It seems as though a hard ticketed event would be the best way to handle this in the future, yes. That would limit park capacity, give both APers and non-APers an equal shot at getting tickets, and make it easier to manage.
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I dislike the trend to hard-ticket events though I can't quite pin down why. I feel like I'm paying for regular access, and have to pay again for days that should otherwise be available.
In that case I prefer they don't even give a "line up time" and just let people crazy enough to wait that long do so. But they should also give people in line tickets early on, not so they can leave, but so that they can't save spots for people. Only people with tickets can enter.
Yeah, telling people when they can line up means people *will* be there that early. One of my coworkers was at DTD at 10pm to be one of the very very first in line. And someone else told me they distributed wristbands at some point.