Originally Posted by
FWAAA
On a flight that long, I would stay at the gate until everyone has boarded and the agent is giving the "get on board now" request. I would not board early to get overhead space and risk someone else getting "my" upgrade if the agent doesn't come fetch you from economy. On a shorter flight, I might risk it. Not to HKG. I'd be the final passenger to board.
I'm curious - have never cleared a battlefield upgrade with AA yet, although I'm happy to say the number of occasions when my request didn't clear in advance have been limited. On the occasions that it didn't, I made sure to turn up at the gate early enough to catch the gate agents when they were not super busy. Being told that there was essentially no hope, I have then proceeded to board. Are there concrete examples of people getting their upgrade only because they waited until the very end of the boarding procedure?