all of these produce a harsher sound i guess

can you put them in some order please from soft to harsher?

SYNC, FM, RING, DISTORTION?

 

I'm not shure but my shots are
FM, Distortion, Sync, Ring

 

dude are u trying to get us off to other websites? :/ :p

thanks for the answer :D

 

What? Haha

 

Use your ears.
It's all subjective.
Listen to examples of all of them yourself and come to your own conclusion.
One man's nail scratching on blackboard nightmare is another man's harmonic heaven.

 

When used correctly they don't sound harsh.Don't overdo the effect.Analog hardware ringmod,sync,fm sounds way better than synth plugins too.

You can't sort them from softer to harsher because they are different effects,one can't replace the other.
Ringmod and exponential fm are useful for sfx sounds,synthetic drums and everything atonal generally.Try them with 2 oscillators detuned for a better effect.
Linear fm and sync can be used especially for tonal sounds,lead and basses especially.But it's not forbidden to use them for sfx and drums too,that works well for them too.I love the sync effect on analog synths.Detune the synced oscillator few semitones above the second oscillator.Try to modulate the pitch of the sync-ed oscillator with an envelope (or an lfo),that's great for basslines!

Distortion is an allround fx and most of the time it's nice when not abused.

 

You can make any kind of sound with FM/PM. Using it just for harsh sounds is completely missing the point of it.
Distortion - same, but you have to start from sine wave. I haven't seen such synth.
Sync - alternative to wavetable synthesis (in terms of what sounds can be produced), just use different starting waveshapes, very underrated and underutilized.
Ring - this one produces complex timbres very quickly, you need to carefully select the spectrum of your initial sounds.