Fewest Moves: Tips and Techniques

[Cubenovice]

Sometimes it can be usefull to try moves on a different cube than the one you are actually solving.
This makes it easier to track where pieces go and you do not risk messing up your "main" cube when you make an error.

They also come in handy for checking your scramble, I typically scramble two cubes and (too) often I find that they are not the same...
Imagine working with just one cube and solving a wrongly executed scramble!

There is even more than the three cubes, you are allowed to use little stickers to highlight certain pieces / sticker so it is easier to look for insertions.

I reccomend reading this whole thread, the FMC article in the wiki and the FMC home thread to get a good idea what FMC is all about.
I am nit very good at it but still I find FMC a really rewarding cubing discipline.

[Olivér Perge]

Arnaud! Would you be so kind to edit the NISS method into the OP? It would help a lot of us!

Thanks!

[MarcelP]

I am normally not about bumping old topics. But the first post in this topic is so excellent that I just had to do it. Thanks mr van Galen. I have printed out all your examples and will go over them a few times. This is great stuff!!

[Luis]

I'm learning FMC now and have come across this thread. I find a couple of things missing that I'd like to mention:

1) Some examples of a beautiful technique to insert a commutator that "doesn't solve any piece but just cycle unsolved pieces with many cancellations" can be seen in this same forum here. I love it.

2) Concerning the shortest existing edge commutator, don't forget that it can be expressed in four different forms. This widens the possibilities for cancellations. For example:

R' L F2 R L' U2

produces identical results than

R' F2 R L' U2 L,
F2 R L' U2 R' L and
L F2 R L' U2 R'