You can skip the multistage dryhop and leave it for a future IPA. That's the most complicated of the three...kind of an advanced technique. Though the technique is not that new. Stone and Russian River, among other breweries, have been doing it for awhile now. The theory is that the best benefits of the dryhops are provided in the first 3-5 days, when the hops are fresh, potent, and oily. I don't know how true it is, but some have said the dryhops can have a vegetal, staleness if left in the beer beyond 7 days. I have personally NEVER experienced that, but it's something to take into consideration. I think this is more of a problem with grassy Noble hops, which are not usually used in American IPAs (or old hops). I usually use very fresh high oil, high myrcene American hops.
But back to staging a dryhop... If you desired more aroma than a short 3-5 day dryhop would provide, then you can do it a couple times, each time pulling out the prior addition, discarding it, and adding the new addition. You can do this with a small weighted hop bag tied with twine to the neck of the carboy. With this method, you're not using more hops that you would if you employed a single stage, so you're not really wasting money. Pellets are better for staged dryhops because they release oils faster than leaf hops so you get the maximum benefit in the 3-5 days. I've noticed that the three and four step staging methods do give you more aroma... For the most part though, I tend to employ a 10-12 day pellet dryhop and I can still achieve very satisfying citrusy, piney, fruity, tropical aromas without risking oxygenation.
Late extract additions are simple. Instead of adding all of your extract at the beginning, save a portion of it to add at 15 minutes left in the boil. In IPAs, it helps to boost hop utilization while decreasing melanoidin formation.
All hop stands are not created equal. If you tell 20 people to implement a 60 minute hop stand, you probably won't have 2 people doing it the same exact way. There can be many intricacies in individual brewer technique. I've tried numerous methods: wort chiller, ice bath, flameout, mid flameout, no flameout, dryhop, no dryhop, staged dryhop, etc. etc. - I had the best aroma by using a slow working ice bath and adding the flameout hops when the wort was about 150-160 F. The ice bath ensures cooling, but not immediate cooling. So the hops steep in the warm wort until it reaches 65 F. Someone else mentioned in a another thread that you can quickly cool the wort to 160F with a wort chiller, and then rely on an ice bath to do the rest of the cooling. This is a very sound method as well. Either way, I found that a long hop stand at specific temps for 30-60 minutes lends the best aroma when used in conjunction with a dryhop... staged or unstaged, your choice. For regular IPAs, 0.50 - 0.65 oz. dryhops per gallon beer - For Imperial IPAs, 0.70 - 1.00 oz. dryhops per gallon beer.
