C* AmpVTS destroyes your ears by default

[Qtamo]

The "gain" knob of this LMMS plugin is set to the value 2.25 by default, which is horrible. Setting it to 1 by default would fix this issue.

Version 1.3.0-alpha.1.33+g4f74151 (Linux/x86_64, Qt 5.6.3, GCC 5.4.0 20160609).

[musikBear]

It is a distortion guitar amp, with a harsh rough output.
I think what it does, is what it is supposed to do. It also has a limiter function, so there is no clipping, even with powerful output:

I Dont believe this is flawed

[Qtamo]

Ok. I still don't like the philosophy of an effect changing the volume (at least louder) by default. The volume is something that can be easily manually made louder if the user wants. Having these sorts of jumscare effects discourages people from experimenting with different plugins, and it can ruin the vibe of a nice production session. What makes it even more confusing/suprising is that the other amp effects (including other C* ones) don't make the the volume louder by default. At least it should be consistent.

I do understand that non-normalized distortion effects can sometimes naturally make things a bit louder (maybe 10-30%). Even that I think is at least a bit annoying. But 125% louder is something different...

[musikBear]

Ok. I still don't like the philosophy of an effect changing the volume (at least louder) by default

Agrees 100% !
In this case it is not that bad, because the plugin is after all an Amp -We have some plugins that will enhance loudness, even though the purpose of the plugin has nothing to do with loudness.. but in case of this one, it will still be better if it pr default keeps the loudness at base-value, but that train may have left the station..
We cant simply change default value, if that results in broken user-projects.
But if does not, yes it should be default at base

[Qtamo]

Ok. I still don't like the philosophy of an effect changing the volume (at least louder) by default

Agrees 100% ! In this case it is not that bad, because the plugin is after all an Amp -We have some plugins that will enhance loudness, even though the purpose of the plugin has nothing to do with loudness.. but in case of this one, it will still be better if it pr default keeps the loudness at base-value, but that train may have left the station.. We cant simply change default value, if that results in broken user-projects. But if does not, yes it should be default at base

Ok. I understand the issue now. Backwards compatibility is a tricky issue. I would personally still lean towards bravely resetting the default volume for this plugin (and other such plugins that change the volume a lot at least in the louder direction), even with the risk of breaking user projects. It would definitely be annoying to have to reset volumes for some instruments, but far from unfixable. I think the pain/reward for such a change is worth it (also I'm no stranger to LMMS devs breaking my projects, I don't mind, it's a sign of progress I guess XD).

[musikBear]

also I'm no stranger to LMMS devs breaking my projects

Ooops! When where how?
Even projects from 2003 opens for me
How has progress interfered with your saved projects?
But that said, there will come a day where LMMS changes in core. My thoughts is that we best wait with tiny inconveniences- like this one, and fix all of those when the first in at-voidable situation emerges, instead of minor fixes over time that result in several breaks of backward compatibility each on its own.
Making a META for just those issues, would be smart.

[zonkmachine]

Unreasonable amp level confirmed. This has been fixed upstream in a later version of AmpVTS so this will be fixed in #4027 . In the mean time, if you're on linux, you could test the latest ladspa/lv2 version of caps from the repository. It's really a big difference. We could maybe nudge the value manually on our side as the update may take a while.