# How to use a VCA to pause events

**URL:** <https://qa.fmod.com/t/how-to-use-a-vca-to-pause-events/20385>\
**Category:** FMOD Studio\
**Created:** [July 5, 2023, 12:14am UTC](https://qa.fmod.com/t/how-to-use-a-vca-to-pause-events/20385 "2023-07-05T00:14:05Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![fractanimal](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/qa.fmod.com/fractanimal/32/3897_2.png) [@fractanimal](https://qa.fmod.com/u/fractanimal)\
**Post date:** [July 5, 2023, 12:14am UTC](https://qa.fmod.com/t/how-to-use-a-vca-to-pause-events/20385/1 "2023-07-05T00:14:05Z")

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Hi there, sorry for the noob question.

How do I use a VCA to pause all music events sent to a group bus?

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**Author:** ![joseph](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/qa.fmod.com/joseph/32/264_2.png) [@joseph](https://qa.fmod.com/u/joseph)\
**Post date:** [July 7, 2023, 5:46am UTC](https://qa.fmod.com/t/how-to-use-a-vca-to-pause-events/20385/2 "2023-07-07T05:46:37Z")

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You can’t. VCAs cannot affect the play state of events.

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**Author:** ![fractanimal](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/qa.fmod.com/fractanimal/32/3897_2.png) [@fractanimal](https://qa.fmod.com/u/fractanimal)\
**Post date:** [July 10, 2023, 12:42am UTC](https://qa.fmod.com/t/how-to-use-a-vca-to-pause-events/20385/4 "2023-07-10T00:42:28Z")

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oh derp, VCA is for volume settings. my bad

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**Author:** ![Damion1](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/qa.fmod.com/damion1/32/2716_2.png) [@Damion1](https://qa.fmod.com/u/Damion1)\
**Post date:** [October 19, 2023, 8:55am UTC](https://qa.fmod.com/t/how-to-use-a-vca-to-pause-events/20385/5 "2023-10-19T08:55:46Z")

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@joseph

Can I put in a feature request for this? Since we _can_ pause a BUS, I see no reason conceptually why we couldn’t also pause a VCA, since a VCA is just a collection of busses (and events), which are themselves all pausable…?

It would be nice to have a PAUSABLE VCA, which allows the FMOD user to control very specifically what is paused and what is not, without touching code…

(I considered a workaround where I could get all of the busses running through a VCA and simply loop through them, but there doesn’t seem to be an API call for getting that kind of information from a VCA)

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**Author:** ![joseph](https://yyz2.discourse-cdn.com/flex036/user_avatar/qa.fmod.com/joseph/32/264_2.png) [@joseph](https://qa.fmod.com/u/joseph)\
**Post date:** [October 20, 2023, 4:11am UTC](https://qa.fmod.com/t/how-to-use-a-vca-to-pause-events/20385/6 "2023-10-20T04:11:07Z")

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> [@Damion1](#):
>
> Can I put in a feature request for this?

Of course!

> [@Damion1](#):
>
> Since we _can_ pause a BUS, I see no reason conceptually why we couldn’t also pause a VCA, since a VCA is just a collection of busses (and events), which are themselves all pausable…?

While buses and VCAs are presented in similar ways in FMOD Studio, they’re significantly different under the hood: Each group bus corresponds to a channel group, and channel groups have a number of built-in features for performing mass operations on their child channels and channel groups; whereas VCAs do not correspond to channel groups, and so do not have these features.

Which isn’t to say we can’t do it; just that it’s not as straightforward and simple a change as it might seem.

In any case, I’ve added your suggestion to our feature/improvement tracker.