Let's talk about the advice that the best way to beat crowds and avoid lines at Epic is to rope drop.

As UOAP holders, our experience has been this is NOT true. Unless you plan to stay from park open through park close, our (hot?) take is it’s much better to start late and shut the park down, than to rope drop and leave before closing.

However, we wasn’t sure whether to die on this hill, so we decided to investigate. We used Park Prophet's route planning algorithm to backtest the minimum time it would take to hit all 11 rides at Epic over the recent spring break period.

We compared the shortest possible ride plan starting at park open with the shortest possible ride plan that ends ride before park close. The results were pretty eye-opening.

Starting with Saturday, April 4 as an example. Easter weekend, busy day. Park was open 9 AM – 10 PM. Here’s the shortest possible route through all 11 rides starting at 9 AM:

April 4th Rope Drop - Shortest Plan

Combined Time Stats:
Wait: 500 min Walk: 58 min Ride: 69 min
Finish Time: 7:27 PM

Ride Name

Arrival Time

Wait Time

Yoshi's Adventure

9:00 AM

25 min

Constellation Carousel

9:33 AM

5 min

Fyre Drill

9:47 AM

5 min

Curse of the Werewolf

10:04 AM

55 min

HP Battle at the Ministry

11:11 AM

120 min

Stardust Racers

1:26 PM

20 min

Monsters Unchained

1:55 PM

15 min

MK Bowser's Challenge

2:29 PM

90 min

Dragon Racer's Rally

4:17 PM

35 min

Hiccup's Wing Gliders

5:03 PM

40 min

Mine-Cart Madness

5:54 PM

90 min

Compare that with shortest possible route through all 11 rides starting four hours later at 1 PM, which has you sneaking onto Marko Kart as your last ride at 9:48 PM, 12 mins before close:

April 4th Close Down - Shortest Plan

Combined Time Stats:
Wait: 435 min Walk: 61 min Ride: 69 min
Finish Time: 10:25 PM

Ride Name

Arrival Time

Wait Time

Constellation Carousel

1:00 PM

30 min

Mine-Cart Madness

1:38 PM

90 min

Dragon Racer's Rally

3:18 PM

40 min

Monsters Unchained

4:08 PM

10 min

Hiccup's Wing Gliders

4:39 PM

40 min

Fyre Drill

5:30 PM

20 min

Stardust Racers

5:59 PM

35 min

Curse of the Werewolf

6:43 PM

35 min

Yoshi's Adventure

7:28 PM

25 min

HP Battle at the Ministry

8:05 PM

85 min

MK Bowser's Challenge

9:48 PM

25 min

Takeaway: Starting at 1 PM instead of 9 AM gets you through all 11 rides a full 65 mins faster!

Looking at another date, Thursday April 9. Still spring break but not quite as busy as easter weekend. Park was open 9 AM – 9 PM.

Starting in the morning would take you a minimum of 475 mins to hit all 11 rides:

April 9th Rope Drop - Shortest Plan

Combined Time Stats:
Wait: 475 min Walk: 61 min Ride: 69 min
Finish Time: 7:05 PM

Ride Name

Arrival Time

Wait Time

Monsters Unchained

9:00 AM

10 min

Constellation Carousel

9:26 AM

5 min

Hiccup's Wing Gliders

9:40 AM

35 min

Curse of the Werewolf

10:26 AM

20 min

Fyre Drill

10:58 AM

5 min

HP Battle at the Ministry

11:15 AM

90 min

Dragon Racer's Rally

1:04 PM

40 min

Stardust Racers

1:51 PM

40 min

Mine-Cart Madness

2:41 PM

105 min

Yoshi's Adventure

4:37 PM

50 min

MK Bowser's Challenge

5:38 PM

75 min

By comparison, starting at 12:30 PM would only have taken you 420 mins, saving 55 mins time in line:

April 9th Close Down - Shortest Plan

Combined Time Stats:
Wait: 420 min Walk: 58 min Ride: 69 min
Finish Time: 9:37 PM

Ride Name

Arrival Time

Wait Time

Monsters Unchained

12:30 PM

20 min

Dragon Racer's Rally

1:10 PM

40 min

Mine-Cart Madness

1:59 PM

105 min

Stardust Racers

3:52 PM

35 min

Constellation Carousel

4:32 PM

30 min

Fyre Drill

5:11 PM

5 min

Hiccup's Wing Gliders

5:28 PM

35 min

Curse of the Werewolf

6:15 PM

60 min

Yoshi's Adventure

7:26 PM

20 min

MK Bowser's Challenge

7:57 PM

40 min

HP Battle at the Ministry

8:56 PM

30 min

Looking more broadly at other dates, this pattern is very consistent, both on busy days and even more on slow days. The only exception is days where all rides are open to start but several go down later in the day.

Rope drop die-hards, come at me. Are you convinced?