Pattern Effect Commands

When using samples or VST instruments, you may want to apply minor effects to them which may not be possible to achieve neatly with automation or envelopes.

We can apply those with Effect commands in the effect column of the track, the volume column or the panning column.


By default the panning column does not show in the tracks because it is hidden.
To toggle the panning column, press the lctrl+lshift+p keycombination or toggle the most right button on the track controls in the control panel:



I will show a list of default effect commands that can be applied upon the instruments.

A few sidenotes here to keep in mind

  • Edit mode needs to be enabled in order to manually type in effect commands. Also the cursor advances downwards instead of to the right. You can set Edit Step to 0 (ctrl-0) to prevent advancing downwards but you will have to use the right cursor key to advance to the right.
  • xx, xy, zz and other command suffix digits represent figures. xx means the digit combination fully qualifies for the whole value, xy means x is a separate parameter value and y is also a separate value parameter. zz can be interpreted the same way as xx, be it that x and y are prefixes and references in that case.
  • Not all default effects are applicable to MIDI / VST instruments; those which aren’t applicable are indicated to be sample related only.
    • MIDI instruments are controlled by MIDI commands, effect commands do not have any influence on the MIDI instrument behaviour.
      • You can send CC commands through a MidiCCDevice in the effectlist. Or you can send CC, pitchbend, and program change commands in the panning column if the MIDI-device supports it. (See bottom of this page.)
    • VST instruments have their own internal controllers.
      • you may be able to use a VstiAutomateDevice to control the VSTI’s parameters, if it accepts incoming parameter commands. Or you may attempt to do it with CC / Pitchbend and program change commands in the Panning column. (see bottom of this page)
  • All effect-column commands are applied to all notes in the track on the affected row, including subtracks. Use available panning column or volume column commands (if available) to apply specific note-only effects.
  • Some effects are applied even when no note is being triggered but only require the note to be currently playing.
  • some effect commands in panning / volume column can be combined with effect commands in the effect column. (e.g. sample offset 09xx and playing a sample backwards b0)
  • when referring to ticks, effect-values are Hexadecimal and the effect values are always ticknumber minus 1 → (tick 1 is 0 in 0d00, tick 2 =0d01, tick 3 = 0d02 etc.)
  • Similar effects or similar style of effects are grouped in a generic used syntax colour.
  • Glide and slide commands continue to slide up or down the relative step of their previous value when the 00 value is being used on the next rows. This makes it easier to make glide or slide effects make a certain flow without having to type their exact values on the next rows.




Effect column

  • 00xy - Arpeggio (x=base note offset 1, y=base noteoffset 2) (Sample instrument related only)
  • 01xx - Pitch Slide up (00 - ff) (Sample instrument related only)
  • 02xx - Pitch Slide down (00 - ff) (Sample instrument related only)
  • 03xx - Set Channel volume (00 - ff)
  • 04xy - Volume slicer → x = factor (0=0.0, f=1.0), slice at tick y. (Sample instrument related only)
  • 05xx - Glide to note with step xx (00 - ff) (Sample instrument related only)
  • 06xx - Volume slide up with step xx (00–255) (255 x 0601 will slide from 0 to full, 2 x 067F will do the same.) (Sample instrument related only)
  • 07xx - Volume slide down with step xx (00–255) (Sample instrument related only)
  • 08xx - Set panning (00 - ff)
    • 00 - most left
    • 80 - center
    • ff - most right
  • 09xx - Trigger sample offset, 00 is sample start, ff is sample end . Offset positions are related to the total sample size in Renoise mode. The larger the sample, the more inaccurate stepping will be (Using Amiga/FT2 mode, ff means the 255th block of 256 bytes). (Sample instrument related only)
  • 0axx - Surround width (00 - ff) (Sample instrument related only)
  • 0bxx - Play sample backwards (b00) or forwards again (b01 → during play when sample is playing backwards). Tip:Use with 09xx to apply offset changes from an offset closer to the sample start. (Sample instrument related only)
  • 0cxx - Set track-volume (00-ff)
  • 0dxx - Delay notes in track-row xx ticks before playing. (00 - speed)
  • 0exy - Retrig notes in track-row every xy ticks (y=ticks 0 - speed) The first digit (x) sets the volume of the retriggered sample. Value effects on volume for each retrig are (x):
    • 0 No change
    • 1 −1
    • 2 −2
    • 3 −4
    • 4 −8
    • 5 −16
    • 6 *2/3
    • 7 *1/2
    • 8 No change
    • 9 +1
    • a +2
    • b +4
    • c +8
    • d +16
    • e *3/2
    • f *2
  • 0fxy - Vibrato x = speed, y = depth; x=(0 - f); y=(0 - f) (Sample instrument-related only)
  • XYzz - Send zz (00 - ff) value to parameter Y (0 - e) of vst/dsp effect number X (0 - e) in the effect rack of the Track Dsp’s. To turn on or off an effect, send value F as Y parameter:
    • xF00 → Turn effect x off;
    • xF01 → Turn effect x on.
  • f0xx - Set BPM (20 - ff)
  • f1xx - Set songspeed (01–14, 00 = stop song)
  • f2xx - Set trackrouting to channel xx (00 is stereo output, other values determine upon your sound-card’s abilities. ASIO only!)
  • fbxx - Pattern break (don’t finish playing till the end of the pattern, jump to next sequence position from patternbreak point, you can only have one functional patternbreak command per pattern.) xx is the startposition (row) in the next pattern.
  • fcxx - Set mastervolume (00 - ff)
  • fdxx - Delay complete pattern xx lines.
  • ff00 - Stop all track effects and notes.




Volume column

  • 00 - 7f - Set note-volume of current subtrack.
  • 9x - Volume slide up in current subtrack with step x. (0 - f)
  • ax - Volume slide down in current subtrack with step x. (0 - f)
  • bx - Play sample of subtrack note backwards (0 is backwards, 1 is forwards again, see 0bxx in effect column command-list)
  • dx - Delay note x ticks (0 - f) dx and fx combination tricks
  • ex - Retrig note x ticks (0 -f)
  • fx - Notecut after x ticks. (0 - e)




Panning column

  • 00 - 80 - Set panning position of current subtrack.
    • 00 - most left
    • 40 - center
    • 80 - most right
  • 9x - Panningslide left with step x (0 - f)
  • ax - Panningslide right with step x (0 - f)
  • bx - Play sample of subtrack note backwards (0 is backwards, 1 is forwards again, see 0bxx in effect column command-list)
  • dx - Delay note x ticks (0 - f) dx and fx combination tricks
  • ex - Retrig note x ticks (0 -f)
  • fx - Cut note after x ticks (0 -f) dx and fx combination tricks
  • MIDI / VSTI commands in panning column
    **90 - Send CC Change, value in the effect-column (XXYY, XX = controller, YY = value)
    • Controllers
    • 01 - MOD wheel
    • 91 - Pitchbend, value in the effect-column (XXYY, XX global range, YY = finevalue)
      • XX - 40 = center value, 40 - 7F = pitch-up, 40–01 = pitch down
      • YY - 00 - 7F = finevalue range.
    • 92 - Program change, value in the effect-column (usually the last two bytes are used only (00 - 7F)

Note : insert the 9x midi commands in the panning column of the right-most subtrack;
the 9x MIDI commands show a different syntax colour than when they function as panning values
Also when entering a 9x value in the last panning column, a 0000 value automatically is filled in on the effect column.
Take care that you also add the instrument-number so that Renoise know which MIDI instrument it should send the command to and, the target MIDI instrument number has to be re-added on every line you want to send a MIDI command to.

If you do not desire a MIDI command being send because you actually want to perform a panning-slide (e.g. you only use one note-column in the track), add another subcolumn to resolve this limitation and then add the 9x panningslide value in the first panning column, or the more logical alternative: just use automation to perform a pan-slide.



ex / 0exy command behavior

Note on the ex pan/vol and 0exy on the effect column: The pan/vol edition does not restart the sample from start when retrigging while 0exy effect command does. This behavior is intended to give you a choice of two different retrigger modes.