Does anyone use more than one method?

[conanthewarrior]

Hi everyone, I hope you are all OK.

I was wondering, does anyone here use a combination of methods to solve their cube?

I am still stuck at the beginners method myself, as I seem to be kind of overloading myself with information and am unsure of which method to actually use. I have read the guide to choosing a method on here, but am still unsure.

With CFOP, I am having a lot of trouble remembering algorithms. I do have memory issues from a previous illness, and had learnt the beginner method when I was younger, so learning this was more refreshing something I already knew. Learning the new things is what I am finding hard.

The main thing is, I am having fun cubing. With CFOP, following the guides, my times are very, very slow, much slower than with the beginners method. Is this a usual hump that everyone must overcome?

Thank you all for your help, Conan.

 

[DGCubes]

I kind of alternate between using ZZ and CFOP for OH solving, but I don't think it provides a significant advantage. I think it's generally better to pick a method and stick with it, so you know exactly what to start looking for during inspection.

It is very normal for times to temporarily get much slower when you switch to a new method. If you keep practicing though, you'll get used to CFOP and you'll eventually get much faster than you are with the beginner's method. Another option I'd recommend looking at before you commit to CFOP is Roux. It's not as alg-heavy as CFOP and it relies much more on intuition, so it might be a good fit for you.

 

[shadowslice e]

I don't think anyone sub 15 is truly method neutral but there are several who are quite good with a few different methods like tau yu and vincent wong.

There are also a few who will occassionally use a different method if the scramble is very good for that method (like me, kian, Louis etc) eg of there is a half cross or something switch to CFOP.

 

[TDM]

With CFOP, following the guides, my times are very, very slow, much slower than with the beginners method. Is this a usual hump that everyone must overcome?

Yep, this is perfectly normal. With your memory difficulties the hump might be bigger for you than for others, but it's definitely a hump which everyone deals with at some point.

Answering the question in the title/first half of the post:

I think when I'm casually solving, my solves are close to 60:40, Roux:CFOP.

However, I would not recommend being method neutral, even though I sort of am (and would be in competition). It's far too much work. It also requires learning even more algorithms. If you want to be fast and not learn many algorithms then Roux and ZZ are probably your best options:

Roux: 9 algs for beginner, 42 algs for intermediate and 150ish for advanced.
CFOP: 16 for beginner, 78 for intermediate and well over 200 for "advanced" ("advanced CFOP" isn't really well-defined, but usually it involves learning more algorithms).
ZZ: 13 for beginner, 46-48 for intermediate variants and 500+ for advanced variants.

I'm assuming you probably won't want to learn anything past intermediate. However, Roux and ZZ require more concentration since more thinking is involved. If that's not an issue then switching may be a good idea. If concentrating on solves is difficult for you as well, then CFOP isn't too many more algorithms but requires significantly less focus. 3-look LL is 31 algorithms and relatively fast, and would likely be your best option.

E: ZZ also has a 28-algorithm version (OCLL-PLL) which is, like CFOP's 3-look LL, somewhere between beginner and intermediate. It's also pretty fast, and if you don't mind the extra thinking during F2L, it may be better than Roux if you don't want to learn all 42 CMLLs.

 

[Y2k1]

As a ZZ main, I found much easier to be neutral cfop than roux (sub-12 zz, sub-17 cfop, compared to sub-25 roux) This may be due to my terrible zzf2l skills, but I found more carries over to cfop from zz than roux, which is almost like a reverse zz in a certain sense.

 

[conanthewarrior]

Thank you all for your answers and help- I feel better knowing this increase in time is normal, and not just down to my memory.

@TDM , for now I will want to learn the beginner algorithms, and then progress to the intermediate ones. With enough practice maybe even advanced, but I know that will take a large amount of time and practice.

It may be I am not reading the best sources for the methods. For example, where would I find the beginner Roux algorithms? All I seem to find is a list of them all, not listed into beginner, intermediate and advanced.

If I could view these for each method, it would be great. CFOP may be the best choice for me after all as concentrating on solves is quite difficult for me, I do get confused rather easily now and lose track of things.

16 algorithms for beginner isn't too bad, and I do think if I spent the time I could learn them- I just am unsure which ones are the beginner algorithms for CFOP.

 

[Mastermind2368]

I have used Petrus OH, ZZ 2H, but now I just to ZZ for both.

 

[TDM]

Thank you all for your answers and help- I feel better knowing this increase in time is normal, and not just down to my memory.

@TDM , for now I will want to learn the beginner algorithms, and then progress to the intermediate ones. With enough practice maybe even advanced, but I know that will take a large amount of time and practice.

It may be I am not reading the best sources for the methods. For example, where would I find the beginner Roux algorithms? All I seem to find is a list of them all, not listed into beginner, intermediate and advanced.

If I could view these for each method, it would be great. CFOP may be the best choice for me after all as concentrating on solves is quite difficult for me, I do get confused rather easily now and lose track of things.

16 algorithms for beginner isn't too bad, and I do think if I spent the time I could learn them- I just am unsure which ones are the beginner algorithms for CFOP.

Those beginner/intermediate/advanced aren't standard names; they were just something I came up with to help you decide. They won't be listed like that elsewhere. Here's what I meant by each of those:

Method	Beginner	Intermediate	Advanced
CFOP	4-look Last Layer (16). I've counted F2L as 0 algorithms (intuitive, but still less thinking than Roux/ZZ).	2-look Last Layer (78). Again, F2L counts as 0. You *could* learn it algorithmically but that's an extra ~40 algs and isn't necessary.	Lots of VHLS/WVLS algs, COLLs, ZBLLs. There's no real way of counting since most people will only learn bits and pieces from each set.
Roux	2-look CMLL (9). Intuitive F2B.	Full CMLL (42). Possibly a couple of SB algs for difficult cases as well.	Two CMLLs per case (to avoid 6-flips); EOLR.
ZZ	3-look LL (13). Intuitive F2L.	COLL-EPLL (46), or WV-PLL (48). A couple of F2L algs may help though I didn't include any in the total.	ZBLL (493), plus you'll probably still use WV/SV and PLL sometimes.

 

[pglewis]

I'm low 30s with CFOP and have dabbled with ZZ the past couple weeks. I'm not fast enough to plan the EO fix-up in 15 seconds yet, let alone EOLine, but with unlimited inspection time I'm nearly sub 40 without much practice. I enjoy ZZ solves more but I don't think I could have adapted well to ZZ from the start... having some CFOP fundamentals under my belt first helped me both understand and appreciate the implications of edge orientation. Everyone is different in that regard. I don't know if I'll switch methods for 3x3 yet but I'm enjoying splitting practice time between the two methods and ZZ practice has improved some aspects of my CFOP solves as a by-product.

The main drag on your times will be time spent stalled, thinking. You need to learn new, more efficient things to move forward but that also means you'll initially have to think about those new things and thinking is slow. It happens to everyone, things become more automatic with practice. I'm perpetually in a state where I have 2-6 new-ish algs I'm learning and trying to get to the "automatic" stage. If it feels like all the algs I currently know are comfortable then I choose some more. You don't have to attack an entire alg-set like PLL in one shot; you only need a couple to do 2-look PLL and then you are free to pick them up one or two at a time, once 2-look is comfortable. Every PLL you learn means you'll never have to 2-look that particular one again.

 

[mDiPalma]

For 2H I'm Petrus/ZZ neutral (maybe with slight Petrus bias) and will even do CFOP if there's an easy cross. I have some videos.

The only real advantage I see to method neutrality (besides that it's more fun) is that it basically makes you seem faster than you actually are, with little effort.

I.E. If you went through your CFOP avg100 and marked the times you got for the scrambles with the top 25% easiest crosses, they are probably among your fastest times. Theoretically, if you globally averaged the same for 4 different methods and picked the method that was easiest for each scramble (assuming 25% for each method), your full method-neutral avg100 would be approximately the avg25 for your easiest CFOP crosses.

For me, picking between Petrus/ZZ shaves ~0.5 seconds off my average (12.5-13 sec) for free. For slower solvers, that would be more significant

 

[Diamond Cubing]

Currently, I'm trying to switch from redux to Yau on 4x4.

 

[oscar]

Hello how about, somebody for the doubts would know about the HLS method (that would be to insert the last pair of F2L, to do a skip oll)

 

[Charles Jerome]

I don't use multiple methods, but for 4x4 I have used two methods before, which is Redux and Yau, I use yau now.

 

[Hazel]

Hello how about, somebody for the doubts would know about the HLS method (that would be to insert the last pair of F2L, to do a skip oll)

This is VLS, Valk Last Slot

 

[AlphaSheep]

This is VLS, Valk Last Slot

Actually it would is OLS. Both HLS (Hessler last slot) and VLS (Valk last slot) are subsets of OLS. VLS is the subset for when the pair can be inserted with R U' R', and HLS is the subset for when the pair can be inserted with R U R'

 

[Gold Cuber]

I do CFOP with COLL if you don't know what COLL is check it out