I accidentally figured out what works best for us - a hybrid strategy.
1. Get there close to open, but not early. In my experience, most of the value of rope dropping comes from being there at open - not necessarily being there an hour early and waiting in line. (Exceptions may apply when you're talking about a new ride opening.) Sure being there at 7:15 on an 8:00 am open day gives you the absolute best situation, but being there at 8:10 isn't bad at all. My non-scientific guess is you get 90% of the benefits of actual rope-dropping without waiting at all.
2. Being there early is what gives you freedom. I've sort of gone away from hard core touring plans simply because my touring plan has turned into this - know the hard to get things, hit them early, relax the rest of the day and go with the flow.
3. And here's the hybrid part I "lucked" into by accident. Go all out, open to close, 8:00am to midnight, no rest for the weary... and then take the entire next day off. Rinse and repeat. We had a cast member friend that gave us three day tickets, and we wanted to be there longer. We were thrilled (of course) but disappointed we couldn't stay more days. But by using this strategy it was amazing. We had totally boss Disney days, power-touring all day long. Then we could go to our room, crash, wake up late, roll out of bed for a late breakfast. Lounge around reading a book. Do some light resort hoping. Laugh and compare notes about the day before. Take a swim if that's your thing. Just chill. Do some light shopping. Get to be early, and then... Bam! Refreshed and ready ot power tour the next day. It's sort of like those recommendations to take some hours off during the afternoon, which I can never do because I can't afford a hotel on the monorail ... Just better, IMO.
I swear, by doing that we felt like we had a much better, happier, fuller, and more relaxed trip that we ever had before on 5 or 6 day tickets. Three great days with two rest days in between was better than 5 full days in the parks. That's what we plan to do in the future.