aNub
Regular
- Joined
- Jan 27, 2018
- Messages
- 25
Can someone give me some critique?
- Thread starter aNub
- Start date
Fun fact: you'll get better times if you cube with proper lighting.
I'm just going to go through the first solve because I don't think looking at all five solves will let me offer any more specific advice.
Something that jumped out at me when I did a quick watch through was that you rely on rotations way too much. Your cross+F2L had a total of 13 rotations, and your last layer had 6; ideally, it should be more like 0-5 rotations for cross+F2L and 0 rotations for LL (unless you get A/E perms).
Cross: You don't seem to plan the full cross in inspection, although you do at least (seem to) plan three pieces in all your solves. Even if you can't plan your full cross, try to look for the last cross piece as you finish the first three cross edges.
First slot: Green-orange is a pretty bad pair because both pieces are stuck in the wrong slot and the edge isn't oriented, which means you'll have to do a rotation (or a weird insert) to solve it. Your solution is essentially speed-optimal for this case, but there was a long recognition pause before the rotation. Blue-orange is slightly nicer and doesn't require a rotation (U L' U L2 U' L'), but it's still not very nice so whatever.
Second slot: You did two rotations and a bunch of AUFs before actually starting to solve the pair, and this took ~2.7 seconds. Solution is fine, but the rotations and AUFs could have been minimised (U L U L' U L U' L' or U R U' L U L' R').
Third slot: Two rotations at the start again. Stop doing that. Again, the solution after the initial rotation+AUF mess is fine, but the rotations really were unnecessary and you can also use the opposite free slot to form the pair (U R' U' R L' U L).
Last slot: Whooooooa that's a terrible F2L solution. You should never use four triggers for an F2L pair. For intuitive F2L, what you should do is to split the corner and edge as you remove them from the slot, which will give you an easier F2L case. You can do this from any angle, so there's no need for a rotation at the start.
What you did: y' R U R' U' R U2 R' U2' R U' R' U y' R' U' R (15 moves + 2 rotations)
Alternative: L' U L y' U' R U R' U R U R' (11 moves + 1 rotation)
Move-optimal alg: F R U2 R' F' L' U' L (8 moves, rotationless)
OLL, first look: Have you tried something other than f sexy f' for this EO case? If you have to rotate in order to execute the f' at the end, I'm sure you can shave a bit of time just by switching to a better alg (e.g. F U R U' R' F' or r U R' U R U2 r').
OLL, second look: You did a rotation to check for the corner orientation on the back face. Don't do that. Corner orientation should be easy to recognise from just the top face and two faces (either front/right or front/left depending on grip). Also, you can use Sunes and Antisunes from multiple angles to minimise AUFing as well.
What you did: U' R' U' R U' R' U2 R
Alternative: R U2 R' U' R U' R'
PLL: Don't do y rotations (except in special circumstances). Use U/U2/U' moves instead.
Miscellaneous comments: (i) Lighting sucks and the video quality suffers partly because of that (and partly because the bitrate is way too low). (ii) You should scramble with WCA orientation and provide scrambles when asking for critiques, to make it easier to follow what you're doing.
I'm just going to go through the first solve because I don't think looking at all five solves will let me offer any more specific advice.
/* Scramble */
B' F' R2 B U2 L2 D2 U2 B R2 U B2 R2 B2 L' B2 D B F'
/* Solve */
z2 y // inspection
R' D2' R' x U2 (x' y') (y' x) R' U R x' // cross
R U R' U' R U U R' U' U' y R U R' // first slot
U U y' x' (x U') y' R U R' U l F' l' // second slot
U' U' y' U y' R' U' R U' U' R' U R // third slot
y' R U R' U' R U U R' U' U' R U' R' U y' R' U' R // last slot
U f R U R' U' y' r' // EO
x' (F F' x) U' R' U' R U' R' U2 R // CO
x' x y' R' U L' U2 R U' R' U2 R L U' // PLL (J perm)
// View at alg.cubing.net
B' F' R2 B U2 L2 D2 U2 B R2 U B2 R2 B2 L' B2 D B F'
/* Solve */
z2 y // inspection
R' D2' R' x U2 (x' y') (y' x) R' U R x' // cross
R U R' U' R U U R' U' U' y R U R' // first slot
U U y' x' (x U') y' R U R' U l F' l' // second slot
U' U' y' U y' R' U' R U' U' R' U R // third slot
y' R U R' U' R U U R' U' U' R U' R' U y' R' U' R // last slot
U f R U R' U' y' r' // EO
x' (F F' x) U' R' U' R U' R' U2 R // CO
x' x y' R' U L' U2 R U' R' U2 R L U' // PLL (J perm)
// View at alg.cubing.net
Something that jumped out at me when I did a quick watch through was that you rely on rotations way too much. Your cross+F2L had a total of 13 rotations, and your last layer had 6; ideally, it should be more like 0-5 rotations for cross+F2L and 0 rotations for LL (unless you get A/E perms).
Cross: You don't seem to plan the full cross in inspection, although you do at least (seem to) plan three pieces in all your solves. Even if you can't plan your full cross, try to look for the last cross piece as you finish the first three cross edges.
First slot: Green-orange is a pretty bad pair because both pieces are stuck in the wrong slot and the edge isn't oriented, which means you'll have to do a rotation (or a weird insert) to solve it. Your solution is essentially speed-optimal for this case, but there was a long recognition pause before the rotation. Blue-orange is slightly nicer and doesn't require a rotation (U L' U L2 U' L'), but it's still not very nice so whatever.
Second slot: You did two rotations and a bunch of AUFs before actually starting to solve the pair, and this took ~2.7 seconds. Solution is fine, but the rotations and AUFs could have been minimised (U L U L' U L U' L' or U R U' L U L' R').
Third slot: Two rotations at the start again. Stop doing that. Again, the solution after the initial rotation+AUF mess is fine, but the rotations really were unnecessary and you can also use the opposite free slot to form the pair (U R' U' R L' U L).
Last slot: Whooooooa that's a terrible F2L solution. You should never use four triggers for an F2L pair. For intuitive F2L, what you should do is to split the corner and edge as you remove them from the slot, which will give you an easier F2L case. You can do this from any angle, so there's no need for a rotation at the start.
What you did: y' R U R' U' R U2 R' U2' R U' R' U y' R' U' R (15 moves + 2 rotations)
Alternative: L' U L y' U' R U R' U R U R' (11 moves + 1 rotation)
Move-optimal alg: F R U2 R' F' L' U' L (8 moves, rotationless)
OLL, first look: Have you tried something other than f sexy f' for this EO case? If you have to rotate in order to execute the f' at the end, I'm sure you can shave a bit of time just by switching to a better alg (e.g. F U R U' R' F' or r U R' U R U2 r').
OLL, second look: You did a rotation to check for the corner orientation on the back face. Don't do that. Corner orientation should be easy to recognise from just the top face and two faces (either front/right or front/left depending on grip). Also, you can use Sunes and Antisunes from multiple angles to minimise AUFing as well.
What you did: U' R' U' R U' R' U2 R
Alternative: R U2 R' U' R U' R'
PLL: Don't do y rotations (except in special circumstances). Use U/U2/U' moves instead.
Miscellaneous comments: (i) Lighting sucks and the video quality suffers partly because of that (and partly because the bitrate is way too low). (ii) You should scramble with WCA orientation and provide scrambles when asking for critiques, to make it easier to follow what you're doing.
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