More effects after the stack

Hi there,

Fast question: Is already possible to put more than 4 effects after the stack?

History: I've been using the Kemper Stage for almost 2 years now and I remembered how annoying it was at the time when I realised that -in a digital device- there could be just 4 effects pre-stack and 4 effects post-stack, but I supposed that since it is a digital device and I assume those buttons are not hard-wired it would change at some point, but the last question about this was from 2021 so hope is the last thing I want to lose.

Thank you!

That I thought... Well, it's time to watch reviews about the Quad Cortex 😅

Since I see you both V8guitar and Steve5478 interested, I'm going to explain my issues and my disenchantment with Kemper OS.

What I wanted was to be able to replicate my valve amp + pedalboard live rig with just one digital device. This -IMHO- should be the first approach of these type of devices.

The first issue I happened to see with Kemper in general is that you can't purposely oblige people to just have 4 effects in their signal chain. That just is not happening in real word for most of us. The second is even worse: You're limited to 4 effects before the amp and 4 effects after the amp. So you'll have to decide which ones you want to be able to activate because you only have 4 hardware switches.

I understood these things and thought that their way to think about this device is that you use the 1-5 slots predefined for each part of a song - but that's limited to just the users that want to use it that way. In my case, my gigs used to be 4 hours-long with medleys of songs that could last more than 20 minutes straight of music - you can imagine that I wasn't able to use the Stage that way.

BUT what I believe is really simple - in terms of programming a digital device - is to let people decide where they want the effect blocks. If so, my case wouldn't be so dramatic because I just need 5 FX, all of them after the stack (because I used the slots for my gain stages), and as you probably know, it is possible to assign the looper switch to another effect. But no, can't do that since I have octaver, chorus, delay and short reverb already after the stack. If I want the long reverb -which is my 5th effect- I have to change to the next performance where I have the same setup but the reverb module has a long reverb and it's active whenever I change to that next performance.

This situation would be even worse for those who like to use a lot of effect pedals inside the same song after the stack. At least Quad Cortex -which obviously has its cons- let's you assign the switches to whatever block you want in stomp mode, so theoretically you'll get up to 8 effects.

I hope I didn't bother anyone on this 😅 Kemper still being an incredible device and I'm really happy I purchased it quite some time ago, but for me it has these type of cons that makes me wonder if Quad Cortex would be better in this sense.

Cheers!

Quote from V8guitar

Thanks for taking the time explain and no bother to us at all.

I think your ask is reasonable - to replicate your analogue set up. However, every digital device has limitations. So you could add 1 million external pedals to your valve amp set up and no digital all in one solution will match that. Of course your request is more reasonable but 8 effects pre and post is not a small number - your issue is the assignment pre or post I think so I would hope this is addressed.

However, there are work arounds - if its the same effect morph. Does every effect have to be post? I would probably put the octaver pre...I wouldn't normally put this in the effects loop but the front end of an amp if it was a real pedal so why not pre?

Just to clarify your terminology - you said you have to change performance? Do you mean performance or slot in a performance?

How are you using your slots in a performance. For example, I have typically 1 performance per band. In that performance I run a pure clean, slightly dirty, main rhythm, Rhythm with effects, and solo. I morph all of them as well to various degrees. My point is, I have at least 2 slots "spare" from a normal 3 channel valve amp ( in this example slightly dirty and Rhythm with effects) for dedicated songs. The only reason I say this is because there are so many ways to set up your KPA and we can get fixed on copying our analogue set ups too much.

The other point of course is different devices have different advantages - the Quad might be for you but be aware it have negatives. Note a few people have questioned the footswitches in alive context.

Dude, I hope this helps in some way

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Thank YOU for taking this time answering! I agree completely with you. Let me explain how I use the Kemper, so maybe someone thinks about a different way:

Two performances. The first one is set as follows:

- Slots 1 to 5 are my gain stages - from completely clean to complete distorted metal-type sound.

- All 4 effect switches used (octaver, chorus, delay and short reverb). All effects except reverb are locked because I need to be able to change slots 1-5 without loosing the effect (I need to sacrifice the reverb).

- All morphs are set as my booster, increasing the amp volume (since I can’t use any effect switch because they are already been used).

The second performance is set EXACTLY as the first one but the reverb is set to be a long reverb and it is active whenever I change to that second performance.

For example, another easy thing would be to be able to lock things INSIDE a performance and not for ALL the Kemper. That way would be possible to have different kind of effects along performances but keep the state of the effect on the same performance.

Also if I change to that long reverb second performance and then fast enough I change again to the first performance, most of the times it keeps that long reverb although it’s not even active so I have to change again to that 2nd performance and back again to that 1st performance. 🤦🏼‍♂️

I agree all devices have its pros and cons (and Neural has so many cons) but for me I think it would be nice, but of course I’m not sure at all.

Quote from dave5150

Nothing is stopping you using your pedals with the Kemper if you are unable to work within the supported 4x pre and 4x post effects.

Yeah right, what stops me is that I purchased the Stage to avoid carrying any other stuff. So -for me- doing that doesn’t makes sense but I surely get that for a lot of users do and is enough.

Quote from Kellerblues

Are you aware that you can add up to 4 (2 time dual switches) hardware switches to have all blocks on separate switches? You can even re-assign the Tuner and looper switches to activate fx-blocks instead

That’s another thing that bugged me. I don’t find the actual use of that dual switches, since it obliges you to have always one of the effects enabled OR both enabled or disabled. Would be nice if you need for example reverb+delay in a certain part, but whenever you want one or the other, you can’t.

I also stated before what you say about re-assigning looper and tuner, but the limitation of 4 effects after the stack persists, but thank you for noting!

Quote from Wheresthedug

I disagree with this entirely.

the first approach should be to provide the best possible sound and user experience. This may require traditional behaviour in some cases but many times this type of unit allows the possibility of avoiding the drawbacks and limitations of traditional analog setups.

the question is whether the specific workflow and feature set which Kemper designers settled on is the best user experience. Kemper could have gone for full flexibility and massive routing options etc like some of the competitors but they opted for simple and logical. Neither is right or wrong just different approaches. A Ferrari may be the best car in the world (for country roads or track days) but I wouldn’t choose one pver a Range Rover to drive through muddy fields. Different beasts equally brilliant.

for me it is certainly very close. Of course there are some things which I would love to see implemented but none of them are deal breakers. I actually agree with you that it would be nice to have the ability to place any number of effects pre or post the amp section. I rarely use many Fx at all but having a split of say 5 pre and 3 post or 6 pre and 2 post would probably work better for me than 4 + 4 but there are plenty of other ways to achieve the results I need so I’m not losing any sleep over it.

I get it! I didn’t say anything about it but this discussion wouldn’t happen if the Kemper sounded horrible 😂 I think we all agree that at sound level Kemper is top notch. But for me -a guy who wanted exactly the same analog rig but weighting and occupying 10 times less- I didn’t find effective the approach of “here you have 5 slots that can be the 5 parts of a song”. That alone couldn’t work for me since I had to play 20min long mixes with really heavy changes in effects and gain levels of sound. 🥲 But for sure, most of the users will be okay with its little cons as you mentioned. The only thing that really bugs me is to oblige people to have a certain number of effects pre and post. That doesn’t makes sense for me with a digital device. It doesn’t have to be fully routable but having an option to select wether you want an effect pre or post would be a simple thing to do without being anything crazy in terms of millions of possibilities or anything. Just the effect you want, pre or post and its parameters.

Again, this is just MY opinion and the way I use it, I don’t pretend to re-make the wheel here 🤣

Quote from Finally

How many effects units do you run downstream of the mic on your amp with a traditional rig?

Of the mic?

If you mean in the effects loop, I used to have like… two delays (one of them programmable), “two” reverbs (BlueSky), chorus, tremolo and octaver. Also my amp had two channels and I put a dual channel drive to get up to 6 gain stages.