HELP! Learning Guitar Effects?

Im planning to buy stompbox effects and put it on a pedalboard, is it really hard to switch from one to another? lets set an example, on an intro of a song i combined distortion and delay effect and going to verse1 requires me just to turn on the chorus+phaser effect only, should i be really lightning fast to turn off the distortion and delay effects and then turn on the chorus+phaser? i hope you do understand my question :) i really want to learn this and P.S. i do have multi effects, but i think i have to explore more, thx people of yahoo :)