The Philosopher King from USA firm Pigtronix combines a compressor, sustainer, distortion and a polyphonic amplitude synthesizer.
It creates a guitar sound with the compression and distortion and then feeds that into an amplitude modulation section for reshaping.
"The compression and distortion alone is great, but the tone and envelope-shaping opens up new sonic horizons"
Without the envelope-shaping, there's a neat range of compression, with added distortion via the Grit knob, all delivered via a knob that mixes it in with the dry sound for some great blends from really subtle to blistering high-gain sustain.
Hitting the Swell or Fade footswitches brings in the envelope, allowing pick- triggered volume swells that can be controlled nicely by playing dynamics.
The synth functionality adds granular textures with variable timing there's quite a range of tones such as backwards tape-style envelopes, stuttery on/off tremolo and staccato single notes.
The compression and distortion alone is great, but the tone and envelope-shaping opens up new sonic horizons.