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Nothing like a world class exhibition of thread hijacking. Why don't you guys start your own thread?

So they can just put sandwich vending machines on the ship and call it a day? I think even folks whose primary focus is fun want to eat something a little better.

Enjoying gambling as a form of entertainment it the key. If one is going to gamble regardless of how they paid for the cruise then the casino offers make doing what you were going to do anyhow much less expensive. But I think the idea of those who don't care to gamble marching themselves to the casino to earn perks is not very wise. They are working while on vacation. We, on the other hand, are just doing what we do for fun so it makes sense.

I agree that overworked is a subjective perspective and even if they are I don't think that is the underlying cause of the decline in service in the MDR. I think the underlying cause is reduced staff. That may well cause some of the staff to overwork themselves out of pride of doing a good job though. So the two are not mutually exclusive. But whatever the underlying cause, they are taking waiters away from their primary function at a time they are providing substandard table service, in order to put on their performance. I would rather they devote their resources to providing table service. If they ever get to the point they are again providing excellent table service and still have folks standing around then, and only then, should they put the idle folks to work as performers. Just my opinion.

It's not a bad thing, but it is Carnival's problem and they make it mine.

Our experience also.

Same here. Pre-covid I would occasionally come out ahead. In 12 since covid, zero times. They gotta pay off that debt...

Well, that was certainly uplifting...😇.

Back to pet peeves; the toilet paper. We now have toilet paper on our trip check list of things to bring. I really should swap rolls with them and bring back theirs to use as finishing sandpaper on furniture projects.

A bit off topic, but this thread reminded me of something that happened years and years ago. On about the third day of the cruise we had just given our orders in the MDR when our head waiter came over with a very young oriental girl. The waiter approached me and said "the casino wishes to give you a bottle of wine. Would you like it with dinner?" Then the young lady said, in just passable English, "you've lost, we know." My wife and I about fell out of our chairs laughing. Our view ever since that experience has been that the comps are the casino saying, "you've lost, we know" and showing a little sympathy. One might come out ahead on the occasional cruise, but in the long run the house always wins.

I would go with cheers. Being dependent on the drinks waiters coming around really sucks. At times there are hardly any waiters on the floor. Then they often take forever to bring your drink. When there are few waiters and a full casino they take a ton of orders before going to the bar to be filled and spend a lot of time delivering drinks, often having to track down folks who have moved, with the result that often all the ice in your drink has melted. Over the last six months all our casino offers have included free drinks everywhere (cheers) for the both of us and we just go to the bar for our drinks. You get to know the bartenders and get better drinks faster than waiting for the waiter. Having experienced the difference we decided that if we are on a cruise with just drinks while playing we would buy cheers.

It all depends on how you look at it. As far as our bank account we are out $5,000 plus taxes, port fees, gratuities and parking. I don't know offhand the going rate for balcony rooms, but I would hope they are not $5,000. Of course if we did pay regular price and didn't gamble we would still want some entertainment over and above the free stuff. So it depends on what your alternative costs would be in the comparison. We long ago did shore excursions to death, but if one were to pay regular price and do shore excursions rather than gambling that would go into the comparison, for example. Also, I've been talking about our costs. What Carnival gets is a different thing, mainly in how much my wife spends on the ship v. ashore or brings back. I guess I could reduce my total costs by not giving my wife any entertainment money, but that would just result in my early death so I don't see that as a cost effective strategy.

We each have a budget for "entertainment" of $2,500. My wife plays in the casino on occasion, but only if the slots are paying. So she doesn't spend a lot in the casino; she buys jewelry, clothes and gifts in the ports and usually comes back with unspent money (at least unspent on the cruise). She still gets some offers, but we always use my better offers. I spend my $2,500 in the casino plus the $1,000 free play they have been giving me since covid and that usually gets me a bit over 10,000 points in the casino. So we cruise in balcony rooms for $200 ($100 each for which we get $200 on-board credit) plus taxes, port fees, gratuities and parking (we drive to the port). We have a year long travel medical policy for a bit over $200 a year but I'm leaving that out of the calculation since its cost per trip is minimal and depends on the number of cruises. So I guess it depends on what you include in the "cruise price." Looking only at me it costs $2,500 plus taxes, port fees, gratuities and parking. If you look at what I am actually out of pocket taking my wife into account it costs me $5,000 plus taxes, port fees, gratuities and parking. On the other hand, including my wife and subtracting the value of "other services" a cruise puts her in the mood to provide I think I might be getting paid to take the cruise...

I guess it is one of those "you can't win for losing" situations. I have seen threads in which an OP expressed surprise about some "changes" they encountered on their cruise only to be pretty much told they didn't have the intelligence of a brick because they had not been following CC. Everything they mentioned had been discussed on CC ad nauseam and they were an idiot for not having done research before their cruise. Now the OP of this thread is doing his research. Since covid, on each cruise (12 cruises for us) something has been "changed" as the OP has probably noticed (can't say cut, that is negative thinking and change is normal and constant) so OP is asking. Strangely on our recent cruise, for the first time since covid, the only change was for the better.

We cruised about three weeks ago. What we noticed: - There is one cutback reversal. The late night snacks are back; something we really missed. - The Diamond lunch was a true lunch with some of the best food we have ever had on Carnival (why can't they do that for the MDR). - The soups in the MDR were back to pre-covid quality. That is, the chicken soup had a nice amount of chicken in it (on our prior cruise my soup had not a speck of chicken meat), the meatball soup had lots of very good meatballs. All the soups were very good. Service in the MDR still sucks (they try but too few staff).

I suspect it has to do with it being the first sailing after dry dock. But I, for one, would not mind at all if I could sleep a little later the day of boarding if it is the new normal.

So did I...

We resisted, but finally caved. One of the things we enjoyed about cruising was putting our phones in the safe and being away from the rest of the world for a week with only our sign and sail cards to keep up with. Alas, another of the joys of cruising that have disappeared.

I assume you are correct. We were always in the habit of putting our phones in the safe the first day and leaving them there till the last day, so we would have just ignored the app pre covid. But right after covid, when we explained our phones would not work with the QR code, they never directed us to the Hub app. Were the menus on the app all that time? Just curious. If it was on there I had an unknown at the time peeve that they didn't tell us that.😁

Right after covid they had QR codes on the tables. I don't recall if they still do. The QR code would take you to a web page with the menu. But if you have good security on your phone it won't let you open a web browser over an unsecured wi-fi connection. We had that problem on our first cruises after covid before they came out with the Hub app. The Hub app can be used over an unsecured connection (it doesn't have a web browser's potential to hack your phone so security doesn't stop it) and the menu that shows up from there is just as readable and expandable as a web page.

They have them, but sometimes in limited quantities. At times they make you feel like you are disrupting things by asking. My old eyes don't like trying to read a tiny screen or fumbling around to have the screen on when they come to take the order so I can remember what made-up name they gave something.

Before covid we did not get Elite offers, just Ultra. Since covid we regularly get Elite offers. Our gambling hasn't changed. I generally have 10,000 to 11,000 points for the cruise. I don't get offered suites, just balconies and only get offered $300 casino cash. Also, I don't think we get first shot at picking the Elite cruise we want. I recently received my latest offer and it says "access" starts October 12 while I have seen others comment that their access starts October 10. So I guess we are "low end Elite."

I agree. The tablecloths were nice. And the servers singing and dancing we find aggravating. We would rather not sit waiting for our meal or dessert while they do their thing. But a lot of folks seem to enjoy it so I think no end is in sight.

While it is not desirable it is unavoidable on a "family" cruise line. We only cruise September through April to reduce the problem and that has worked well for us. But it is a legitimate peeve.