Hello I am going through Merlin’s guide and I need help understanding parts and patterns. I copied part one into part two and on my pattern 3 in part 2 I changed the sound on one of my triggers. The change also happens in my part 1 pattern 3. If I am understanding correctly I thought part 2 would be independent from part 1. Thank you
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Parts store which machines are assigned to the tracks, which samples are assigmed to the machine and all the track and fx parameters.
The 16 scenes are also stored in parts.
For midi tracks parts store the midi setup (midi channel, program changes), note page, arp page, midi cc assignments and lfos for each of the tracks.
The trigs you enter in a pattern basically play what the parts tell them to play.
A pattern is always linked to a part.
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Dumb question, you’ve copied the part, but have you selected it for the pattern ?
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You have to save parts before moving onward and change something, in order to go back and things still be the same.
So.
- Write pattern. Save part 1.
- Copy part 1 to part 2. Write new pattern, make changes etc. Save part 2.
Copy part 2 to part 3, write new pattern, make changes save, etc. Repeat.
Of course you can have many patterns attached to the same part. I use 4 patterns per part, in general.
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They are.
Did you use a sample lock ?
In that case it is linked to patterns, not parts.
saving parts
I don’t save parts, they are saved in banks files anyway.
I think saving parts systematically is a kind of paranoid behavior. 
I am paranoid for other reasons.
It implies a very boring workflow.
You have to save all modified parts before you save the project, otherwise previous part are recalled. PITA.
For me saving a part is useful only if you want to reload it live after tweaking, randomize parameters, but for tweaking I use the crossfader and a couple of parameters I can set to their original position (Pitch, Rate, Len…)
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Did you switch to part 2?
After you copy one part you also have to switch to the part that you want to be active on a give pattern.
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Patterns contain the same sequence data no matter which part you select.
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Saving parts means you can reload them.
Which is very cool for live shows…insant undo button.
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A part is a different band, in a different room. With a different mixing desk.
A pattern is the music score given to all the bands at once. Like an overhead projector.
Switching parts mutes band/room 1 and changes to band/room 2.
You can change the members of the band and their instruments, and the effects on the mixing desk. You can’t change the music score though, without all the bands having to play it. You need a different pattern for that.
Hugely versatile system. My only critique is there is only 64 steps per pattern, but I suspect that is me being overly picky.
It’s almost definitely this.
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Yep. I precised it.
For me that’s a feature that I use like all the time. That’s a matter of personal workflow of course. Personally, coming from the MD and FUNC+EXTENDED that’s written in my DNA.
I need to put this on a post-it note, thanks!
With conditional trigs and ‘length per track’, you can squeeze a lot of mileage and variation out of those 64 steps 
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i run my master track at 1/2
Incorrect.
You can have 128, 86, 41, 256, infinity if you want.
Plus you can chain patterns. So 64steps x 16patterns x 16banks equals a shed load.
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I have it tattooed.
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If I can recommend something, and I’m going off of the assumption that this may be causing the confusion in your production as it did mine, but adding VOL mute trigs/p-locks at the very end of the sequence on each track prior to part transitioning helped me. Though they are the in the “same” project/pattern range the parts don’t automatically mute themselves when switching. It took time to digest that. Also, that’s if you’re trying to keep things tidy and don’t necessarily want those sweet reverb/delay hangs between the switch. 
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How? Unless using micro steps or something, there is 16 steps, which you can increase to 4 pages of 16…