[Help Thread] ZZ and ZB Discussion

[AlphaSheep]

Something I sometimes struggle with is when I'm planing out EOLine, and I will see a nice, pre-made block. Unless you can see a very clear, simple way of preserving that block, completely ignore the block. If I don't, then my EOLine will get really long and inefficient and the solve will be much slower even if my f2l got a nice start.

This. If the EOLine is really easy I might spend a couple extra seconds thinking about how the block will break up so I know where to start looking once I start F2L. But unless I can preserve it with a single move, I'd take a short EOLine over preserved block anyday. EOLine is the most awkward part of the solve with the worst TPS whereas F2L is much higher TPS for me. In my opinion 2 awkward moves saved in EOLine is easily worth the 5 extra moves in F2L.

 

[CubingGenius]

Yeah, that's the idea. Since most of the time you'll be starting F2L by making a 2x2 block in either L or R, if you can track the three pieces you need to form a block then that's perfect. If not then at least one of either DL or DR will be a good start.

Unfortunately I'm not very good at ZZF2L, so I'm not the best person to ask. Maybe someone else will be able to help you with that. One thing I will say though is to slow down and look ahead. Even if you're not turning as fast, if you don't pause then you'll find that you might even be faster. And if you're slower at first, it shouldn't take much practise with slow turning before you get back down to below your normal speed.

Okay. So if I am right, turning slower makes you solve slower but it improves your look ahead?

There are no such things as "cross" edges in ZZ. You need to think of all 6 f2l edges as the same when executing.
Because ZZ has a fixed solving position, with time, when you see a piece, you will know where it goes. I don't think it would be something you learn as much a just practice.


Well, i'm not that fast either (sub-18.5), but my F2L, I feel, is my strongest point, which normally takes around 8-11 seconds (Yes, my LL is awful).



Don't be partial to pairs over blocks or vice versa. Do what you see first, but as TDM said, turn slowly and try to use lookahead when possible. When there aren't any pauses, you can very slowly increase your tps, but try to keep those pauses minimal and keep using lookahead.

Something I sometimes struggle with is when I'm planing out EOLine, and I will see a nice, pre-made block. Unless you can see a very clear, simple way of preserving that block, completely ignore the block. If I don't, then my EOLine will get really long and inefficient and the solve will be much slower even if my f2l got a nice start.

Thank you for that advice. I will now treat F2L edges equally.

I use blocks a lot, so I don't think that's the problem. It sound like all I need to do is practice turning slower, because I don't always know what to do next.

 

[CubingGenius]

This. If the EOLine is really easy I might spend a couple extra seconds thinking about how the block will break up so I know where to start looking once I start F2L. But unless I can preserve it with a single move, I'd take a short EOLine over preserved block anyday. EOLine is the most awkward part of the solve with the worst TPS whereas F2L is much higher TPS for me. In my opinion 2 awkward moves saved in EOLine is easily worth the 5 extra moves in F2L.

So is it rarely worth saving a block/pair already made in the EOline?

 

[AlphaSheep]

Okay. So if I am right, turning slower makes you solve slower but it improves your look ahead?

Yes, but only if you actively concentrate on looking ahead. Also if you usually make unnecessary moves in solves (I had this problem), turn even slower and concentrate on thinking about whether your next move really is the best option.

Always remember that the idea of turning slower is that your mind improves at a slower rate than your fingers, so you need to give your mind a chance to catch up. If you're turning slower, but not pushing your mental abilities, you won't see much benefit from it.

So is it rarely worth saving a block/pair already made in the EOline?

It's only worth it if you can save it with one move, or if there's an obvious way to do it that you see in inspection. If you start the solve and you're not already 100% certain how you're going to save the block, then rather let the block break up and try track the pieces.

 

[CubingGenius]

Yes, but only if you actively concentrate on looking ahead. Also if you usually make unnecessary moves in solves (I had this problem), turn even slower and concentrate on thinking about whether your next move really is the best option.

Always remember that the idea of turning slower is that your mind improves at a slower rate than your fingers, so you need to give your mind a chance to catch up. If you're turning slower, but not pushing your mental abilities, you won't see much benefit from it.


It's only worth it if you can save it with one move, or if there's an obvious way to do it that you see in inspection. If you start the solve and you're not already 100% certain how you're going to save the block, then rather let the block break up and try track the pieces.

Thank you for the advice.

I have been trying colour neutral ZZ. The F2L is going surprisingly well, but the EOline does not really seem any better than being y-axis neutral. Plus it often takes 1-2 minutes of inspection and is not really improving.

Do you think if I go back to y-axis neutrality instead of full colour neutrality, I can look ahead quite far into the solve? (e.g. Plan out a block in inspection)?

 

[ChrisCross]

Hey guys, I was just wondering what you guys do in 3x3 stage of big cubes as ZZ solvers? For example in Yau for 4x4 you already have a cross, so do you just break the cross and fix the edges?

 

[4Chan]

I just CFOP it.
I don't think ZZ on big cubes post reduction would ever be worth it.

 

[AlphaSheep]

There are no good big cube options that work well with ZZ. I've tried a few and still haven't found anything that actually flows perfectly. For a while I did Yau with an EO step before F2L but it always felt so inefficient and the pause for inspection throws the whole solve off. I now do something like Hoya on 4x4 which has no major pauses. I'm sure a CFOP finish is much faster but I'd rather be slow than have to deal with CFOP F2L.

Here's what I do

1. First 4 centres (F, B, D and L colours) and then hold the cube a y rotation away from my normal orientation (F on left)
2. Solve line edges on DR and DL, and pair and orient any three other edges in BR, BL and DB.
3. Last 2 centres
4. Pair the last 7 edges with 2-2-3, orienting if you can.
5. Something like a Petrus kind of EO for the last few edges. This is all <R U L> if you can orient DF in the previous step.
6. y' rotation followed by ZZ finish.

On 5x5 and up I just do reduction and a normal EOLine. The couple of seconds it costs is much smaller fraction of the total solve time than 4x4 so it doesn't feel so bad.

But don't listen to me. I'm really really slow at big cubes.

 

[shadowslice e]

There are no good big cube options that work well with ZZ. I've tried a few and still haven't found anything that actually flows perfectly. For a while I did Yau with an EO step before F2L but it always felt so inefficient and the pause for inspection throws the whole solve off. I now do something like Hoya on 4x4 which has no major pauses. I'm sure a CFOP finish is much faster but I'd rather be slow than have to deal with CFOP F2L.

Here's what I do

1. First 4 centres (F, B, D and L colours) and then hold the cube a y rotation away from my normal orientation (F on left)
2. Solve line edges on DR and DL, and pair and orient any three other edges in BR, BL and DB.
3. Last 2 centres
4. Pair the last 7 edges with 2-2-3, orienting if you can.
5. Something like a Petrus kind of EO for the last few edges. This is all <R U L> if you can orient DF in the previous step.
6. y' rotation followed by ZZ finish.

On 5x5 and up I just do reduction and a normal EOLine. The couple of seconds it costs is much smaller fraction of the total solve time than 4x4 so it doesn't feel so bad.

But don't listen to me. I'm really really slow at big cubes.

Have you ever tried Z4?

 

[gyroninja]

There are no good big cube options that work well with ZZ. I've tried a few and still haven't found anything that actually flows perfectly. For a while I did Yau with an EO step before F2L but it always felt so inefficient and the pause for inspection throws the whole solve off. I now do something like Hoya on 4x4 which has no major pauses. I'm sure a CFOP finish is much faster but I'd rather be slow than have to deal with CFOP F2L.

Here's what I do

1. First 4 centres (F, B, D and L colours) and then hold the cube a y rotation away from my normal orientation (F on left)
2. Solve line edges on DR and DL, and pair and orient any three other edges in BR, BL and DB.
3. Last 2 centres
4. Pair the last 7 edges with 2-2-3, orienting if you can.
5. Something like a Petrus kind of EO for the last few edges. This is all <R U L> if you can orient DF in the previous step.
6. y' rotation followed by ZZ finish.

On 5x5 and up I just do reduction and a normal EOLine. The couple of seconds it costs is much smaller fraction of the total solve time than 4x4 so it doesn't feel so bad.

But don't listen to me. I'm really really slow at big cubes.

When you are pairing the edges and you replace a solved dedge with an unsolved one. When you take it out, take it out with good eo. If you keep this in mind you'll be able to predict a super simple eo case (usually 2 bad edges) and whether or not you have oll parity.

Additionally when doing the "cross" part of hoya, only pair edges that will have good eo.

 

[AlphaSheep]

Have you ever tried Z4?

Yes I have. Honestly, it's an improvement over beginners reduction but is vastly inferior to any other advanced edge pairing method. With Z4 you only pair an average of 1.5 edges per 2 slice moves, compared to 2.4 edges for 3-2-2-2-3 or over 2.7 for Yau or Hoya. It's way too many extra moves to be worth it.

 

[sub20oneday]

are thes splits ok? what should i improve?
eoline: 4 seconds
zzf2l: 10 seconds
last layer: 5 seconds

 

[GenTheSnail]

@sub20oneday
I just did an 5 solves and timed my splits: EOLine->block->block->block->block->OCLL(s+as)/COLL->PLL/EPLL.

1. 17.84 = 2.93, 3.79/3.34/2.51/1.85, 1.09/2.30
2. 15.78 = 2.85, 1.26/3.84/2.11/1.45, 2.19/2.06
3. 19.69 = 2.49, 3.00/2.16/2.50/1.35, 4.72/3.44
4. 19.12 = 4.06, 4.02/2.94/2.27/2.01, 1.94/1.85
5. 17.03 = 2.65, 3.83/1.93/2.40/1.04, 3.38/1.77

Mean. 17.90 = 3.00, 3.18/2.84/2.36/1.54 (=9.92), 2.66/2.28 (=4.54)

So, okay average, it was a little high, but that was probably because I didn't do any warm up and I had to keep hitting space bar.
I might do some more of these later, just to get a more accurate reading.

I would say that you should work on your EOLine. I managed to do it in 3< seconds 4/5 times.
If you can't plan out your entire EOLine when inspecting, just track the pieces so when you're done with EO, you can jump right into it.
LL could also stand to be a bit faster. I did slip up on solve 3; and 5 was just me being bad at recognizing L cases.
Do you use OCLL/PLL or COLL/EPLL, or some other variant?

Hope this helped.

 

[AlphaSheep]

I tried timing my splits like @GenTheThief. I usually average around 19 seconds. I just did splits for 20 solves. The times were a couple seconds higher than usual, but I think it's inevitable having to stop and press spacebar every 3 seconds (which not only messes with my grip, but seems to screw up any chance of lookahead too).

I had a few skipped steps and a couple of bad lockups, so to keep the comparison meaningful, I dropped the best and worst from each step and averaged the rest. Here are my results:

EOLine: 3.61
First block: 3.88 + 2.55 = 6.43
Second block: 2.92+2.13 = 5.06
Last Layer: 3.10 + 2.83 = 5.93

Total: 21.42

For the first step of the last layer, the 1.xx cases were sune/anti-sune, and solves 17 and 19 were ZBLLs. The rest were all COLL.

Spoiler: Individual times

#		Total	EOLine		Square	Pair	Square	Pair		COLL/OCLL	EPLL/PLL
1		21.26	3.22		4.01	6.28	0.74	2.07		3.05	1.85
2		20.31	3.55		2.5	3.6	3.28	2.1		1.64	3.61
3		27.34	3.85		4.21	5.04	3.59	2.25		4.09	4.28
4		22.38	3.4		7.06	1.72	1.55	2.81		3.52	2.29
5		21.62	4.35		2.75	4.07	3.36	2		2.99	2.09
6		22.92	4.45		5.21	1.69	2.79	1.62		3.56	3.57
7		19.88	3.45		3.92	2.55	2.8	1.67		1.56	3.89
8		24.04	3.2		4.51	2.94	2.92	3.78		4.41	2.25
9		25.33	6.98		3.44	3.55	3.8	1.35		4.23	1.95
10		18.88	3.61		3.2	2.51	2.29	1.93		2.97	2.35
11		21.62	2.88		2.91	1.64	2.36	1.55		1.84	8.42
12		18.77	3.47		2.75	2.28	2.16	4.07		1.48	2.54
13		21.6	4.11		4.13	1.5	2.49	2.99		3.5	2.85
14		21.96	3.57		3.23	1.53	4.25	1.96		1.55	5.84
15		19.3	3.19		2.93	2.02	3.56	1.75		2.92	2.9
16		20.88	4.36		3.83	1.99	2.79	1.89		3.76	2.25
17		19.56	0.77		6.52	1.52	3.35	2.54		4.61	0.23
18		20.22	3.47		3.79	2.12	3.28	1.59		2.97	2.98
19		25.11	4.87		5.7	2.5	5.94	1.66		3.96	0.46
20		18.18	2.04		2.88	2.72	1.95	2.26		3.25	3.05

 

[sub20oneday]

ok thanks for the help ive already got me eoline down to 3 seconds an i will probabaly try to finish coll

 

[ChrisCross]

I have now fully switched to ZZ and now know that there are many variants to it. I just wanted to know what ZZ variants you guys use or think are best?

 

[GenTheSnail]

I have now fully switched to ZZ and now know that there are many variants to it. I just wanted to know what ZZ variants you guys use or think are best?

All the hype is on ZZ-CT right now.
https://www.speedsolving.com/forum/threads/zz-ct-thread.61348/
Though, if you are good at alg learning and are willing to learn the whole thing, ZBLL is considered better.

I just use COLL/EPLL + (anti)Sune/PLL right now, but I'm planning on switching after my next comp in a couple of weeks.

 

[CubingGenius]

I have now fully switched to ZZ and now know that there are many variants to it. I just wanted to know what ZZ variants you guys use or think are best?

I think using ZZ-a (ZBLL) is the best. But if you don't want to learn all of it I would say ZZ-b (Phasing + ZZLL) or possibly ZZ-CT (TSLE + TTLL). I think those two are the best options after ZZ-a.

 

[genericcuber666]

i use zz and i just started getting sub 20 averages but im getting worried that im using a "bad" method the reason is i average 22 with cfop and i havnt practiced since i switched when i averaged 25-30 and if i knew full oll im sure i would be sub 20 another thing is that noone fast uses zz people use cfop and roux but even for one hand only colorfull pockets uses zz also it feels like zz is only a novelty method for people who want to make a bad last layer variant is this true or what realy are the benefits of this method (except for it being amazingly fun)

 

[GenTheSnail]

i use zz and i just started getting sub 20 averages but im getting worried that im using a "bad" method the reason is i average 22 with cfop and i havnt practiced since i switched when i averaged 25-30 and if i knew full oll im sure i would be sub 20

Well, I use cfop until 20sec area too, but then I switched and with less practice, I now average sub-18 and ~24-23 OH.

another thing is that noone fast uses zz people use cfop and roux but even for one hand only colorfull pockets uses zz

So, depending on how you gauge "fast", yeah, no one world class that I'm aware of uses ZZ. I know we have @Petro Leum , who has a sub-10 average and we might also have Hyeon Kyo Kyoung (I'm not sure if he uses ZZ), who is world class (sub-8 in comp average, 18th in the world for average).
Also, Colorful Pockets isn't the only OH ZZ cuber. Phil Yu (asmallkitten) had the NAR in OH way back in, like 2012. And, while he isn't practicing OH as much anymore, he still broke his pb average at nats and as a 10.07 single (and he is still faster than Pockets). And there are other OH ZZ cubers. They probably just don't have a youtube channel with 20k subs.

also it feels like zz is only a novelty method for people who want to make a bad last layer variant is this true or what realy are the benefits of this method (except for it being amazingly fun)

So, ZZ basically has the best LL variants because of EO. Direct quote from wiki:
"With edges pre-oriented many systems exist for completing the last layer in a ZZ solve, ranging from OCLL/PLL to ZBLL."
And the benefits of this method are:
"The method is focused both on low move count and high turning speed"