The trend today in cruising is "a la carte". No sense in going on a cruise that includes wine and liquor if you don't drink. No sense in having shore excursions included if your prefer to book your own, or not take excursions in particular ports. You get the drift. I'd rather pay less upfront and than pick and choose the amenities and services I want to use. We've been on all 6 of the mass market lines and each has it's pros and cons, our favorite is Princess but we always found something to like about Carnival, NCL, RCCL, HAL and Celebrity.

As to missing ports, several years ago we took a "Glacier Bay" cruise and missed Glacier Bay. It was on NCL and the ship sprung an oil leak and wasn't premitted into Glacier Bay. They gave a small credit and substituted a different port but we were very disappointed. As it turned out we had another NCL cruise booked for several months later and were given a substantial credit against that cruise. We have sailed NCL twice since Glacier Bay and have enjoyed both cruises. As another plus we plan to cruise Alaska again in the future and hope to get into Glacier Bay the next time, hopefully on Princess.

P.S. In all the cruises we have taken, that was the first and only port we ever missed out of about 60 ports.