I must have phrased my questions wrong. I understand the 2 modes are different. What Im trying to find out is if its possible to leave Maschine in MIdi Mode and have everything custom mapped so that it still works perfectly with the plugin but also allows transport control as well.
These are two different modes completely, you have to use Maschine to fully grasp it. There is no amount of midi assignment that will allow the integration with Maschine the way it is, it's really a work of art as you can do so much in Maschine from the controller.
When you use it as a plugin, you have all the same functions as you do when standalone, the ONLY thing you can't do is stop the sequencer from playing, that's it. You can still turn record on and off (in maschine not the daw), you can still use all the knobs and pads, still use all the functions just like normal...it's just a slave to your daw so you can't actually stop it from playing with the play button.
If you already start and stop your daw manually now, there really is no difference, at first I was very much against it lol...and ONLY used Maschine in standalone mode...but when I thought about it...I wasn't controlling my daw transport before with anything but my space bar lol...so it wasn't a big deal. I plan to get a new midi keyboard, one with transport controls, either that or I'll get a fader port since I use Studio One....
It's really not that big of a deal and trust me I was one of the biggest critics of this.
Yes it will be cool if they add some way to control this WHILE controlling Maschine...but the fact is you can setup custom templates in the midi mode with the controller editor.
I have one setup for Ableton, I can switch back and forth from controlling abletons transport, volume, pan, sends, and track arming for my other vsts, then switch back to Maschine mode and bang out with that.
If this is the only thing you feel is stopping you, then don't let it lol...it's really not that serious. Just hit that space bar lol.