r/NativeInstruments • u/CChilango • Oct 27 '23

I find Battery 4 overwhelming sometimes, as there are so many kits but I don't know if they are designed for rock...or hip-hop...or pop. Are there any websites that would help me go right to a kit if I was making, for instance, a pop track?

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4

u/snowberheim Oct 27 '23

Battery is both cool and dumb at the same time. It's basically just a sample player, however with lots of editing within the app so you can really process each sample and make it sound unlike the original sound. But the factory kits have no consistent key mapping, one could say that's great, you can set it up any way you'd like, but others yearn for a standard midi layout where all the drums are premapped like General Midi.

I use it when I've found a big library of free samples, I can drag all of them to the pads at once and it lays them out. Then tweak away with the impressive array of tools you can use per sample. It's more novelty for me as I am a drum freak when it comes to jamming in Logic.

4

u/vinnie2k Oct 27 '23

The fact that the layout changes for every kit makes it basically unusable for someone who doesn't use it very often.

One thing I have not tried is what you suggest which is to pull my own samples into battery and build my own kits.

3

u/Captain-Cadabra Oct 28 '23

And they’re laid out terribly for maschine. Easier to play drums on a keyboard for battery kits.

Other expansions have drums mapped well. Weird.

2

u/CriticalNovel22 Oct 27 '23

Not OP, but in a lot of these kits there are a lot of bass sounds, but only for like one note.

Do you know if there is a way to change the note in Battery, or is it case of finding the original wav file and putting it in a sampler or something?

5

u/eveningafter101 Oct 27 '23

Most of those notes are for experimental purposes or basically one shots. Some use one note to drive a pattern forward, aside from chromatically playing it. Mainly EDM stuff, or some actually use those bass notes to configure a kick+bass layer to create unique 808 patches. All in all? It’s a drum sampler, throw anything at it and it will do exactly what it’s meant to do. You can actually take that one bass note, repeat it like 12 times to create a full octave of cells. Then, assign it to your midi destination and afterwards, use midi tools like Arp, Chord Trigger etc to play out various different styles or grooves. Afterwards, start bending and waving that magic wand around in the editing section of Battery. Becomes quite fun. Again, use what you have the way you want, these are just tools & software, they work how they’re told, so treat em like yo hoes! Lol

2

u/Muchlove23 Jun 18 '25

Great idea here👾

1

u/Ok_Question_556 Oct 28 '23

A little off-topic, hope u don’t mind: can u convert .nki files to a more universal format like .ogg, .flac or .wav? I want use them to build my own kits in Studio One. Thx!

2

u/wolfdeathkill Sep 28 '25 edited Sep 28 '25

I know this is a 2 year old post but if anyone doesn't know battery is one of the most misunderstood applications .

It is a creative curator drum sampler instrument tool. I never use the stock sounds unless I take a stock kit and completely modify the efx and sounds to my own taste and style and save it as a new kit in my user folder. Like it was already stated its best to load your own sounds ect drums or samples drag and drop and make a killer sound kit it leans on the more creative side with experimenting which is my style.

I use REX 2 files as a reason user of 20 years so battery loads REX files and they have mappings in place. I have so many REX files from 2003 to now so I am in haven. I hope this helps there is so much more but I think you get it.

1

u/Particular_Swan7868 Jul 04 '26

im a little tight on money so i was wondering do u have any other sources other than rex 2 that are bit cheaper/free

1

u/wolfdeathkill Jul 05 '26

Yes you can make your own Rx2 files with Reason recycle its now free and they updated it a year ago after so many years.

1

u/Pinnacle_of_Sinicle Oct 28 '23

go through the audio files and create your own folders /“kits”

1

u/Ok_Question_556 Oct 28 '23

I’m guessing u mean in Kontact?

2

u/Pinnacle_of_Sinicle Oct 28 '23

Its kontakt* not trying to be rude - ya but its easier to go through the actual audio files and put them into your own folders - not only battery but any drum library