[Help Thread] FMC Discussion

[SkewbIsTheBestEvent]

I need help with this scramble for finding an HTR: R' U' F U2 R2 L' B U' F R2 B2 R F2 B2 R' F2 B2 R' U2 R' L D' L2 R' U' F
I managed to get DR in 18 moves (Bad) but I was fine with that since I am trying to practice HTR.
Attempt (Everything On Inverse):
(R B' L' R2 F) // EO (5)
(U' R' D R) // 4C2E (4)
(U' F2 L2 U2 L2 U2) // Setup to Trigger (6)
(L' D2 L) // Trigger (3)

From my Ortega Corner Solution I got 3 quarter turns, although I do not know whether or not there is something better. I got a few HTR's but the issue is tha they were all fake. Tips on avoiding Fake HTR would also be helpful.

Thank You!

 

[THE_V01DL0RD]

I'm wondering if any one can reduce this scramble below 52 moves(what I got)
F2 D2 R' B F2 L' R2 U L2 D2 B2 D2 U L2 F
I'm not good at FMC so I want some suggestions
This is my solution
F2 M U' E2 R2 E2 R' E B E' R f D f' z' y' U' R U' R' U' F' U F U L' U L U F U' F' y' U' L' U L U F U' R U R' U' F' y2 l' U R' z r2 U R' U' r2 u2 F

 

[SkewbIsTheBestEvent]

I'm wondering if any one can reduce this scramble below 52 moves(what I got)
F2 D2 R' B F2 L' R2 U L2 D2 B2 D2 U L2 F
I'm not good at FMC so I want some suggestions
This is my solution
F2 M U' E2 R2 E2 R' E B E' R f D f' z' y' U' R U' R' U' F' U F U L' U L U F U' F' y' U' L' U L U F U' R U R' U' F' y2 l' U R' z r2 U R' U' r2 u2 F

Wide or Middle Slice moves aren't allowed. Also, use the basic FMC techinques, such as NISS, blockbuilding, Edge Orientation, and Skeleton & Insertions, which can be found in J perm's channel.

 

[THE_V01DL0RD]

Wide or Middle Slice moves aren't allowed. Also, use the basic FMC techinques, such as NISS, blockbuilding, Edge Orientation, and Skeleton & Insertions, which can be found in J perm's channel.

What is your solution?

 

[xyzzy]

I'm wondering if any one can reduce this scramble below 52 moves(what I got)
F2 D2 R' B F2 L' R2 U L2 D2 B2 D2 U L2 F
I'm not good at FMC so I want some suggestions
This is my solution
F2 M U' E2 R2 E2 R' E B E' R f D f' z' y' U' R U' R' U' F' U F U L' U L U F U' F' y' U' L' U L U F U' R U R' U' F' y2 l' U R' z r2 U R' U' r2 u2 F

Forget FMC techniques, you should learn:

1. Notation (reg 12a). Slice moves are not permitted in (normal) FMC.
2. Any non-beginner solving method. (Beginner's layer by layer, as you used in your solve, does not cut it.)

A 40-move solution using the same scramble, no advanced or FMC-specific techniques used:

 Twizzle link 

 Setup 

F2 D2 R' B F2 L' R2 U L2 D2 B2 D2 U L2 F

 Moves 

U F U' F // 222 (4/4)
R' B2 R2 D' R' D // 223 (6/10)
D L2 D' L' // F2L-1 (4-1/13)
B' L B2 L2 B' L2 B' L' // F2L (8/21)
L' D' R' D L D' R D // OLL (8-1/28)
L B' R B2 L' B R' U' D' B2 U D // PLL (12/40)

(I'll count this optimal G perm as non-FMC-specific because I use it for OH, hurhur)

 

[THE_V01DL0RD]

Forget FMC techniques, you should learn:

1. Notation (reg 12a). Slice moves are not permitted in (normal) FMC.
2. Any non-beginner solving method. (Beginner's layer by layer, as you used in your solve, does not cut it.)

A 40-move solution using the same scramble, no advanced or FMC-specific techniques used:

 Twizzle link 

 Setup 

F2 D2 R' B F2 L' R2 U L2 D2 B2 D2 U L2 F

 Moves 

U F U' F // 222 (4/4)
R' B2 R2 D' R' D // 223 (6/10)
D L2 D' L' // F2L-1 (4-1/13)
B' L B2 L2 B' L2 B' L' // F2L (8/21)
L' D' R' D L D' R D // OLL (8-1/28)
L B' R B2 L' B R' U' D' B2 U D // PLL (12/40)

(I'll count this optimal G perm as non-FMC-specific because I use it for OH, hurhur)

I did an X cross
that has to count for something
also, whats f2l-1

 

[Aldhi R.]

no advanced or FMC-specific techniques used

I guess blockbuilding is an FMC technique.

Wide or Middle Slice moves aren't allowed

You could write wide moves but by adding “w” after the normal move notation, such as Uw, Fw, Rw.

 

[THE_V01DL0RD]

I guess blockbuilding is an FMC technique.


You could write wide moves but by adding “w” after the normal move notation, such as Uw, Fw, Rw.

Why did they ban slice moves?

 

[Aldhi R.]

Technically they didn't ban slice moves, but it just count as two moves and you should write it such as “R' L” for M', “U' D” for E', etc.

 

[THE_V01DL0RD]

how would you do h perm

Technically they didn't ban slice moves, but it just count as two moves and you should write it such as “R' L” for M', “U' D” for E', etc.

 

[Garf]

how would you do h perm

R2 L2 D' R2 L2 U2 R2 L2 D' R2 L2

 

[tseitsei]

Got a PB mean of 3 today! 23, 24, 27 = 24.67 First sub25 mo3 for me.

Solve 1 (23 moves):

Spoiler

scramble: R' U' F D2 B2 R2 B2 L2 R2 U L2 D R2 F D2 U2 F U2 R' B2 D' B' U R' U' F
solve: R2 F2 R2 F2 D2 U' B2 D2 B2 F2 L2 B2 U' B2 L U L2 U' L2 D F R2 U' (23)

(U R2 F') //DR-4C2E 3/23
(D' L2 U L2 U' L') //DR(2q) 9/23
(B2 U B2 L2 U2 F2 * U) //HTR 16/23
(D2 F2 R2 F2 R2) //2E2E 21/23

* = F2 U2 F2 B2 D2 B2 //6-4=2 23/23

Really good solve all in all. Great DR and HTR. Couldn't find a better finish after the HTR but there might be one sinve that is little bit on the longer side.

Solve 2 (24 moves):

Spoiler

scramble: R' U' F D' F' L2 D2 U B2 D' U' F2 L2 U' F2 L F' R U2 B' F' D' U2 R' U' F
solve: R B2 R2 U2 F2 U2 F2 L' U D F2 D' U' B' L B' L2 F2 L' F' R' D F B' (24)

(B F' D' R F) //DR-3C1E 3/24
(L F2 L2 B L' B') //DR(3q) 11/24
R B2 R U2 F2 U2 F2 L' //HTR 19/24
U2 L2 * U2 //3E 22/24

* = L2 U' D F2 D' U //6-4=2 24/24

Decent DR. I found a 27 move solution using this DR on inverse about 40min in to the attempt. Only found this HTR on normal with less than 10 minutes remaining but it was so insanely blocky that finish was fast and easy to find.

Solve 3 (27 moves):

Spoiler

Scramble: R' U' F B2 U D2 R2 D2 B2 R2 F U2 B D2 R2 F L2 R' B L2 B2 D B U2 R' U' F
Solve: F' U2 R B D2 R D2 L U L' F2 L2 F2 R2 D B2 D2 R2 U2 F2 R2 B2 U F2 U F2 U2 (27)

F' U2 R B //EO 4/27
D2 R //DR-3C1E 6/27
D2 L U L' //DR(3q) 10/27
(U2 F2 U' F2 U') //Setup HTR 15/27
(B2 D2 L2 * D') //HTR 19/27
(R2 F2 L2 F2) //2E2E 23/27

* = L2 D2 R2 F2 U2 R2 D2 B2 //8-4=4 27/27

Nervous attempt since I knew that even an average solve would mean PB. This was the only good DR I found in 30+ minutes (next bests were like 11 moves and corners 4qt from solved). So I had to stick with it even tough I didn't find a really good continuation for it, but still it was an ok solve for me in the end. My global average is around 28 moves so I'll take it!

 

[SkewbIsTheBestEvent]

You could write wide moves but by adding “w” after the normal move notation, such as Uw, Fw, Rw.

In Competition? I never knew that, I thought it was illegal.

I think you need to practice for consistenly finding short (14 moves or less) DRs on any scramble at first.

Try to find DR triggers in 6-7 moves or less. The best way is to write down as many EOs on an attempt (maybe like in the first 10-15 minutes), and then try each one of them until you get short DR trigger(s), hence short DR(s) from them.

Ok Thanks! But for HTR, would you recommend finding a lot of DR's until you have a good DR that leads to nice HTR?

 

[tseitsei]

I need help with this scramble for finding an HTR: R' U' F U2 R2 L' B U' F R2 B2 R F2 B2 R' F2 B2 R' U2 R' L D' L2 R' U' F
I managed to get DR in 18 moves (Bad) but I was fine with that since I am trying to practice HTR.
Attempt (Everything On Inverse):
(R B' L' R2 F) // EO (5)
(U' R' D R) // 4C2E (4)
(U' F2 L2 U2 L2 U2) // Setup to Trigger (6)
(L' D2 L) // Trigger (3)

From my Ortega Corner Solution I got 3 quarter turns, although I do not know whether or not there is something better. I got a few HTR's but the issue is tha they were all fake. Tips on avoiding Fake HTR would also be helpful.

Thank You!

Okay! I took a quick look at your solution and here are some tips:
(Disclaimer: My solution shown below might not be (close to) optimal either since I just took a quick look!)

1. You should get better at doing DRs. 18 moves is a lot for DR. For your EO I quickly found 2 different 14 move DRs:
DR1(on white-yellow axis):

Your EO
(D' L) //4c4e
(B2) //creates a second 1x2 "bar" on DLB corner
(D R2) //creates a 1x3 bar on FD position
(B2) //creates a second 1x3 bar on UR position AND sets up the to correct e-slice edges to be on the same side
(U2 D' L) // solves the rest.

DR2(on red-orange axis):

Here you already have a 4c4e case after doing your EO
(L' U2) //creates a 1x3 bar on UF position
(R2 B2) //creates a 1x2 bar on URB position
(L' U2) //creates a second 1x3 bar on UB position
(L' R2 D) //solves the rest

And additionally there was even a 16 move DR using your 9 move 4c2e solution:
DR3:
Your 4c2e
(D' L2 D U) //setup to trigger
(L D2 L') //trigger

Take a close look at those examples above and make sure you learn how to more efficiently setup the triggers. Also only try to generally use 2 moves max to get from EO to 4c2e or 4c4e cases. If you cant find any 2 move or less setups you propably should try another EO.

2. Speaking of EO. Make sure you find optimal EOs AND make sure you check multiple different EOs:

I dont know if you saw it and checked it but there are some 4 move EOs on inverse on different axis.
(R D2 B2 D) and (R U2 F2 D) are both 4 move EO solutions.
Also it is VERY important to check many EOs. Most of the EOs dont have a good continuation so you should check as many of them as you can.

3. HTRs:
You are correct that your DR solution is actually 3 qt away from solved. The reason you got fake HTRs is because you used 2 or 4 or any even number of quarter turns to get to your (fake) HTR. To get real HTR you need use odd number of QTs since you are an odd number away from solved. You should google "hyper-parity". There is a document from which you can learn to quickly recognize how far (in QTs) you are from HTR and how you can move closer to HTR. That is vital in finding HTRs. How ever that is quite advanced so I would recommend you getting more experienced and comfortable with finding efficient DRs first and foremost.

Here is however a HTR I found for your start quickly:
First we notice from the hyper-parity graph that we are 3qt away from solved (bars+bars case, we could "solve it in 2 moves but that would give us a fake HTR since we have parity). We also immediately notice that just doing a U will move us to solved+one face case which is only 2qt from solved so we do that.

(U') //puts us 2qt away from solved.

Now we look at the hyper parity graph again and see that next we need to get to slashes+oneface case if we want to finish in 2 quarter turns.

(L2 U') // puts us 1qt away from solved

Note that you also want to have exactly 2 M or S-slice edges on the correct slice since we want to solve the edges in 1 quarter turn next along with corners. R2 instead of L2 would work for corners here but not for edges. And that will always be the case here: turning the opposite layer will have similar impact to corners but different impact to edges, which is very useful to understand.

Now we just want to create two 1x3 bars AND have the correct edges be in the "same side" of the cube once we are done. Just like when solving 4c4e DR case. Except we can only use half-turns now. So lets imagine we are trying to just do DR on blue-green axis. We already have two 1x2 bars and just doing R2 would make two 1x3 bars. But the problem with this is that it would leave the 2 edges (white-blue and green-yellow) on different sides of the cube. So we must first do:

(B2 L2 B2) //moves the edges to different sides of the cube

Now that the (whiteblue and greenyellow) edges are on different sides of the cube we can do

(R2) //creates two 1x3 bars while moving the 2 edges to the same side of the cube.

Rest is easy. Just finish like it was DR.

(D2 F2 D) HTR


Now dont worry if the HTR stuff seemed too complicated. It is hard at first but getting better at DRs helps. And learning the hyper-parity graph is essential.

I hope this helps you to get better and understand some concepts

Edit: link to hyper-parity: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Onc2lu5iW_ODnT71oN5lgpVVjVqbvUMzaylzxgykx0I/

 

[THE_V01DL0RD]

Scramble: L U F' R B2 F' L2 R' D' B2 U B D L U'
Solution: R F2 R' U' F U' B R' B' R B2 R B R' D' B' D B D' B' D B' U B U' Rw' U L U F U' F' y U2 R U' R' U' F' U F y2 L' U L U F U' F' y R2 U2 F R2 F' U2 R' U2 R' U' M' U R U' Rw' R2 U2 R U2 R2 U2 R2 U2 R U2 R2 U'

I didn't use slice moves and used the w thing for wide moves
I just want a tutorial for FMC so I don't have 70 move solutions.
I use beginner F2L and 2LLL

 

[THE_V01DL0RD]

R2 L2 D' R2 L2 U2 R2 L2 D' R2 L2

R2 U2 R U2 R2 U2 R2 U2 R U2 R2

 

[SkewbIsTheBestEvent]

Okay! I took a quick look at your solution and here are some tips:
(Disclaimer: My solution shown below might not be (close to) optimal either since I just took a quick look!)

1. You should get better at doing DRs. 18 moves is a lot for DR. For your EO I quickly found 2 different 14 move DRs:
DR1(on white-yellow axis):

Your EO
(D' L) //4c4e
(B2) //creates a second 1x2 "bar" on DLB corner
(D R2) //creates a 1x3 bar on FD position
(B2) //creates a second 1x3 bar on UR position AND sets up the to correct e-slice edges to be on the same side
(U2 D' L) // solves the rest.

DR2(on red-orange axis):

Here you already have a 4c4e case after doing your EO
(L' U2) //creates a 1x3 bar on UF position
(R2 B2) //creates a 1x2 bar on URB position
(L' U2) //creates a second 1x3 bar on UB position
(L' R2 D) //solves the rest

And additionally there was even a 16 move DR using your 9 move 4c2e solution:
DR3:
Your 4c2e
(D' L2 D U) //setup to trigger
(L D2 L') //trigger

Take a close look at those examples above and make sure you learn how to more efficiently setup the triggers. Also only try to generally use 2 moves max to get from EO to 4c2e or 4c4e cases. If you cant find any 2 move or less setups you propably should try another EO.

2. Speaking of EO. Make sure you find optimal EOs AND make sure you check multiple different EOs:

I dont know if you saw it and checked it but there are some 4 move EOs on inverse on different axis.
(R D2 B2 D) and (R U2 F2 D) are both 4 move EO solutions.
Also it is VERY important to check many EOs. Most of the EOs dont have a good continuation so you should check as many of them as you can.

3. HTRs:
You are correct that your DR solution is actually 3 qt away from solved. The reason you got fake HTRs is because you used 2 or 4 or any even number of quarter turns to get to your (fake) HTR. To get real HTR you need use odd number of QTs since you are an odd number away from solved. You should google "hyper-parity". There is a document from which you can learn to quickly recognize how far (in QTs) you are from HTR and how you can move closer to HTR. That is vital in finding HTRs. How ever that is quite advanced so I would recommend you getting more experienced and comfortable with finding efficient DRs first and foremost.

Here is however a HTR I found for your start quickly:
First we notice from the hyper-parity graph that we are 3qt away from solved (bars+bars case, we could "solve it in 2 moves but that would give us a fake HTR since we have parity). We also immediately notice that just doing a U will move us to solved+one face case which is only 2qt from solved so we do that.

(U') //puts us 2qt away from solved.

Now we look at the hyper parity graph again and see that next we need to get to slashes+oneface case if we want to finish in 2 quarter turns.

(L2 U') // puts us 1qt away from solved

Note that you also want to have exactly 2 M or S-slice edges on the correct slice since we want to solve the edges in 1 quarter turn next along with corners. R2 instead of L2 would work for corners here but not for edges. And that will always be the case here: turning the opposite layer will have similar impact to corners but different impact to edges, which is very useful to understand.

Now we just want to create two 1x3 bars AND have the correct edges be in the "same side" of the cube once we are done. Just like when solving 4c4e DR case. Except we can only use half-turns now. So lets imagine we are trying to just do DR on blue-green axis. We already have two 1x2 bars and just doing R2 would make two 1x3 bars. But the problem with this is that it would leave the 2 edges (white-blue and green-yellow) on different sides of the cube. So we must first do:

(B2 L2 B2) //moves the edges to different sides of the cube

Now that the (whiteblue and greenyellow) edges are on different sides of the cube we can do

(R2) //creates two 1x3 bars while moving the 2 edges to the same side of the cube.

Rest is easy. Just finish like it was DR.

(D2 F2 D) HTR


Now dont worry if the HTR stuff seemed too complicated. It is hard at first but getting better at DRs helps. And learning the hyper-parity graph is essential.

I hope this helps you to get better and understand some concepts

Edit: link to hyper-parity: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Onc2lu5iW_ODnT71oN5lgpVVjVqbvUMzaylzxgykx0I/

Thank You!
Edit: Thank to your tips I just got a 13 move DR, which is the best I've gotten

 

[Aldhi R.]

In Competition?

Yes

 

[xyzzy]

how would you do h perm

The closest to an as-executed version would be:
R2 Rw2 U R2 Rw2 U2 R2 Rw2 U R2 Rw2

Basically, every time you want to do M2, write R2 Rw2 instead. Written rotationlessly, it'd be what Garf wrote above.

This is a bad H perm to use in FMC though; consider also:
L R U2 L' R' F' B' U2 F B (10 moves; always cancels at least 1, or at least 2 if there's a surrounding quarter turn)
R2 S2 R2 U R2 S2 R2 (9 moves + AUF; always cancels at least 1, or at least 2 if there's a surrounding half turn)
R2 S2 R2 U L2 S2 L2 (same as above; unlikely to cancel more moves but good to know)

(I hope it's obvious enough, but in case it's not: you learn the alg with S2, and write it down with F2 B2.)

Scramble: L U F' R B2 F' L2 R' D' B2 U B D L U'

You should maybe start using proper scrambles. Seems a bit much of a coincidence that the two scramble sequences you've posted are both 15 moves.

Scramble: L U F' R B2 F' L2 R' D' B2 U B D L U'
Solution: R F2 R' U' F U' B R' B' R B2 R B R' D' B' D B D' B' D B' U B U' Rw' U L U F U' F' y U2 R U' R' U' F' U F y2 L' U L U F U' F' y R2 U2 F R2 F' U2 R' U2 R' U' M' U R U' Rw' R2 U2 R U2 R2 U2 R2 U2 R U2 R2 U'

 Twizzle link 

 Setup 

L U F' R B2 F' L2 R' D' B2 U B D L U'

 Moves 

R F2 R' U' F U' B R' B' R B2 R B R' D' B' D B D' B' D B' U B U' Rw' U L U F U' F' y U2 R U' R' U' F' U F y2 L' U L U F U' F' y R2 U2 F R2 F' U2 R' U2 R' U' M' U R U' Rw' R2 U2 R U2 R2 U2 R2 U2 R U2 R2 U'

(edit: I missed this earlier, but your solution still has an M' in it)

Your cross took 6 moves, which, fine, whatever. You then spent 19 (!!!!) more moves to finish solving the green layer.

Here's a 6-move xcross on green. You did mention you use xcrosses, right?? (If I were colour neutral, I would have gone for this xcross in a speedsolve. This is not an FMC-specific thing!)

 Twizzle link 

 Setup 

L U F' R B2 F' L2 R' D' B2 U B D L U'

 Moves 

U' D2 F U' B L2

The biggest weakness of the beginner LBL method you're using is that it involves a lot of breaking up and restoring. You're constantly destroying your earlier progress in order to solve additional pieces. Once the cross is solved, it minimally takes 3 moves to insert any first-layer corner. Once the first layer is solved, it minimally takes 5 moves to insert any second-layer edge, often at least 7 moves. That's a lot of wasted moves that can be avoided with a not-beginner method.

(Exercise for the reader: in what situations can you preserve the first layer and solve a second-layer edge in 5 moves? Answer: R2 U2 R U2 R2)

The big four (speedsolving) methods don't suffer this problem nearly as strongly.

CFOP: You still have to break up and restore the cross constantly, but it's still much less bad than beginner LBL because you're solving two pieces at once. Instead of 3 (solve corner) + 7 (solve edge) = 10 moves to solve one slot, you solve it in 4-7 moves most of the time.

Petrus: This problem only shows up during the EO step and the last layer. EO turns out to not be a major detriment because it's often possible to solve it in 2-5 additional moves in many different ways.

ZZ: Like Petrus, except that EO is done at the very beginning so there are no restrictions there, so the problem only shows up during the last layer.

Roux: This problem only shows up during CMLL, and even then it's not that big of a deal because you can often handle CMLL with insertions (an FMC technique) or with short algs. (Arguably, the need for slice moves during LSE might also count, but the efficiency win in F2B makes up for that when compared against the other big speedsolving methods.)

At your level, you don't need to practise FMC to get better at FMC. You need to practise literally any of the big four speedsolving methods.

 

[tseitsei]

Thank You!
Edit: Thank to your tips I just got a 13 move DR, which is the best I've gotten

Nice. Glad it paid off immediately.

Ok Thanks! But for HTR, would you recommend finding a lot of DR's until you have a good DR that leads to nice HTR?

About this topic:
Yes, it is important to try and find several good DRs since not every DR has a good continuation. More important metric than just the length of the DR is (length of DR)+(number of quarter turns needed to get to HTR). So even if I get a 10 move DR but it needs 5qt to get to HTR I will propably just discard it. But if I find a 12 move DR that only needs 1 or 2 qt to get to HTR I will definitely check it.

I usually spend about the first 30 minutes of the solve just looking for DRs. Excpet if I find a really good DR early on (like a 9-10 mover with only 1-2 qt needed to get to HTR). Then I will immediately start working with that since I am most likely not going to find anything as good anyway.

After 30 minutes I take few of the best DRs I have and start looking continuations for those. If I don't have any decent ones I will look for a little while longer but at 40min mark I just need to take the best one I have and go with that in order to avoid DNF. Those solves are usually the ones that I might go over 30 moves with but it is better than DNF.

Also remember that when you have a good DR you should always look for HTR on both normal and inverse for that. Sometimes it is much easier on the other side. Sometimes you also have a possibility to take an existing DR and modify it slightly to get a slightly different DR which might give you better continuation.