Wampler Tumnus Overdrive V2

If you are one of those that go to the bottom line first, then here it is - buy it!
I bought one of these as i wanted a quality, low gain drive to use with a clean tone to add a little hair to the tone. And this pedal does that brilliantly. My pedal of choice for this in the past has been a Hermida Zen Drive, which is the pedal of choice for Robben Ford, amongst others. I mention tis because I wanted to let you know that I am used to a quality tone. I got a good offer for my Zen Drive from a mate, and sold it. I immediately regretted it, and bought a Gold version. Then the Black version. All very good, but not as good (IMHO) as the original. So i sold them,. and before i ordered another Silver Zen, I looked around for some alternatives. I saw a review of the Wampler on YouTube, was very impressed, and ordered one. I have to say, that for me, it is the best pedal I have owned. It gives me exactly the right amount of light to mid overdrive I want. It works well with my 335, les Paul & Strat, adding a snarl to the tone, in a very musical way. Well made, great sounding, and worth every pedal.

Pros:
Tumnus is versatile overdrive that suits any style and set up. Sturdy metal housing doesn't take much room on your pedalboard. It adds a pleasing amount of edge as well as grit to the player’s tone. Those who desire low-to-medium gains with transparent boost will be very satisfied with this pedal. If needed, Tumnus can dial quite some distortion but for heavy distorted sound you will need to stack it with other pedals or use other distortion/fuzz pedal. Wampler Tumnus OD is not true bypass but buffered bypass so it boosts your signal.
Cons:
Due to it's small dimensions, knobs are also small and not so easy to work with. LED light indicator is to bright and interferes my sight. On/off switch is pretty resistant so you have to use quite amount of force to operate. If you are not too petty you will have no problem to accept these cons.

This pedal is absolutely a great one with the sound and build quality. I am using Fender Blues Junior III and this pedal fits very well. Tubescreamer is kind of must pedal for this amp but it is not as clear as Tumnus when i play arpeggios. Even this pedal is a mid range pedal but the EQ response is different from the tubescreamer,s. I played side by side many times with different tone and drive combinations and as a conclusion i keep both of them for different tastes. By the way stacking them is another journey… (see John Mayer setup.

Well, beside the sound clarity during breaking up the tubes, it is a good booster. I put it before Nobels and the result is great huge sound with telecaster.

The build quality is very good. I would say it is the highest build quality pedal on my pedalboard. Knobs are strong and smooth, led is blue and not eye scratching - very good really, and the switch makes you feel it wont let you down after many years.

In conclusion, sound and build quality would be one of the best! I tried many overdrives but in the end I found this pedal which will stay on my pedalboard forever.

I use the Tumnus in front of a 5150 II and a Laney IRT Studio as neutral-sounding clean boost for high-gain, metal type sounds. It complements a Maxon OD9, which I use when I want to add some classic Tubescreamer-voicing to the sound. One could stack the overdrives, but I have not tried that yet.
At any rate, the pedal does its job ridiculously well. Needs a little bit of tweaking to get the filter to work just right, but after you dial it in it feels like lifting a blanket off the speakers, and it tightens the bottom-end as well. If you want chug that retains more of your amp's original sound, you may want to give this one (or other Klon-type pedals) a try.
Build quality appears solid, button feels solid, status LED is bright and unambiguous, form factor is very compact, and the complementary transport pouch is a nice touch.

Honestly, I spent an embarrassingly long amount of my guitar playing life thinking a Klon type of overdrive wasn't for me. Just as I was about to check out my order, I thought "f*ck it" and added the most popular Klon type pedal I could think of to cart and paid before I could change my mind. At least for the moment my other OD's are not getting any love.

So far I've experimented with a Tweed and Blackface amp with a Strat and especially with the Tweed I'm loving the sounds (no cringey adjectives for you). Also works wonders as a boost to other medium OD's. Well built pedal with underwhelming aesthetics (as with all Wampler pedals). Kind of wish I had opted for the deluxe which has got the EQ but c'est la vie.

Always listened to guys mentioned "you've got to try a Klon" well....I'm glad I finally did.