As far as I can figure it out, its just the insane amount of gain. If you happen to introduce ANY tiny bit of noise etc. you will get really ugly sounding artefacts. So the gain knobs are your friends after all. OTT does not seem to be any ordinary compressor / expander, not sure if it was originally meant as a distortion stomp box
you sir...
I dunno what to say probably I owe you a beer or two..even if you made that story up..:D
Gonna check it out tomorrow.
It makes sense at first read..gain staging..mhm
I don't use OTT, I am using other distortion fx, mostly izotope trash.
..i'm gonna come back to it tomorrow..