It's a lot of trial and error, yes, and some of the pieces don't always make sense unless you've grown the whole cube/planet. The spring in the GROW cube is one of these.
Yeah, Conway, there's a correct order that will get you all MAX. But you'll know when you're close. Slight changes in order have small changes overall, generally. It might seem random at first, but there's very definite patterns that you'll see the more you tinker with it.