# *No More PLL* 3x3 Rubik's Cube Method



## CriticalCubing (Jul 25, 2017)

*No More PLL 3x3 Rubik's Cube Method* (decided on a name xD).
*NMP* is a speedcubing method which uses 4c instead of PLL. You make your cross differently, solve F2L (the same way you do CFOP), COLL and 4c.
It has all the advantages of CFOP (doesn't handicap the CFOP flow), is more efficient than CFOP on average (I'm getting 45-47 stm solves), and the speedsolve can be done pauselessly since 4c is easily predicted, and during F2L, you can predict your corners case (CP). You can also achieve the same TPS that you get with CFOP, using this method and lookahead is similar to CFOP lookahead (so you won't need to re-learn lookahead)

*Why is this method good?*

This method provides an alternate finish to CFOP which has a lower move count, yet still allows for fast TPS and lookahead/prediction ability. Solving with PLL gives rise to bad cases like F/V/Y/N perms which you’ll never get with this approach. Plus, the worst 4c cases are 8 moves which just requires 8.08 TPS to sub 1. Since, these cases are all alg based (like U perm), you can achieve much faster TPS than 8 TPS. Let’s take a detail look.

*3 Last-Step Methods*

*CMLL + LSE*
This is standard for Roux. Avg movecount: 10 CMLL (computed from avg of all the algs in my cmll sheet + 0.25 AUF) + 13 LSE (assuming 8 EOLR/EOFB and 5 4c, essentially the most advanced LSE there is) = *23 STM total*

*OLL + PLL*
This is standard for CFOP. Avg movecount: 10.3 OLL (algdb OLL sheet + AUF) + 13.7 PLL(using all of the fingertricky good algs(15 move G perms, RU U perms, J perm setup N perm, T perm setup F perm etc)) +2.25 AUF = *26 Moves*

*COLL + 4c*
Standard for this method. Avg movecount: 11.2 COLL (taken from algdb + AUF) + 6-7 4c (0.25 move for AUF before M2, 1 move for initial M2, 1 move for AUF, 4 move avg for 4c) = *17-18 STM total*

Not only is the proposed COLL+4c approach more efficient than CMLL+LSE and OLL+PLL, but COLL+4c can reach high TPS too, as COLL is recognize case, and spam TPS to solve. Predict 4c and you can pauselessly transition to 4c and spam MU once more. Since, 4c is pretty algorithmic (it can have 3 move solution, or a 5 move solution), you can spam TPS here like you do for U perms. MU U perms average 7 STM and 4c also averages 7 STM. U Perm can be done around 0.6 on average, and 4c can also be done around that that.

Overall, this method has its merits and can be equally fast as CFOP. You can use your current CFOP techniques, for this method (like X-Cross, CN, etc) and 4c is consistent and pretty short on cases, which is predicted with relative ease and solved like MU U perms MU algs.

*Example Solve *(more in the doc)
L2 B2 L2 D2 L2 F' R' F2 D R' F2 R U' R' D' L' R
z2
F' U' R D U' M' U2 l D // Mixed XX-Cross
y' R U2 R' U2 y' R' U R // F2L 3
U2 R U' R' // F2L 4 + EO
x' R U R' D R U' R' D' x y // COLL
U2 M2 U M' U2 M' // 4c
*34 Moves STM*

**NMP* Method Document: http://bit.ly/idknamemethod 

Thank you *

Edit: Bolded out certain texts.
Edit 2: Added proper move count for OLL/PLL and COLL after counting and verifying using python program. Thanks to Tao Yu for verifying


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## shadowslice e (Jul 25, 2017)

You're being slightly disingenuous with your movecounts for both OLL/PLL and your proposed method as the wiki gives optimal movecounts (there is simply nt way that COLL is shorter than CMLL) and I think you should be doing LS+LL in these movecounts as that's where the *IN* method starts to deviate in approach from standard CFOP (ignoring cross which for all intents and purposes is the same)

You should probably add all AUFs to in each method as well (before COLL, CMLL etc). Also, your method will force a rotation half the time either during or just before LL which none of the other methods do so it does interupt the flow of methods.

E: having read back this post it seems that I'm being too negetive. The method is interesting and could be an alternate way to solve and get very fast time though I'm not sure it is better than Roux (movecountwise) or CFOP (for ability to just spam tps) as the numbers seem to be a but off.


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## CriticalCubing (Jul 25, 2017)

shadowslice e said:


> You're being slightly disingenuous with your movecounts for both OLL/PLL and your proposed method as the wiki gives optimal movecounts (there is simply nt way that COLL is shorter than CMLL) and I think you should be doing LS+LL in these movecounts as that's where the *IN* method starts to deviate in approach from standard CFOP (ignoring cross which for all intents and purposes is the same)
> 
> You should probably add all AUFs to in each method as well (before COLL, CMLL etc). Also, your method will force a rotation half the time either during or just before LL which none of the other methods do so it does interupt the flow of methods.
> 
> E: having read back this post it seems that I'm being too negetive. The deadline is intestine and could be an alternate way to solve and get very fast time though I'm not sure it is better than Roux (movecountwise) or CFOP (for ability to just spam tps) as the numbers seem to be a but off.


I see. Can you please help me with the move count averages? Thank you!
Yeah, it will force rotations 1/2 times after F2L, however that isn't as bad as you think as I do those rotations as d and d' moves, which isn't that bad. Probably will need getting some used to if a person uses this method. I personally think that *IN* is on par with traditional CFOP (if not better) and slightly inferior to Roux in terms of move count. In terms of TPS, you can average same TPS with Cross and F2L on both methods. OLL vs COLL is debatable but 4c vs PLL, 4c has the upper hand. The whole of Last Pieces with *IN* is just alg spam without any pauses (think of it as CMLL + EO, as you can predict EO+position of pieces during CMLL). OLL/PLL can be done close to pauseless execution, but its not entirely pauseless. COLL + 4c in this regard has the upper hand. TPS with COLL + 4c vs OLL/PLL should be similar, but I think we should be comparing times/splits rather than TPS/moves here.


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## gogozerg (Jul 25, 2017)

- Maybe you can optimize more the first step, by letting the "M" centers (the last four) random. Fixing them is a job for "4c". If they are misaligned by a quarter turn, invert the edge orientation pattern while fixing U-EO with the last pair.
- Even more freedom in the first step if you consider putting UF/UB in DF/DB, not just UL/UR.


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## CriticalCubing (Jul 25, 2017)

gogozerg said:


> - Maybe you can optimize more the first step, by letting the "M" centers (the last four) random. Fixing them is a job for "4c". If they are misaligned by a quarter turn, invert the edge orientation pattern while fixing U-EO with the last pair.
> - Even more freedom in the first step if you consider putting UF/UB in DF/DB, not just UL/UR.


Fine additions sir  Using the concept of mis-oriented centers and solving F2L with inverted edge orientation, will allow more efficient first cross. Plus, with the option for UF/UB and UL/UR, we have even more freedom during the initial stages of the solve. Inspection is also used wisely now with your approach. Thank you so much for the advice and improvements


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## gogozerg (Jul 25, 2017)

If I remember correctly, the technique you proposed before shares the same last steps (3/+4/) as the one above:
1/ Solve two L/R 1x2x3 blocks.
2/ Bring UL/UR (or UF/UB by the way) to DF/DB while orienting the 6 edges.
3/ Solve U corners with COLL.
4/ Solve the prepared L6E.

The main difference here is the Fridrich friendly way of making pairs, and 2/ relies on [M, U].
It's probably a matter of personal taste, but I think I prefer the first method.

What's the best in your opinion, do you think the recognition time before 2/ would make it slower (but as you said before, it offers some advantages for 3/ early recognition)?
Hard to tell I guess.


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## Cube4Life (Jul 25, 2017)

Wow...Really cool method! Low alg count, flows well, low move count. Just the right combination. You should make a page on this on the speedsolving wiki and get more people to use it. It's genius!!


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## Coolster01 (Jul 25, 2017)

There are some more cons:

You have to do a y/y' after F2L/COLL if you're not at the right angle.
How would 4c be better than EPLL? Let's say we did F2L + COLL + EPLL... I mean it seems a lot easier to just do that


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## gogozerg (Jul 25, 2017)

Coolster01 said:


> How would 4c be better than EPLL?



It may be about as fast, even if you're permuting 6 edges + centers. The point is: More choice and optimizations in the first step.


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## shadowslice e (Jul 25, 2017)

Coolster01 said:


> :You have to do a y/y' after F2L/COLL if you're not at the right angle.


I've already mentioned this


> How would 4c be better than EPLL? Let's say we did F2L + COLL + EPLL... I mean it seems a lot easier to just do that


4c is better than EPLL; it's less moves and in general easier to predict.

E: also what gilles said


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## SolemnAttic (Jul 26, 2017)

New method....... 25.03 avg of five. Nice job CC!


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## OriginalPgr (Jul 26, 2017)

Wow.. I need to check out this method now...


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## Palmtop Tiger (Feb 2, 2018)

I've toyed around with this idea for a bit but i did it in a ZZ solve. So basically building an eo line with UR and UL or UB and UF. Apart from having more choices in building the eo line i noticed that phasing (solving relative edge permutation during inseration of the final pair) is super easy to do because you only need to look at the top layer to recognize it. Unfortunately it doesn't eliminate long LSE step 4c cases (but a few ones that are hard to recognise). I think i should mention this. maybe someone finds a legitimately good use for phasing in this method.


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## The Pocket Cuber (Feb 8, 2018)

I really like this method as I found it yesterday, I am currently using CFOP, bug I will probably switch to this, it's genius


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## 1001010101001 (Feb 12, 2018)

Strange cross?


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## The Pocket Cuber (Feb 12, 2018)

1001010101001 said:


> Strange cross?



No, it isn’t weird at all IMO, it’s just like a normal cross except with different yellow pieces in DF and DB, which very similar to CFOP. 

So far, after using this method for 3 days, my PB’s are as followed 
1/mo3/ao5/ao12/ 23.03/29.33/30.56/33.45

Definitely a great method, will be switching, the cross is quite optimisable, has great finger tricks, but still remains as a great low-move count method.


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## Duncan Bannon (Mar 9, 2018)

The Pocket Cuber said:


> No, it isn’t weird at all IMO, it’s just like a normal cross except with different yellow pieces in DF and DB, which very similar to CFOP.
> 
> So far, after using this method for 3 days, my PB’s are as followed
> 1/mo3/ao5/ao12/ 23.03/29.33/30.56/33.45
> ...



PM me how your doing. It would be nice to see your progress. I'm interested in the method as well.


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## 1001010101001 (Mar 10, 2018)

Can you do EO first? Like a ZZ version of this method


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## Palmtop Tiger (Mar 10, 2018)

1001010101001 said:


> Can you do EO first? Like a ZZ version of this method


Yes, just build your eo-line with the up-right and up-left edge. Alternatively you can use up-back and up-front ( up-front and up-back is only a bit harder to recognise during the 4c step )


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## The Pocket Cuber (Mar 13, 2018)

Palmtop Tiger said:


> Yes, just build your eo-line with the up-right and up-left edge. Alternatively you can use up-back and up-front ( up-front and up-back is only a bit harder to recognise during the 4c step )


Yes, that’s what I do!

I build the EO-Line, except on left and right, so I skip an alg. Trust me, it doesn’t take long to get decent at. I average 7 moves for EO line in this method.


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## 1001010101001 (Mar 13, 2018)

This method has no disadvantage over CFOP or ZZ


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## B-Cuber (Mar 18, 2018)

I can’t find anything online like tutorials for NMP. Could someone show me a link to a tutorial? I can’t find one.


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## The Pocket Cuber (Mar 18, 2018)

As far as i know, there is no tutorial


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## CarterK (Mar 20, 2018)

For those that are claiming that you have to rotate sometimes before 4c, you can just do a D.


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## 1001010101001 (Mar 20, 2018)

CarterK said:


> For those that are claiming that you have to rotate sometimes before 4c, you can just do a D.


d*
corrected


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## CarterK (Mar 20, 2018)

1001010101001 said:


> d*
> corrected


I think D is still better because even though it's one more move, it's way easier to do.


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## 1001010101001 (Mar 21, 2018)

CarterK said:


> I think D is still better because even though it's one more move, it's way easier to do.


It hinders recognition though. You could just do EOLine at the start


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## CarterK (Mar 21, 2018)

1001010101001 said:


> It hinders recognition though. You could just do EOLine at the start


That's way worse of a method than to just do a D. It isn't that hard to get used to and it doesn't hinder recognition after you get used to it.


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## 1001010101001 (Mar 25, 2018)

CarterK said:


> That's way worse of a method than to just do a D. It isn't that hard to get used to and it doesn't hinder recognition after you get used to it.


EOLine also eliminates rotations remember?


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## SoundBalloon (Apr 25, 2019)

What I don't like with the basic idea is that 2/3 of the time, the 4c are no better than a U-perm (in movecount). But actually, there's a way to force nice cases. (Let's call it Phased COLL for now)

Here's the idea: you may find that the best 4c cases occur when edges that should be opposite, are opposite:
good: DF/DB on UR/UL or UF/UB.
bad: DF/DB on UR/UF or UR/UB.

So why not force opposite edges to be opposite while solving the COLL? (Or on the contrary, force opposite edges to be adjacent?)
Granted, you need many more algs. There are 3 cases per COLL, so 100 to 120 algs, 40 of which are COLL. But ZBLL is 12 cases per COLL, so you need 4 times less algs, and still get all the advantages of ZBLL.

Why? Let's have a look at the 4c you may get. AUF for 0.75 moves on average, insert the UL/UR with M2 (1 move), then you get (each option is equally likely):
- DF in DF, that's a skip (with AUF, total 2.75 move after ZBLL - I am including EVERY move after the ZBLL, including the insertion of UL/UR and AUFs)
- DF in UB (AUF, M' U2 M2 U2 M' U2, total 8.75 moves). Algs like E2 M2 U M' E2 M' or M2 u2 U' M' E2 M' solve it in 6.75 moves.
- DF in UF (AUF, M' U2 M2 U2 M', total 7.75 moves)
- DF in DB (AUF, M2 U2 M2, total 5.75 moves)

Furthermore, the recognition in this step is easy: you just have to look at whether the FU (or DU) sticker matches the F center. And there is little ambiguity in which alg to apply (up to symmetry).


If you decide to phase so that opposite edges are NOT adjacent, you only need two algs per COLL (33% less!), and you may get:
- A 3-cycle with both D edges (7.75 moves)
- A 3-cycle with both U edges (6.75 moves)
- no skip
It gives an average of 7.25 moves, 1.5 more move, with less skips but with a less nasty case and a lower alg count. The recognition is just as good.


*Let's sum up.*
- On average, you need 5.75 moves, very possibly less after the phased COLL, compared to 0.75 moves for the AUF in ZBLL. Remember that phased COLL is a subset of ZBLL, so you actually get just 5 more moves than ZBLL. Since you may chose shorter ZBLL, and gain a few moves at the start, the extra movecount might be even lower.
- The recognition of phased COLL is faster and easier than ZBLL (it's COLL recognition, plus looking at where the D stickers are on the U face!), so you spend less time there.
- The 4c cases, being the easiest, are even faster than in standard NPL.



*Pros of phasing COLL:*
+ 4 (or 6) times less algs than ZBLL for less than 5 (or 6.5) extra moves on average (but recognition might be faster, any expert here?), Compared to approx +8 moves for COLL+EPLL.
+ stepping stone to learning ZBLL
+ recognition is incredible
+ The ending is braindead.
+ Skip 25% to 50% of the time (depending on whether you count the DF/DB case as a skip)

*Cons of phasing COLL:*
- still around 3 times more algs than COLL.


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## AegisSharp (Apr 25, 2019)

Looks like an interesting method, although I don't quite understand how you do the last step with mismatching centres.
Also, can someone point to a tutorial on orienting edges during f2l? I am not certain of how to consistently do this.


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## PapaSmurf (Apr 26, 2019)

AegisSharp said:


> Looks like an interesting method, although I don't quite understand how you do the last step with mismatching centres.
> Also, can someone point to a tutorial on orienting edges during f2l? I am not certain of how to consistently do this.


ZZ is by far the most reliable way to orientate edges, and works better with this method than CFOP imo. It has already been posted on this thread how to do it. It's slightly better than ZZ with COLL/EPLL, but not as good as with ZBLL, so you can decide.


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## MarcelP (Apr 26, 2019)

I need some sample solves on Youtube


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## DiamondGolem12 (Jun 2, 2021)

Sorry for the bump

I'm thinking of learning the algorithms for this method. Is it worth it? Also does anyone have the 4c algorithms


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## WarriorCatCuber (Jun 2, 2021)

DiamondGolem12 said:


> Sorry for the bump
> 
> I'm thinking of learning the algorithms for this method. Is it worth it? Also does anyone have the 4c algorithms


4c? It's like roux, it's intuitive.


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## DiamondGolem12 (Jun 2, 2021)

WarriorCatCuber said:


> 4c? It's like roux, it's intuitive.


Oh, ok thanks.


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## WarriorCatCuber (Jun 2, 2021)

DiamondGolem12 said:


> Sorry for the bump
> 
> I'm thinking of learning the algorithms for this method. Is it worth it? Also does anyone have the 4c algorithms


Sure it's worth it! It's really just COLL which is an all around very useful set for any speedsolving method


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## tsmosher (Jun 4, 2021)

So, there shouldn't be many algorithms to learn with this method.

Firstly, you can and probably should use 2-look corners (aka 2-look COLL/CMLL/CxLL). This means you only need to learn 7 OCLL cases (~4 algorithms tops) and 2 CPLL algorithms.

For EOLL, I would recommend learning 3 corner-preserving algorithms. This would allow you to eventually do 1-look compound (C)OLL with this method. (In other words, you could plan your EOLL alg and COLL alg at the same time and execute both algs one after another to arrive at step 4c with only 1 look.)

The other option here would be to orient edges at the very beginning of your solve, treating this method as a ZZ variant moreso than a CFOP variant. This carries a steeper learning curve though.

To get better at 4c (and 3-cycle cases), look up a guide on or watch a video about BU recognition. There are dozens of them. Find one that makes sense to you.

Ultimately, 4c only requires you to know 2 algorithms in my opinion: U2 M2 U2 and E2 M E2 M'.

I guess I'm saying: Don't overthink it. You could still get amazingly fast with this method using only intuitive F2L and ~10 algorithms.

This is a very underrated method in my opinion. Simply because 4c averages 2 moves less than EPLL.


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