I think of a drum "kit" as a collection of samples mapped to keys. There are Performances with "kits" as part of the Performance along with a handful of ARPs to automate playing these kits. The ARP "catalog" inside Montage has a number of usable variations that are not preprogrammed inside the factory Performance.
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Performance-wise there is a range of Performance #651-694, #696-697, #2071 - #2123, #2129, #2130, #2133-#2143 that have "Kit" in the name. That's 112 "kits". There are probably other Performances without the name "Kit" that are in the "Drum"/"Drum/Perc" Main/Sub Categories that would also qualify as a "Kit" - not many.

Each of these probably have 4-8 arpeggios pre-programmed in the "Kit" Performance to show an example of using the drums with an ARP. In order to hear these, you need to turn the ARP Master ON and possibly the drum PART's ARP on hold.

Arpeggios #6292 - #9733 (3,442 total ARPs) are arpeggios that are customized to work "perfectly" with certain kits. The data list "Sound Type" (last) column in the chart lists which Performance (Kit) the arpeggio is designed to work well with. Although not completely interchangeable - the ARPs should work fine with kits that are not the "ideal" kit listed as many kits share common locations for the major drum pieces (bass drum, hi hats, toms, snare, etc).

In order to change out the ARPs - you need to go to the drum PART [EDIT] and select Arpeggios then "Individual" and press on the "Name" parameter which should allow for you to select the arpeggio category search to look for a different "Dr/Pc" (Drum/Percussion) main category arpeggio. Set the sub-category to "all" to show all 3,442 drum arps or use the sub-category to narrow down by genre.

There's nothing to download except for firmware updates if you are not updated to the latest. Otherwise - all of this is inside your Montage.

A rim shot isn't really a "rhythm". It's a sound. Generally when you hit the snare drum. A kit like "Songwriter 2015" has the snare drum rimshot mapped to the key F#5. The ARPs do not really tell you which ones will trigger this drum key or not. There's not a great way to search for arps by exactly what they do. You've got to just go through them and listen for what matches what you're looking for. It can be painful given the number of choices if you're looking for something like this ("drum arp with rimshots" ). And ... "Songwriter 2015" is an example of a Performance with a Drum Kit "bundled" in the Performance - but does not have the name "Kit". The drums that are in this Performance are likely a duplicate of some other more dedicated drum kit.

Yea this section of the montage is still a little confusing to me. Outside of arpeggio seems I have to just accept its limitations when it comes to drum parts. The Yamaha MX has some great drum kits/backings.

I'm not sure what the MX has other than to say it has a dedicated "Rhythm Pattern" button that makes it "easier" to get to drum patterns on the MX while Montage is more programming-oriented and therefore more flexible at the expense of ease-of-use. MODX has something similar to the "Rhythm Pattern" feature that Montage does not (yet?) have. I can't say compared to MX if the Montage drum ARPs are a superset of the MX patterns - or somehow different. I can say that there are no less choices for patterns on Montage and that the quality of these patterns should be no better on MX. I just think the interface of how to call these up is throwing you off which makes it harder for you to find the content vs. MX.

Yes, I agree with you.

If searching for what you need is painful, you are likely doing it wrong, or perhaps you need to modify your method slightly. Nothing should be painful.

The only problem with having 10,239 Arpeggios is if you try to audition them all. When you have a smaller (finite) number of Rhythm Patterns (like MX’s 208), you might listen to them all — that’s doable.

When you have over 3400 drum grooves as in the MODX/MONTAGE, it is not recommended (necessarily) to audition them all. Life is too short. I’d suggest a different approach... if you know exactly what you’d like, then record your own. (Yes you can create your own Arp Drum Phrases).

But if you don’t and are looking for inspiration, then use the engine to refine your ‘search’. What happens to many folks, is they think that a verbal description will tell them what it sounds like... it will not... it cannot... sorry, no matter how detailed the description, there is no substitute for hearing it/trying it. So what to do?

Say you’re looking for a shuffle ... did you know, you can turn any drum arp into a shuffle using the Play FX (this adjusts the time/feel and attitude)? I mention this because here is a fact: just because a drum groove matches the tempo, does not guarantee it will work... playing with the feel via play effects (Swing Quantize, etc, etc) can adjust how it plays and can mold it into different attitudes from straight time all the way to shuffle... don’t forget you can double time, or cut time the Arps by using “Unit Multiply”

I highly recommend, as an exercise, picking a drum groove close to what you like and spend some time just experimenting with just how much you can adjust and ‘mangle’ it with Play FX, Note Limits, Velocity Limits...etc.

This exercise may help you realize that Arpeggios are extremely flexible — use as much, or as little, as you feel works. You may never find the perfect drum Arp... I mean how likely is it that someone else’s programming will fit exactly what you are envisioning. To me, that just sets you up to fail. Expect to find something close and then go to work!

Instead:
_ learn to take what you like from an Arp and remove those portions you don’t. Use Part Note Limits.
_ try finding, initially, the kick drum and snare drum pattern that fits your concept, then know you can grab another Arp Phrase and isolate just the hihat Pattern you like (by artfully using Part Note Limits on the Drum Kit you can take just what you need from each Arp Type.
_ recognize that you can swap any sound in any kit with a sound from another Kit.
_ if you find a kick/snare groove that feels right, then record your own hihat pattern, and create a new User Arp... this can be done onboard the MONTAGE.
_ since any drum sound (including any .wav/aif that you load) can be placed into any Kit, you can replace any sound in any Kit with a different drum Waveform.

Don’t mix up a DrumKit with an Arp Phrase
A Drum Kit in MONTAGE contains 73 Waveforms, one per Key, C0~C6. Each is an autonomous entity with its on Volume, Pan position, filters, Envelopes, tuning, routing configuration through the Effects, and each can be routed to the Main L&R Outputs, the Assignable Outputs Or any of the Assignable USB Outputs 1-30.

An Arp Phrase in MONTAGE is typically either Note data and/or Controller data, that when the requirements that you setup are met (Note Range, Velocity Range) will playback at the current tempo (or a multiple that references that tempo).

You can move any sound (like a “rimshot”) to any Key (C0~C6) in any Kit.
There are many types of rimshots... many of the snare drums are layered samples... stacked 3, 4, or even 5 deep... each triggers at different velocities. You may find a rimshot as the “hard strike” option on many of the snare drum sounds.

Making your own Drum Kit is a highly recommended task when looking for “new drum kits”... especially the principal Drum Kit sounds (found typically between notes C1~B2)... and yes you can load in new Drum Kits. There are drum Kits from compatible products MOXF/Motif XS/XF, Motif ES. I am not aware of any libraries that just include Drums (although the BlueMan Group Library for the Motif XF has some unique percussion sounds).

Check out the Parts that contain just Snares (Acoustic Snares, Grouped St Snares, Dance Snares...) find a snare you wish to use can move it into your DrumKit. Same with the Kick. Several Kits contain just Bass drums... you can use these to audition individual drums then move your selection into your Drum kit.

The worst thing you could do is think it should work like the MX (if you find it easy to figure out on MX it’s because it’s kind of a fixed function). Imagine when you do figure this out (and it’s doable) how happy you’re going to be.

You can manually assign Arps to any Kit, or you can accept Yamaha’s suggestion (and it is only a suggestion... for example, a Kit with “Hip Hop” in the name will likely have Hip Hop Drum grooves assigned to it, the Kits with “Rock” in the name will likely have Rock drum grooves assigned to it, “Jazz” Kits will have an appropriate groove for playing jazz, and so on.

The only real limitation is your willingness to dig in.

Extra Credit: any Song (.mid File) that you load to MONTAGE can be the source for new Drum Arpeggios. Load the Song as FILE > “Content Type” = .mid File. Once loaded you convert the drum data in that file into a User Arp... grab 4 or 8 measures or whatever you need and convert it into a User Arp using the “Fixed” note Convert Type.

Extra Credit 2: I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Groove Agent SE 5 (comes with your free copy of Cubase AI) — a lite version of one of the premiere Drum Track construction tools on this planet. If you have not explored this yet... then you should. Flexible and adjustable and dedicated to Drum programming...