….People not in park were assigned BG’s., including myself……….several people on one of the forums i was reading had same thing happen” –Mike
If you have similar reports, we’d encourage you to share in the comments below. (Just for fun, include where you are in the world.) We’d also really like to hear from guests inside Disney’s Hollywood Studios, as we can only imagine the disappointment and lines at the Guest Experience Team tents.
We’re also curious if/when/how Walt Disney World might release more boarding groups later today. A good percentage of guests won’t possibly be able to use redeem their spot in the virtual queue, since it’s sorta hard to catch a last-minute flight from Minnesota! Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance thus should get through all primary and backup groups, barring major downtime later today.
Some of you might speculate that this is a permanent change, and is occurring so that guests don’t potentially waste their time entering Disney’s Hollywood Studios. After all, this would mean on-site guests can try to score an elusive boarding group while lying in bed at Caribbean Beach or Art of Animation, and only take the Skyliner over to Disney’s Hollywood Studios if they’re successful.
With the recent crowds and chaos (read our Disney’s Hollywood Studios Hours: This Isn’t Working for more insight into that), this would theoretically be an improvement in the guest experience in the mornings at Disney’s Hollywood Studios. Fewer guests would arrive, and the limited attraction lineup around the park would see lower wait times–among other things.
That’s one theory. We doubt it, though. Although Walt Disney World hasn’t released any official statement about this–and almost certainly won’t–we strongly believe that this was a glitch or error. It’s possible Disney IT is in the midst of tweaking the process and unintentionally pushed this change. Either way, we would not expect a repeat of this scenario tomorrow.
The problem caused by not validating theme park admission is that it’d significantly open the pool of guests potentially competing for boarding groups. As we stated in the above This Isn’t Working post, Walt Disney World needs to shrink that pool to avoid this becoming a lottery.
Expanding the day-of pool would lead to a precipitous increase in disgruntled guests within the park, and lower satisfaction among attendees. There’s definitely an argument to be made for expanding this pool, but that would necessarily entail shifting the timing of the virtual queue entry process. It’d need to be at least a day in advance.
At several points in the hundreds of comments to the This Isn’t Working post, we advocated for shifting the virtual queue to the FastPass+ infrastructure. From our perspective, that’s ideal. Use the same 60/30-day priority booking windows, potentially release inventory over time, but retain the boarding groups (rather than switching to return windows).
In other words, we think a change is due for how Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance distributes capacity. It wouldn’t surprise us if one is on the horizon after Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway opens and Walt Disney World has a couple of weeks to observe crowd flow and attendance trends. However, this is almost certainly not that change. If this is anything other than a glitch, it would be shocking. We’ll continue to monitor the situation and update this story later today (or tomorrow morning) as we learn anything new.
If you’re planning on visiting the new land, you’ll also want to read our Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge Guide. This covers a range of topics from basics about the land and its location, to strategically choosing a hotel for your stay, recommended strategy for the land, and how to beat the crowds. It’s a good primer for this huge addition. As for planning the rest of your trip, we have a thorough Walt Disney World Planning Guide.
YOUR THOUGHTS
Were you in Disney’s Hollywood Studios this morning? Have any observations about guest reactions today? Did you accidentally score a boarding group from home? Do you agree with our assessment that this was probably an error? Or, do you disagree with our assessment and think this was probably deliberate? Have any theories about the future of the virtual queue for Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance? Any questions? Hearing your feedback–even when you disagree with us–is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts below in the comments!
We were there on the 26th. We arrived at HS at 7:30am. Two of us in our party of ten tried the app right when it opened. Both of us were able to select the names of those in our party and click to join a boarding group, and both of us received the message that something had gone wrong. We refreshed and tried several times. The groups were all gone within the first minute. Pretty disappointing since none of us have ridden it yet, and we are not able to go back anytime soon.
They must have gotten my space, I was inside the park and the app insisted I wasn’t in the park yet and therefore wouldn’t let me reserve a boarding group. 🙁
If you check the “Tickets and Passes” section of the MDE app after you enter the park, does it update immediately to show one less day on your ticket? If so, that seems to be a good way to confirm that it recognizes that you (and your party) are “in the parK”
How do I link my husband to me on the app? When practicing, it takes a second or two to add him to my group when he actually is linked to me in My Disney Experience for room, tickets, and Fast Passes? Why is he not linked to me on this app?
funny, I was practicing on the app for my trip to Disneyland earlier this month and after scanning my ticket voucher I actually got a message to join a backup boarding but I didn’t go any further because I was scared of invalidating my ticket voucher…
Just curious – would the commenters here prefer there to be a standby line that you’d have to wait, say 5-7 hours in, or keep up with the current system? On the one hand, there would be a correlation between your personal commitment/patience and the likelihood that you’d ride. On the other hand, there is a risk that you won’t be able to ride, but you’d know that first thing in the morning and be able to spend your day in an alternative manner of your choosing. The fact is that this ride is unparalleled, (whether you like it or not, there is nothing like it anywhere else), and wildly popular. Not everyone will be able to ride every day, no matter what method is deployed.
It’s not the popularity of the ride, or even the concept of the boarding group itself. It’s simply the fact that Disney is forcing guests to commit to physically being present inside Hollywood Studios (oftentimes within large crowds) for a chance to go on the ride. There is absolutely no reason why anyone with a valid admission for any particular day (and a Hollywood Studios Fast Pass reservation linked to the ticket) should not be able to try for a boarding group from (at least) within Walt Disney World property. Disney knows what day I intend to go to Hollywood Studios simply by what Fast Passes I have linked to my admission. And on that day, I should have the ability to wake up and try for a boarding pass from where I choose to be. If I don’t get one, so be it. But I haven’t wasted even one minute of my time going to Hollywood Studios, and can go to another park of my choosing.
I get that, to a certain extent. At the same time, you have to be in a park to wait in any line, and there is still no absolute guarantee that you’ll ride. My next trip will have fastpasses and ADRs lined up around DHS on the day I intend to try for a boarding group, anyway, so bailing on that park over a missed boarding group wouldn’t be a great option for my group. I’m asking myself whether I’d want to wait half the day in a queue, or just swallow the disappointment and carry on.
They should have done the same thing they did for Millennium, standby only. Sure, the first few weeks may have seen 5+ hour waits. But the reality is that even as good as it is. And it is, it would have maxed out around 3 hours at this point as average guests weighed for themselves if it was worth the wait. They would say yes once. But far less likely to wait that long more than once. THAT is the only fair and reasonable option. As a bonus, it also gives resort guests a leg up on early magic days since they could line up first.
Can anyone comment as to what Customer Service is doing for people who complain about the Boarding Group process? (i.e. those who are shut out of RoTR any particular day for any reason.)
This may be simplistic (or unrealistic) thinking, but if you spend time going through this nonsense, and you are solely at Hollywood Studios to ride RoTR (and cannot attain a boarding group), Disney should just make that day’s pass available for another park of your choosing. If this was common practice (it most likely is not), it would make the entire situation completely bearable. No RoTR, no reason to stick around Hollywood Studios – just leave and hit another park. The idea that people are paying to add single day Park Hopper to their tickets solely for a RoTR contingency plan is absolutely absurd!
They do nothing but apologize for the inconvenience, and tell you to come back the next day to try your luck again … At best. Worse, they can be rude and condescending, and dishonest. However, one did say that the boarding groups were filled within 12 seconds of opening. Many people never saw the join button light up at all. The line for the Guest Experience umbrella behind the shops extended almost to the entrance, filled with many angry people.
Unless Disney does something to fix these issues, Rise of the Resistance – while an amazing experience – will ultimately be a failure. Beyond this, it seems that Disney had taken on an every more obvious attitude that they do not care about the guest experience or satisfaction, not do they care if guests leave and never come back. We’re about there ourselves.
@006, I agree!
I was thinking if you 1. physically scan into HS before opening and 2. don’t get a BG of any kind Disney could allow just those shut out guests the choice to add a park hopper for the day for free. Maybe those shut out guests would have until 8:15ish or something to decide and, to avoid people scamming the system for free park hopper passes, only allow this action once per account per calendar year when the top two criteria are met. This would be a really good accommodation for long distance travelers who are making their one and only visit. This is simple coding that Disney could build into their app. Not everyone would take advantage but at least it gives those disappointed guests a choice to resolve a bad situation.
This whole process is broken and it appears that Disney is doing nothing to delivery on their “happiest place on earth” mantra. I will be at DW in 3 weeks and plan to take matters into my own hands and try to help some of those kids (sorry adults, not concerned about you) who leave this process sad and disappointed. I’ve purchase 20 Star Wars pins from ebay. It cost me $30. After I inevitably don’t get a BG I’m going to let my kids pick a “special” pin and then have my kids go into the crowd and find other kids who didn’t get a BG and hand them out to try to help a few kids get over their disappointment and have a little better experience by giving them something special to try to cheer them up. It’s not much, but it’s a start. If every guest did something like this or brought a special gift for all/any of those disappointed kids this whole situation could be a lot better and we could create magical experiences DESPITE Disney’s lack of care and and focus on what ALL OF THIS is suppose to be about: magical experiences for children! Making sad kids as a business (when your business is suppose to be about happiness) is unacceptable. COME ON DISNEY, you could already be doing this. At the very least Disney, DO SOMETHING! Don’t make your guests solve this problem.
Well… this is just delightful. Thanks for being a stellar human!
Thanks Jessica. I usually feel like I’m a disappointment but this time I really feel bad for all those kids and need to take SOME kind of action to help. Disney doesn’t seem to be doing anything to mitigate all the saddness this is creating. All the ppl basically saying to manage expectations and deal with it are forgetting what it’s like to be 7 years old. Watching YouTube videos of people cheering when they get a BG while there are obviously children devastated standing right next to them is hard to watch. It breaks my heart. Walt is rolling in his grave. This is not the experience he intended to build.
Yeah I feel like this process is resulting in me seeing tons of adults on sites like this saying “I’ve ridden 6 times since it opened! » and then tons of families who come exactly once every few years, or less, who aren’t as savvy with the process, and end up shut out. It’s exactly the opposite of what they should do. Yes I know everyone on these forums opposes FP for this ride because they want to keep riding weekly until they are bored but FP would allow the families paying $1k a day for their once-in-a-lifetime vacation a guaranteed ride, admittedly on day 7 or more.
The reason FP’s can’t be used is because it isn’t reliable enough yet. If it was running reliably everyday for a few weeks I would say open the FP’s up. I would be unhappy as I will never get one. I live here, never stay on property, and it will enter that place I have never seen-FP’s for SnowWhite, Smugglers Run, Mickey&Minnie’s Railroad etc. I just like the option of opening without a FP for a little while (ie Smugglers Run) so everyone has equal opportunity before it goes to all resort guests. However, that isn’t the case here. If it went to FP with the way it is running it would throw the FP system, and therefore the lines possibly across the board (if they do any ride FP’s when it closes). It would be a horror story way worse than the Boarding Groups. And if you open FP’s it doesn’t guarantee the people who come for the once of a lifetime trip but who don’t stay on property a ride…
So I just taught the families how to get a boarding group. I went on three days in a row with my highest boarding group being 13. So it was amazing to me how many people didn’t do their research on the process. They were just like I expected it to light up while they were on the spotty Disney Wofi standing in a group of 400 people.
I have been worried about the spotty wifi….what did you teach your family to do to be able to avoid that.
How?
Here’s my step by step process this morning:
1. Opened app about 15 sec before 8am
2. Clicked “find out more” button under ROTR area with about 5 sec before 8am.
3. Then there are 2 available buttons, “my status” and “join boarding group”. At 8am, “my status” was lit up, but the other was grayed out.
4. I clicked “my status”, then backed out quickly, then “join boarding group” lit up.
5. I clicked “join boarding group” at about 10 sec after 8am and was taken to the screen to add my party (this is where I got the glitch where my other 3 party members were not listed. Other people have reported the same issue this morning)
6. Once clicking past the join party screen I got the error msg because I was not in the park…this was at about 15 sec after 8am.
Tomorrow I’m going to try step 2 above right at 8am or 1 sec past 8am. I’ll be at WDW in 10 days, so really glad to be trying this out now to get familiar. So far, it seems that practice will help getting quicker on the trigger finger and thinking on your feet, and your chances improve…seconds count big. All this is from home though, so Being in the park likely adds other variables like connection speeds. My wife is making fun of me for being such a Star Wars nerd…trying to manage expectations.
My wife gives me the same grief! Thanks for the tips… if I don’t get a boarding pass next week, c’est la vie, but I don’t want it to be because I messed up a few button clicks because I didn’t know the system!
Why is the ‘My Status’ button even lit up if ‘Join Boarding Group’ is not? You should not have to toggle the app to make a button light up. It just makes the process way more confusing. (Infuriating.)
For me, the screen to add my party was only viewed by clicking ‘My Status’. I don’t think the more logical ‘Join Boarding Group’ ever even lit up for me this morning.
What do you use to know if exactly what time it is to the second?
So if you get the error message you are not in the park screen shot it and go to guest services. They know the app glitches and will add you to a boarding group. Also you hit find out more at 8, join boarding group should be lit, if not hit my status then the join boarding group button there should work
Messed around with mine here in Pa this morning. The App didn’t go live for me until 8:00:46 even with refreshing. No way I would have gotten a BG if I were really trying.
Never hit refresh. If it doesn’t light up close app and reopen then it will light up
Confirmation that yesterday’s glitch was acknowledged and fixed by Disney- post a few moments ago on blogmickey.com
https://blogmickey.com/2020/02/disney-fixes-rise-of-the-resistance-my-disney-experience-glitch
So I tried this AM for the 1st time as a test run. I wasn’t able to get one but by 8:02 they were all gone. So I think this problem must still be occurring. Anyone know if this glitch reoccured today? I would hate for this to happen the day I’m there. I hope it gets worked out.
From my attempt, it appears they fixed the outside the park glitch. I got several screens in and got stopped at the error message that said I was not in the park. This was at 10-15 sec after 8am. I got all the way through yesterday and was assigned BG 38. Today’s experience is what I’ve seen in previous days before yesterday’s meltdown. From the looks of the app screens, if I was inside the park, I probably would have got a BG today.
Despite constant refreshing this morning, I never even got the red “join boarding group” option. I thought maybe they fixed the glitch by not even letting people outside the park get that far, but sounds like that’s not the case based on your experience. If you don’t mind, could you explain your exact process? Logging in right at 8 AM, refreshing on the My Status screen, etc?
More concerning is that all boarding groups were gone in under a minute, and all of those went to people inside the park. Either the crowds are insane or they intentionally only released a small number of boarding groups – either way, not positive developments!
I guess I need to practice more. It seems odd that all groups were gone so fast. I thought it had cooled down in WDW a little and people were getting passes up till about 30 min after park open.
This glitch wasn’t happening when we were there 2 weeks ago. BPs still gone in less than a minute.
Dang ok.
It happened again today, Feb 27. Many, many angry people in line at the Guest Experience Team umbrellas. Most of them saying the button never lit up to even attempt to join a boarding group. Mine didn’t. The cut off of initial groups today is 46, and the crowds appear to be the lowest I’ve seen all week. I will update if I get any further information.
Passes were gone within seconds and to compound the problem, number 10 was the lowest number. So really only 10-46 were before backuo.
I also only got 1 today. Number 37. Couldn’t add family. I asked guest services if mine could be given to anyone if I released it. No. I could let someone else in my party use my ticket, but it would evaporate essentially if I released it.
So were you on wifi? Were you standing in a large group of people? Were you constantly refreshing? Those are the reasons it doesn’t light up.
I’m in Texas and just tried getting a BG again this morning…about 10 sec after 8am. It seems that WDW fixed the glitch since I got several screens in and got the error about not being in the park. I tried it again at 30sec after 8am and all primary BGs were full.
One other minor glitch I noticed was that the my other 3 family members were not listed as options to join my party. I backed out and tried a few more times and the rest of my party showed up on 4th attempt at approx 1.5 min after 8am. If I was in the park today, I would have been trying to convince guest services to add the rest of my family because of the glitch.
My family members didn’t appear either when I practiced this morning and it worried me! I checked and they are all still connected to me in my account. I wonder if Disney is having glitches with app.
In my experience In Disneyland last month, family members appear after their tickets are scanned in at the turnstiles.
In December, my husband showed as in the park but my son did not when clearly we all scanned in. I secured the boarding group for my husband and myself then found a cast member, explained the situation and she was able to scan my son’s magic band to confirm he was “in the park” and add him to our boarding group. Of course back then the boarding groups were lasting until 9:30am when the park opened at 7am – I don’t know if they’d be as helpful now. Plus during our pre-Christmas trip, they were making it to the 200’s for boarding groups in a day which helped all around.
They should try changing it to allow boarding passes from anywhere, but only if you have a valid ticket to enter HS that day for every member of the party.
I could see an issue with this if every annual pass holder or person with a Park hopper logged in at 8 AM, took their shot, and if it doesn’t work out, no loss. Maybe if you instituted a financial penalty for booking and not showing up, like with dining reservations?
I was in the parks early on 2/15 and had the app freeze and got backup group 100+. Is there something I could have or should have plead to Guest Experience team? We rode in December so weren’t entirely devastated but this bonus trip was to get another crack at it. Just wondering if I gave up too easily.
Tom,
This happened to me as well today! Per your advice my wife and I were practicing on our ride to work and I scored boarding group 42 for today. Despite the fact we live in Arlington Virginia and were driving to work in DC. I ended up canceling it soon after to hopefully allow actual guests availability. We will be there next week. Also based on my practice, force refreshing the app is not the best tactic. Restarting the app right before Park open works best. Of course I don’t know the dynamic within the park.
I got boarding group 22 today from orlando BUT outside wdw. It was quite a surprise but I like practicing. I DID cancel my boarding pass. I like the virtual boarding pass. I love it. So much better than fast pass.
I was at the park today in line at 6:45 am and at 8:00 am the app did not work not only for my family but hundreds of others. Never saw hundreds of people and children start their day off extremely angry and disappointed! Certainly not a happy Disney World experience like it should have been. Everyone we talked to throughout the day felt as we did…. Disney World should scrap this app to get into rides!!!! Very unfair process to all and even worse to find out tonight others who were not even in the park today got passes. Shame on you Disney World for ruining the day for hundreds of people!! Are you listening to us your customers????
How?
Well – Disney needs to fix this because I WAS in the park EARLY and was UNABLE to secure a pass. Makes me truly angry others that weren’t even here today took what possibly would have been my boarding passes!!
Agreed!!! I had the same issue and was also IN the park! Makes me so mad!
I have no doubt that people off site were able to have a better connection to the app. I know when I go to very crowded areas, like a sporting event, a concert, Disneyland, etc. my network is way slower compared to when I am at home. I feel awful for every person who went early to HS today and did everything right and didn’t get a boarding pass. We go to Disneyland in a couple of weeks, and we will try to get BGs but if we don’t we will still continue to love and enjoy the DLR. I heard from two friends that just went last week, and they were able to ride three days, but said Disneyland in the morning is awful, but DCA was a dream, so to hop on over across the esplanade.