Blindsolving Discussion and Help

[DrKorbin]

Because in 4BLD you have corners, 24 letters (8 pieces, 3 orientations for each piece), edges, 24 pieces (Fixed orientation), and centres, 24 pieces (Assuming none are solved which is never). So one can simple apply a lettering system for them.

I wonder if it is easier for Japanese people. In hiragana, you have over 100 kanas, so it can be possible to assign 60 kanas to each sticker on corners and on edges, nanodesu
The question is: for each two kanas is there a word that starts from these kanas?

Also I would add another reason for "slow" mega-bld record: it is not a WCA event. I guess not many people want to master it until it becomes official (which is very very unlikely).

What system do people use?

If I were to do a megaminx blind(long time from now) there would be 3 colored sections. Blue would represent the U F L and R faces. Red would represent the D Dfr Dfl and Dl face. Yellow would represent the Br Bl B and Dr faces. I would use a similar anti-spefz lettering scheme that I normally use. If a letter pair was D on the U face and K on the Br side I would memorise a green Donkey Kong. Green because the the primaries Blue and Yellow make green.

I feel as if that is not that hard. I am not saying I could actually do it because my blind ability is fairly poor but it is something I will be sure to try when I have the ability.

Interesting idea, but I think that a man can easily memorize image shapes and not so easily image colors. Maybe I am wrong.
EDIT: also, how can you distinguish it from the case when the letter pair was D on the "yellow" face and K on the "blue" face?

 

[emolover]

Interesting idea, but I think that a man can easily memorize image shapes and not so easily image colors. Maybe I am wrong.

I personally find color easy to remember. I know my friends skin tone without a problem so maybe it would be easier for me.

 

[Mike Hughey]

I found megaminx outlandishly hard to memorize, because it wasn't well suited to English letters. Mondo had success with megaminx; he knows Japanese. And I know István Kocza has said that he used multiple alphabets.

For me, megaminx suddenly became much easier to memorize when I started solving it orient-permute. I first orient all edges, then permute them, then orient all corners, then permute them. This allows me to use just a regular alphabet for almost everything (I add numbers for the last few edges).

I find that significantly more than half the overall solve is spent on permuting edges. The problem is that the commutators are so ugly for those, and setups are so bad that I generally have gone to solving them one at a time, Pochmann-style.

 

[Zane_C]

I'm changing corner memo method. From tap+side letter (Eric Limeback type) to letter for each of 21 stickers. All because of mbld, because visual memo is not good for mbld, for obvious reasons.

I know that kinch002 uses 4 letters in CW direction per face, going through letter in alphabet. I got used to cell phone's buttons so I assigned for one corner orientations ABC, for second DEF, ...you get the point...all the way to TUV.
Do you have any ideas that are more simpler and/or some suggestions?

I don't highly recommend using numbers for multi BLD, however, they might be ok for 1 or 2 cubes (maybe more, depends on the person).
If you learn a lettering scheme, you won't be restricted to using numbers for orientation. By using only letters, you have the option to form words, sounds, images, names... so you may find that dropping numbers allows you to construct a more coherent and memorable memo.

A very powerful method involving letters is letter pairs, they can easily cut the effort of memorising in halve.

 

[Noahaha]

Could someone give me some tips on MBLD? I've been using a room in my house for each cube, creating PAO images out of letter pairs, so each image is 6 letters. I got a 3/3 pretty easily, but when I tried 6 cubes I got everything jumbled. Do I just need to practice more, or is there something wrong with my memorization technique?

 

[Carson]

Do you use the same memo technique for single cubes? If not, try doing some single bld with that system to practice it.

 

[Zane_C]

Could someone give me some tips on MBLD? I've been using a room in my house for each cube, creating PAO images out of letter pairs, so each image is 6 letters. I got a 3/3 pretty easily, but when I tried 6 cubes I got everything jumbled. Do I just need to practice more, or is there something wrong with my memorization technique?

Mats Bergsten has shown that PAO can be an effective method. But it doesn't work for everyone, so maybe you should try experimenting with non-PAO images. You might like to start off by experimenting with single lettered images, you might find that you are thoughtful enough to make up letter pairs on demand (without memorising a list). If you decide to do a bit of experimenting with letter pairs and it works nicely, perhaps you should then consider going further and memorising a letter pair list.

 

[AbstractAlg]

I don't highly recommend using numbers for multi BLD, however, they might be ok for 1 or 2 cubes (maybe more, depends on the person).
If you learn a lettering scheme, you won't be restricted to using numbers for orientation. By using only letters, you have the option to form words, sounds, images, names... so you may find that dropping numbers allows you to construct a more coherent and memorable memo.

A very powerful method involving letters is letter pairs, they can easily cut the effort of memorising in halve.

No numbers at all. Where have I mentioned numbers in post?
21 alphabet letter for each corner sticker, and letter-pairs for edges.
So all letters to form words/images to store in memo.

For MBLD I use "station method". Because rooms are quite small for me, I visualize bus stations along the route I go along everyday to school and each bus station represents or full edge memo or full corner memo (letter-pair images).
So I sit on the bicycle and go along the predefined route, visit each bus station and see what's happening on the bus stations and extract permutations I need to do from those images. One station for cube no1 edges, second for cube no1 corners, third for cube no2 edges, fourth for cube no2 corners...

 

[Cubenovice]

I got used to cell phone's buttons so I assigned for one corner orientations ABC, for second DEF, ...you get the point...all the way to TUV.
Do you have any ideas that are more simpler and/or some suggestions?

Thanks.

I am doing the same (ABC for the stickers on the same corner piece, going clockwise, starting from the U or D sticker.
This works fine for me in 3 BLD.

But I now that I am getting into 4BLD the Spefz scheme (like Daniel) seems like it could be a better choice. (at least for centers).
Lettering around a face may make it easier to check for "missed" center pieces"...
So If you are just changing you could consider going Spefz.
It also makes it very easy to discuss BLD cycles with other Spefz users.

 

[AbstractAlg]

Thanks, but I'm not anywhere near 4BLD, mainly because I don't have a 4x4 cube at all (EastSheen broken long time ago).
I'll give it a try, if I'm already changing memo, why not to try?

Also, what method Marcell Endrey uses for 3bld?
I watched his 19/19 mbld and he somehow always comes to a pattern where his UBL corner and UL edge are yellow, while the rest of the U face is white, then he does some alg and ends up with a solved cube. Simple parity fix? (?!)

 

[mightysaur]

I am new to blind cubing so can u help me?

Whats a good method for beginners(with a good video)?

Do I have to memorize orientations of pieces and can someone give me a good memorisation technique?

 

[AbstractAlg]

I've been playing a bit with corner lettering scheme and came up with this scheme.

I saw that it's better to group letter per face, because reckognition is faster and easier than grouping letters per corner piece.
So I switched to "Speffz" type but had to modify it a bit to suit me.
Why like this?
Grey corner is buffer, and don't have to memorize it, which gives me three faces with only 3 stickers left to mark with letter, which brings me back to cell phone's keys.
U face - ABC in CW direction (quite natural).
F face - DEF + something easy to memo like vowel -> 'U'.
R face - GHI + 'V' because it looks similar to U letter and it's there just to fill the empty face.
B face - JKL in CCW direction to keep the order of letters.
L face - MNO.
D face - PQRS easy yet full 4 consecutive letters.

I tried this method and memo is very natural, I believe it will took me around two weeks to completely get used to it. It will still need slight modifications for 4BLD centers, but it's enough for now.

Sorry for such a long post, I just though that someone might find this useful as abstract way of thinking and finding the very best option that will suit your needs.

 

[AbstractAlg]

What if you change your buffer?

Why would I?
All the algs I learned are for UBL, OP is for UBL, and some crazy hybrid method that I actually use right now for corners is formed for UBL as buffer.
I have no reason to change it, ever.
Been using it from the start and got used to be memo-neutral for that piece, if I might say so.

 

[emolover]

What do I do for parity on megaminx? What is the R perm equivalent on megaminx if using OP and what do I do if I'm doing 3-cycle?

Sorry for asking so many questions as of lately for something I am far from attempting.

 

[aronpm]

I don't think there is a parity. On a 3x3, if you do a quarter turn, it does a 4-cycle on edges and a 4-cycle on corners. That's (even) parity. On megaminx if you do a fifth turn, it does a 5-cycle on edges and a 5-cycle on corners, which is not parity (well, it's odd parity, which is "no parity" in cubing-words)

 

[rubiksarlen]

What algs to most people use for the following 4BLD targets:

1. Fur
2. Bdr
3. Edge parity (r2)

 

[JasonK]

What algs to most people use for the following 4BLD targets:

1. Fur
2. Bdr
3. Edge parity (r2)

1. F d R U R' d' R U' R F' r2
2. r2 F R U R' d R U' R' d' F'
3. r2 D' L' F (l' U2 l' U2 x U2 l' U2 x' r U2 r' U2 l2) F' L D

 

[Zane_C]

No numbers at all. Where have I mentioned numbers in post?

Whoa, that's an indication that I need to read questions more carefully . I must have somehow assumed there were numbers from "cell phone's buttons". Sorry for the misunderstanding.

Your 'station method' sounds quite nice. The bus stops are neatly sequenced, and your familiarity with the locations makes it all the better.

 

[Marcell]

Also, what method Marcell Endrey uses for 3bld?
I watched his 19/19 mbld and he somehow always comes to a pattern where his UBL corner and UL edge are yellow, while the rest of the U face is white, then he does some alg and ends up with a solved cube. Simple parity fix? (?!)

3-style originating from M2/R2: buffers are DF and DFR, targets (to shoot the buffer piece to in case of parity) are UB and UBR, parity fix is F2 + N-perm.
(I do it differently now btw.)

 

[rubiksarlen]

Okay, so if I'm using BH/Freestyle corners, and I have parity, what I usually do is shoot the last corner target to URB, so its ULB (buffer) > (last corner target) > URB, then after edges I do M2 (y) T-perm to fix parity. But what if I am at my last corner target and I have another twsited/unoriented corner? What do I do?