Got back from DL last night. First time at Disney California. Overall great experience. Radiator Springs, Pixar Pier and Marvel Campus are all great. Really like how close everything is and how easy it is to move from park to park to downtown Disney to hotel, etc.
Paid for Genie+ each day upon entering park. The Lightning Lane access through Genie+ worked well. There were a few rides that had Lightning Lane access that really didn't seem to need it (stand by times were never more than 15 minutes) and then they did not have it on some rides that always had 45+ minute standby lines. Not sure I understand exactly how they decide what rides will have LL as an option. Not a big deal for our trip, just an observation. The Incredicoaster is an awesome ride but it was experiencing technical difficulties quite a bit. Thankfully we got to ride it using Genie+, but when we tried to ride again later it was out of service during our window which was unfortunate but they converted our LL pass to a "multiple attractions" pass which allowed us to have LL access to any ride (except for Radiator Springs Racers, Webslingers & Midway Mania) even ones that don't normally have a LL option. We ended up riding 3 or 4 rides using this golden ticket and for the non-LL option rides they would just walk us through the ride exit and put us on immediately. Pretty sweet.
We paid for the LL individual ride option for Rise of the Resistance, Web Slingers (neat, but not something I would pay for again) and Radiator Springs Racers (awesome). It was "worth it" from a standpoint of how long we would have otherwise had to stand in line (2.5-3 hours for each ride) but it is a bit ridiculous that:
1. you have to pay per ride if you want to avoid spending upward of 2 hours standing in line
2. there aren't any options for Genie+ LL all day from what I could tell (it seems like they should have some (30-50) per hour set aside for the Genie+ folks).
I know it's a money grab, and if people didn't buy them it would change but people, me included, are buying so it will only get worse.
If anyone has any questions about specifics let me know.
Had a blast and got to ride everything we wanted to thanks for the tips and guidance in advance.