Celebrity Newbie with MDR questions

[VegasVic14]

(Randomly selected the Beyond as a sample for a Celebrity cruise.)
The web page states this: "With Celebrity Select Dining you can choose early seating at 6:00 P.M., late seating at 8:30 P.M., or dine whenever you want. You’ll be assigned one of the four main restaurants, while having the option to dine in the other three upon request and availability."

My questions: Is the "assigned" restaurant their choice or yours? Is it a common situation where the option to dine elsewhere upon request isn't possible and you end up in the original restaurant more times than you'd like? 

[Tudy]

The assigned reservation is their choice. But it is not mandatory.

 

You can go online before your cruise, and make reservations for every night at the main dining room of your choice at the time of your choosing. This way everything is decided before you board. 

 

However, if. you are the kind of person who likes to "just go with the flow" you can wait and go where ever you want when you want. There will be a card in your stateroom that will have a recommended dining room and time for you on the first night. This "reservation" will be there whether or not you have already made another reservation. Don't sweat it, just go with whichever you choose.

[Thejuggler]

Just off Apex and we had no issue getting a table for two in any of the four restaurants at any time when going for dinner generally between 7.30pm and 8.30pm each night.

 

The ship however was not full and passengers were older demographic.  We noticed a lot of passengers going for dinner at 5.30-6pm to make the 7.30pm theatre show.

 

At no time were the restaurants full to capacity.  We also ate in the buffet on two nights and that was also busy which takes pressure off the restaurants.

[LeeW]

On Beyond, you could order the "exclusive" dining options of any of the restaurants even if you weren't there.  You don't really need to dine in the four restaurants.  We made 6:30 reservations in Normandie every night (same table/servers) before the cruise.  Did notice sometimes lines in Tuscan were huge and lines in Normandie were small.  Other nights the opposite.  We got an order of cannoli (from Tuscan) with our dessert every night.