Hi iacdxb,
As mentioned, that will not work with a Cloner. Perhaps for each rotation with a new effector, to keep the previous rotations in place. (A formula effector with an id check for a group of nice objects, etc)
If I understand correctly, you want all the options, which is undoubtedly the most complex set up. The problem is that they need to have a central origin (all the time. Position 0;0;0) so they can rotate as they need to. Which makes it impossible to select any block of nine, while keeping the 3x3x3 set up as guide what to choose. This, in return, disables the options to work with Fields. Which I tried to explore during the whole day so far.
My idea was to create with a Field, which provides the needed information on what needs to be rotated, while the position of the objects is analyzed. This should have resulted in a piece of individual information each time if they are in the Filed or not. That, in return, changes the values of the Constrain> Parent. The Parent-object is the one that rotates and one static Null.
https://help.maxon.net/us/#TCACONSTRAINT-ID_CA_CONSTRAINT_TAG_PARENT_GROUP
Which means it is the robot arm idea in the link above, but one rotates, and one keeps it.
If it is in the Field, then the slider for the rotational object is 100%; otherwise, it is 100% for the Static.
I was able, even with all care to screw it up very quickly, as we deal here with 26* (27) cubes and not just with one. *The Rubik’s Cube has no center cube, but that is not important for now. Since it is so super fragile, there was no way to share it at all.
I think the last time I was asked about this was 14 years ago. We animated it manually, as only a few steps were needed. You want a full set up, as mentioned, that is super complex without coding. Hellolux has a two-part tutorial about, however, if that is your target, perhaps it is worth your time. Any other tutorials had a very obvious problematic after a few rotations (yes, I have not clicked through all).
With manual animation the second rotation, if it includes previously rotated cubes, will run into the problem that we have at least two directions in the axis system of the nine cubes. Which will result in a problem, if not rated in groups with equal axis orientations?
Arndt von Königsmarck has one set up that works, but it is in COFFEE, you need something other (older) than R20 to work with it.
https://www.rodenburg-verlag.de/shop/demos/free-magic-cube-script/
I will try to explore something, but my target is, of course, to be able to communicate the set up in a timely manner. Anything else needs a Tutorials series. Perhaps someone has an idea that is educational for a broader area, to showcase other techniques as well.
What is easy to communicate is a simple animation step and copy approach. Whereby the previous step, will determine where the colors are for the second, and the second being never rotated avoids this problem. Which is too much manual work from my point of view.
I have to explore more, but if you can run COFFEE somewhere, try the link.
All the best