I’m building a drum kit and want to sync a custom LFO in it’s effect chain. The manual says to use effect command x8yy (x = device in chain, yy = offset value), but that only seems to work on a track’s effect chain. When I try that command in the phrase section of the drum kit it doesn’t work.
Is there a way to sync a custom LFO in an instrument’s effect chain? Or should I try to figure out a way to move the effect chain to the track?
I think you need to wire the lfo reset to an instrument’s macro control and then trigger the control / knob with a short 1 value followed by a 0 value in the track automation… Which indeed feels quite strange, because of the lack of different types and amount of controls in the macro device. It feels like a workaround.
Maybe the formula device can give you the song position in a counter like value, too, but then u would have to do minimal math with modulus.
If you wire a reset button, the macro control should switch to the same type.
I ultimately was hoping to figure out a way to get LFO sync going in the instrument’s phrase editor, not just the song’s pattern editor, and I found a way:
Use the Key Tracker meta in the instrument’s effect chain and target it to the LFO’s Reset button, set the Key Tracker Destination Max to 0. With this any note entry triggers the LFO to reset, just what I was looking for.
Note: The Key Tracker defaults to “Any” note entry and “Destination Minimum” set to 0, so nothing needs to be changed there.
This stuff may be obvious to veteran Renoise users, but I’m still working my way through learning what it can do. 
Is there a way to sync a custom LFO in an instrument’s effect chain?
You can do this by adding a “dummy sample” to your drumkit and put it somewhere in the phrase (probably on the first line).
Then, in the instruments effect panel, create a new chain which contain a keytracker. Configure it like this:
Make it point to the dummy sample.
Set the max/min values to 0 to make it listen to "all notes*
Route it to the reset parameter of your LFO device
Some examples using this type of meta-device routing come with Renoise. From the samplers instrument preset browser, look for “Tutorial > Key Controlled FX”
(probably a bit more complex than what you have in mind - that example is using a specific keyboard range, which you don’t need).
Edit: ah, you figured this out already. Cool!
Edit: ah, you figured this out already. Cool!
Yeah, got it, thankfully. I was afraid I was going to lose the ability to use phrases for this drum kit.