if I put plugin such as schwa's audio_statistics or any similar to the master track, it shows me the levels of audio on the master track. Question: Why is the levels of audio volume on these plugins on the master track indepenent of the volume setting of the master track? It is even independent of the Mute-button. If, for mastering purposes, I want to fine-tune the level of audio volume on a 24-bit master track so that it does not distort when rendered to a separate 16-bit wav-file, how can I do it when I don't see the effect of master track volume on the final output? Don't the master track volume meters in the mixer window show the volume BEFORE the effects on the master track are applied? Nothing shows me the levels AFTER, or how is it?

All meters are post fader and pan afaik which is a longstanding FR that I hope is still on the table, switchable pre-fader metering. Also there are no post-fader FX slots so you can't do what you want to do with the master without using some pre-master groups.

Duh? How is this a problem? If you set the Master fader at 0.00 it doesn't do anything to the signal, therefore you can control the final level by the plugin, which is what you want right? ie. set a limiter at - 0.03 db that's exactly what you get. If you have too much/too little signal coming into the master, you have a number of choices, including putting a volume plug before the limiter. However i would say if you need to do that you have your track levels all wrong. What am I missing?