JoshC.

One thing which I've noticed people say is about the "unfair ratios" of RnR to people who queue normally, and the long queue times that people have to wait if they queue normally. Surely that shows the system is in fact working well... Say Saw had a 60 minute queue for people who decided to queue normally - which it did at one point yesterday - and (if there's ratios favouring Fastrack and RnR) only 2 out of the 8 cars let normal guests on. Then, there's only gonna be around 200-250 people actually normally queueing for the ride (assuming Saw's throughput is between 800-1000). Assuming the same for the other four coasters, then you're looking at 1000 people queueing for the major 5 coasters. If all the 'ordinary' queues for coasters are longer, then you're still only looking at 1500-2000 at most queueing for the actual coasters. Using the system yesterday, was able to get on the rides very quickly after checking in. I certainly wouldn't have got all 5 major coasters done during the day if RnR wasn't operating, since I wouldn't want to bother with the queues. If those people had to use RnR, and you spread them across the entire park and the 10-15ish rides that could possibly appeal to them, then at this stage, it will give a noticeable, but not particularly huge, increase to ride queue times, as well as boost up virtual waiting times. I want to see the park try just virtual queueing on the coasters, but at the moment, it's probably a step too far given the limited line up to do. So the normal queueing option - whilst confusing and weird and whatnot - is a good idea at the moment. What they need to do now is increase the attraction line up. High throughput rides would be great, but they also need shows, non-rides, etc. to give more alternatives and to keep everyone entertained. That way, the virtual queueing will work, and there's enough attractions to be able to cope. The fact that, for the most part, the non-coasters aren't that much more busier at the moment, shows that the park don't actually need that much more for this to be achievable. I'd even say that if the park could get a season-round show in the arena / Hideaway and CCR back, they could realistically try it next season. Couple more high throughput rides and attraction in the next couple of years and they could attempt to roll it out to more and more rides as well. Long story short - I think RnR is getting to a stage where it's working well. The system seems a lot better than in the past, and these trials are coming back positive. I don't think it'll be that difficult to roll it out to having the coasters to be virtual queue and Fastrack only. Couple of other points. People mentioning about the fact your can reserve rides when not on park. It is a flaw, yes, and it is something which would be good to be sorted out. However, I don't think it's too big a deal? I doubt there's many people who have nothing better to do than book a place in a queue on a roller coaster just to annoy some other people. Some people could do it if they're arriving after the park opens, but I imagine that's a smaller problem since most people will arrive within the first hour of opening. I know many have mentioned the flaw how multiple people from one group can reserve different rides. This is something which could be abused, yes, however I wonder how much it affects to queues. I personally doubt it will affect the overall park waiting times if it happened, but I guess that's only something you can know if you compare the two cases.. If a ride has a long virtual queue, I don't think that's a big deal. Just shows it's popular surely? It's not fun having to plan your day out at a theme park in a way such that you have to say "Right, we have 3 hours till we can ride this ride...", and that's something that Thorpe can improve by having more things to do on park. tl;dr - For RnR to be truly successful, the park needs to give guests more things to do. The trials they're doing at the moment seem promising however. Don't knock it til you've tried it either!

No worries - hope all is okay! Thanks to everyone that showed up. Mr and Mrs was a bit of a flop on terms of a game, but fingers crossed everyone got to know each other a little better, which was the point mostly! And the Quiz was a little too hard in the end I think, but oh wells.. Hopefully another Organized Chat can happen soon as well

Divisional Director Mike Vallis did his nomination! Wonder how long it'll be before Nick Varney gets his nomination?

^Fastrack ratios will likely be different for different rides, depending on the capacity of the ride. The way I've understood how Fastrack used to work (on a normal day) is that anyone waiting in the Fastrack queue waits - at a maximum - a third of main queue time IF there was no Fastrack guests. So, if there was an hour long queue without Fastrack, then Fastrack guests would wait at most 20 minutes. Of course, this means the main queue is longer, since you need to add in the Fastrack users. It's a weird system, and could well be different now. If they're implementing a similar system when RnR is going on, then that's just going to cause so many complications and goodness knows how it would work. For Reserve and Ride to truly succeed, they need to dive in and get rid of the standby queue, and force people to use it (for free of course) or buy Fastrack. Having three different methods of queueing is complicated, confusing and just cannot physically work. I hope that this trial works a treat, showing that the actual computer system works, meaning that they can at least give this another try.

Just a reminder that this is starting in 25 minutes! Mr and Mrs Ice Breaker will happen first, so just after half 7, and the little Quiz will *probably* start at around half 8. All the rules will be explained in Chat. See you there guys!

Couple of pictures which I found on Screamscape (unsure of original source): Layout Logo Website - https://www.carowinds.com/swarm (Was tempted to make some sort of Swarm joke here... ) Looks pretty good; don't like the name though. I don't get this American thing of having a word the adding the ride's height on the end.

Operations Director, Andy Walker, has taken the ice bucket challenge: Will be interesting to see how many of his nominations go online (and how far up the Merlin chain it makes it!)

Kind of in order, since for anything after Inferno, it very much depends on how I feel: 1) Swarm (forwards) 2) Inferno 3) Swarm (backwards) and X 5) Rush 6) Detonator(: Bombs Away) 7) Saw 8) Loggers Leap 9) Stealth 10) Tidal Wave Whilst I haven't actually ridden Tidal Wave for many years, I think it's sheer spectator value gives it a Top 10 spot. Thorpe Park wouldn't be Thorpe Park any more without seeing the huge splash, hearing WWTP Radio or seeing the theming.

Congrats to all on their results. For the most part, GCSEs don't matter too much; as long as they're enough to get you to the next step of life (college, job, whatever), then you're fine and should be happy! Toofy - given how close you are to the geese boundary, you should be able to take Geography A-Level fine; especially if you say how close you were! Pidge - if the grade is provisional, it may mean they're awaiting moderation of coursework, want to double check something or something else; it's unlikely to be because you don't have the certificate. Check with your school's exam officer / your English teacher to be sure though!

It'd probably be a whole lot better than it is now..!

They have done Thursday preview nights in the past; the 2010 and 2011 preview events for FN were definitely on Thursdays, with the first official day being the Friday.

Nice idea - hope people take them up on it! As for price; I'd expect an extra £20-£30 for a bolt on (at a maximum). Given that it's saving guests £10 per visit (£5 for the visit, £5 for the car parking), and they're getting a Fastrack package worth about £15-£20, Thorpe will probably want to entice people to buy it to visit more. As for Fastracks at Fright Nights, whilst I only visited once, I thought that the Fastrack queues were rather short during the night, so actually had little affect on the main queues (since there were times when the Fastrack queue was none-existence. Then again, maybe I visited on a quiet-ish night. Much better than 2012 at least!

Interesting how my opinion's changed on this.. I did like X:\NWO, possibly due to the fact that it was 'that bad it was good'. However, I do prefer X now; much more fun and rerideable as well. As much as I'd like to have just one more ride on it, I don't miss it. Still, my opinion hasn't changed about me missing WWH / CCR / The Flying Fish, as well as the jetties, equally..

Number 2 was the lie. I used to own a Samsung phone, but recently upgraded to the HTC One Mini 2. Old-style TVs are the best, and I do indeed have two pairs of glasses (though only ever wear one...)

Happy birthday Benin - I hope you're having fun collecting more creds in Germany!

I'll do some stuff now, to occupy myself instead of insulting you further Jason ... 1) I don't have a flat screen TV because I prefer the old style TVs. 2) I own a Samsung phone. 3) I have two pairs of glasses. (Yay for being boring with my options...)

Clearly Number 2. *Shakes fist in anger*

Organized Chat! Some people have been asking for Chat-related games/quizzes/ice breakers/whatevers, so I'll have a go at organizing one. So, this Thursday, 7:30pm. Things will start off with an ice breaker game - Mr and Mrs. Rules are still being finalized and stuff, but the idea is that you'll pair up with someone (preferably someone who you don't know very well), then chat with them for a few minutes over private chat bit to get to know the person a bit better. Then there'll be a series of questions, like in the Mr and Mrs game show, that you have to answer about your partner, to see if you've got to know them any better. The idea will be that you have to PM two sets of answers - your guesses about your partner, as well as your answers about yourself, so that I can compare. As I say, rules are still being finalised. (And if this fails miserably, this was LePaige's idea - so it's all her fault ). After the ice breaker, there'll be a small theme park quiz. Questions will probably be about all theme parks and rides - ranging from Thorpe Park to Six Flags to Disney. All a bit of fun of course, just to see how you measure up to others. If you'd like to take part, give a quick post so I know not to start without you. Or, if people want to see a different time, just say - the majority may decide something else. And if you can't take part in this at all, there's usually a couple of people hanging out in Chat most evenings now - why not drop in and say hi?

Empty dodgems. Would benefit from seeing some action going on there. 5/10.

I think that, when the park closes at 10pm, the shuttle bus riibs till 11pm, so you should be okay.

I've found that, in my experience across the Merlin parks, some staff are okay with letting the odd one or two non-AP people through if they're in a group that's mainly AP holders. Some might be a little stricter, some might not be. As you say, no harm in asking!

The amount he was screaming and playing up, I was beginning to think he was an actor to be honest!

Feel like this thread needs to be used some more... 7 toofpikk expertly modelling the glasses used for the Angry Birds 4D Experience. j.s217 is rolling in Inferno's mist with utter joy. Peaj is approving of such shenanigans.

Thorpe Park asked for students to open their A Level results on some rides: (Notice how Saw has a new film IP... )

Feel like this could come in handy at some points...