Figment’s Second 2019 Trip to a Galaxy Far Far Away
Figment and his family decided to make one last trip down to Disneyland on this year's Annual Pass to check out Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge in a more leisurely fashion. We been down during the end of the reservation period, so we had a sense of what Black Spire Outpost was like, but we also knew that there were a lot of things that we did not have the chance to check out during the 4 hour window. This time, the plan for the trip was to spend almost entire time on Batuu!
Millennium Falcon: Smuggler's Run
Got in a total of six rides on the Millennium Falcon on this trip and now I have a much better sense of the ride. For the most part, the ride is the same, but there are a few different things that can happen depending on the crew. The biggest differences (that I noticed) are how many coaxial containers you recover (I
think all runs recovers one, but it's possible to get two) and whether you end up in the Asteroid Belt above Batuu. The dialog implies that if the hyper drive is damaged the ship fall out of hyperspace early and ends up in the Asteroid Belt.
While I definitely enjoyed it more this time around, I'm
still think it depends a lot on which position you get and, to a lesser extent, how good your crew is. I ended up being the gunner three times, the pilot once, and engineer twice. I think the pilot is, by far, the most fun of the positions. It's also the hardest! The next best is the engineer because you do have to push the correct buttons and flip the right switches to "fix" the ship. The least interest position is the gunner because you mostly just press the same button over and over. (I think this might be a more difficult position if you turn auto targeting turned off, but I wasn't quite ready to try and figure that one out.) I still find it hard to watch the main screen and watch for the buttons to light up. I (kind of) wish there was a way to set things on "auto" so that you can just watch the video if you want to ride without having to worry about pressing buttons (at least for the gunner and engineer positions).
Aside:I'm wondering if there isn't a way to do this already, but it's not an option the guests can select. We almost ended up with a crew of 5 one time, so it seems like there must be a way to have that empty position play on "auto" so that the ship either drives, shots, or fixes itself.
The table in the waiting area is still a very popular photo spot, but there often isn't very much time between when you enter the room and your group is called. So if you want to take a photo, head there as soon as you enter the room.
I also learned that there are buttons in the waiting area to be pressed when the light up. Keep your eyes (and ears) open for anything flashing (usually following something that sounds like a crash or bang).
Once your group is called, you're asked to line up (two pilots first, then the gunners, and lastly the engineers). The CMs now have a spiel that they give explaining what each position is. It's not very detailed, but in some ways, it is helpful to at least give guests a primer on what they'll be doing (and why). From there, you head down the corridor to watch a short video of Hondo explaining what you're going to be doing. After that, it's time to enter the cockpit and try your hand at being a smuggler.
At the end of the ride, you're given a summary how well you did and how much you earned. Hondo takes a cut and then deducts what you owe him for repairs that are needed. I didn't quite understand how the scoring worked, but overall, my crews earned between 4,000 and 9,000 per run.
Hondo was very good about providing payment this time around (last time it took about 4 weeks for the payment to show up). You do need to have the datapad app running when you're on the ride (I'd have it running from at least the point where you get the position cards) and bluetooth enabled. I don't know if you have to finish the "Flight Crew Wanted" mission first, but it doesn't hurt to do that one (I'm thinking you don't because the folks in the SRL wouldn't be able to do that mission because they're not in the queue). Most of the time, the payment came just as I was exiting the attraction building, but sometimes it took a bit longer.
Standby Line
The standby line was generally between 55 and 75 minutes when I was there. I tried doing the "Flight Crew Wanted" mission while in the line and for most part it seemed fine. It's definitely designed for when the standby line is going to move slower (probably after they introduce FP). A lot of the mission involved looking at something and counting the number of items or something along those lines. Many times, we walked by that area so quickly that the game couldn't keep up. It doesn't really make a huge difference in terms of the mission, but for anyone that is a completionist, you're going to need to let others go by if you want to finish the mission without skipping parts.
I only spotted on Porg's nest in the standby line. It's in the room where you climb up the ramps, against the windows where you can see another (currently unused) ramp. I'm wondering if that's going to be the FP ramp up. If it is, then the merge point is going to be really close to where you enter the room with Hondo (I did see a pair merge in at that point, so I'm guessing that's where FP will merge ultimately and they're probably using it for rider swap or something similar at this point).
Single Rider Line
I did the Single Rider Line for five of the six rides and for the most part it took about 45 minutes from start to finish (including time on the ride). So it's a little faster than the standby (which had posted waits of 55 to 70 minutes), but not necessarily going to save you a lot of time. I generally found that if the line is backed up to the corridor before the split, that's probably a 35 to 40 minute wait or so (assuming about 5 minutes for the ride itself). That being said, there were a couple of rides where one side was backed up to the split and the other side was nearly at the top of the stairs. So be sure to check both sides before picking one.
The biggest drawback to the SRL is that you miss the entire queue and pre-show with Hondo. The line merges at the point where they're handing out the position cards. The SRL is almost always going to be the last couple of people in any group, so you're more likely to end up with gunner or engineer. In all six rides I did, the positions were handed out in the same order (2 pilots, 2 gunners, and then 2 engineers). So it seems like you have to be in the front of the group to get a pilot. The only reason I got to be a pilot was because the people that got the pilot positions did not want to be a pilot nor did anyone else in their group.