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abunickabhi

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I've been trying to research memorization techniques in order to improve
my times and have been considering transitioning to PAO from regular letter pairs. I think it would alleviate some
issues I've had with regular letter pairs, for instance remembering the correct order of the words. Is there any particular downsides to it (besides that it would take some time to learn)?

Currently I just make up words (mostly nouns and people) for every letter combination and then integrate these with each other into one picture, with around 3-4 loci per 3x3.

It seems like PAO is far less popular in the cubing community, so I would be interested in hearing what you guys think.
Its true that PAO is not used by that many BLDers.
Making up words on the spot is not the best strategy. I guess you make a detailed sheet of letter pairs or PAO letter pairs.

Personally, I have a personalised letter quads sheets that I have been maintaining since 2016 (126k cases of LQs for most of piece types on 3x3,4x4 (4BLD), 5x5(5BLD)). I used letter pairs since 2014 and got fluent with it, but I am investing my time with LQ.
 

Straniz33

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Its true that PAO is not used by that many BLDers.
Making up words on the spot is not the best strategy. I guess you make a detailed sheet of letter pairs or PAO letter pairs.

Personally, I have a personalised letter quads sheets that I have been maintaining since 2016 (126k cases of LQs for most of piece types on 3x3,4x4 (4BLD), 5x5(5BLD)). I used letter pairs since 2014 and got fluent with it, but I am investing my time with LQ.

Yeah, I currently maintain a consistent list for letter pairs. I'll be making one for PAO as well if I switch.
I guess the main reason why most people don't use PAO is because it's more complicated, and knowing over 500 different people is also not easy. I do feel though that if one gets through these hurdles It'll offer an advantage over regular letter pairs. Perhaps I'm a little bit optimistic though :)
Do you think I should give it a try, or is it just waste of time? Obviously a very subject question, but interested nonetheless.

LQs are a whole different beast though, I applaud you for your dedication!
 

abunickabhi

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Yeah, I currently maintain a consistent list for letter pairs. I'll be making one for PAO as well if I switch.
I guess the main reason why most people don't use PAO is because it's more complicated, and knowing over 500 different people is also not easy. I do feel though that if one gets through these hurdles It'll offer an advantage over regular letter pairs. Perhaps I'm a little bit optimistic though :)
Do you think I should give it a try, or is it just waste of time? Obviously a very subject question, but interested nonetheless.

LQs are a whole different beast though, I applaud you for your dedication!
I think you should definitely give PAO system a try.
 

DNF_Cuber

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Nov 14, 2020
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Beyond the grave.....
Yeah, I currently maintain a consistent list for letter pairs. I'll be making one for PAO as well if I switch.
I guess the main reason why most people don't use PAO is because it's more complicated, and knowing over 500 different people is also not easy. I do feel though that if one gets through these hurdles It'll offer an advantage over regular letter pairs. Perhaps I'm a little bit optimistic though :)
Do you think I should give it a try, or is it just waste of time? Obviously a very subject question, but interested nonetheless.

LQs are a whole different beast though, I applaud you for your dedication!
500 actions are probably harder.
 

Zagros

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don't know if this is a commonly used strategy but i always associate my corner memorization with an action during 3bld, for example on a solve i might tense my left knee repeatedly while tracing corners, then i trace edges, solve edges, and when i need to recall corners, i tense my left knee to remember.
 
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