diff --git a/DESCRIPTION b/DESCRIPTION
index 9eaece6ab0677126799ae08c6acd70ecccd1682a..4741a42c495e947b8c0168472dc56e4c139024f2 100644
--- a/DESCRIPTION
+++ b/DESCRIPTION
@@ -1,8 +1,8 @@
 Package: splatter
 Type: Package
 Title: Simple Simulation of Single-cell RNA Sequencing Data
-Version: 1.9.7.9015
-Date: 2019-09-26
+Version: 1.9.7.9016
+Date: 2019-10-01
 Author: Luke Zappia
 Authors@R:
     c(person("Luke", "Zappia", role = c("aut", "cre"),
@@ -42,7 +42,8 @@ Imports:
     SummarizedExperiment,
     utils,
     crayon,
-    S4Vectors
+    S4Vectors,
+    rlang
 Suggests:
     BiocStyle,
     covr,
diff --git a/NEWS.md b/NEWS.md
index 3cb698f85eb3fbbd1055be475dd1883d0bf08113..43dd6ea16a8847de26db27df6a2c739b12289f1a 100644
--- a/NEWS.md
+++ b/NEWS.md
@@ -1,3 +1,9 @@
+### Version 1.9.7.9016 (2019-10-01)
+
+* Change the default SplotchParams cell design to place cells at end of path
+* Add one time warning for Splotch simulation
+* Avoid unnecessarily resetting cells.design in SplotchParams
+
 ### Version 1.9.7.9015 (2019-09-26)
 
 * Add doublets to SplotchSimulate
diff --git a/R/AllClasses.R b/R/AllClasses.R
index 11c05ca8e188ca4b2c2ffa9310e61568a705120b..d53646c66cb67edd8651d9cfd52d459d9984fd66 100644
--- a/R/AllClasses.R
+++ b/R/AllClasses.R
@@ -410,8 +410,8 @@ setClass("SplotchParams",
                                cells.design = data.frame(
                                    Path = 1,
                                    Probability = 1,
-                                   Alpha = 0,
-                                   Beta = 1
+                                   Alpha = 1,
+                                   Beta = 0
                                ),
                                doublet.prop = 0,
                                ambient.scale = 0.05,
diff --git a/R/SplotchParams-methods.R b/R/SplotchParams-methods.R
index c3a51ccdc20400ac07262e42bcabc8821276e289..e8bc02604394e45470bbda31009ef16364f1dd00 100644
--- a/R/SplotchParams-methods.R
+++ b/R/SplotchParams-methods.R
@@ -11,6 +11,11 @@ newSplotchParams <- function(...) {
         stop("The Splotch simulation requires the 'DropletUtils' package.")
     }
 
+    msg <- paste("The Splotch simulation is still experimental and may produce",
+                 "unreliable results. Please try it and report any issues to",
+                 "https://github.com/Oshlack/splatter/issues.")
+    rlang:::warn_deprecated(msg, id = "warn.splotch")
+
     params <- new("SplotchParams")
     params <- setParams(params, ...)
 
@@ -260,11 +265,11 @@ setMethod("setParam", "SplotchParams", function(object, name, value) {
     }
 
     if (name == "paths.design" &&
-        (nrow(value) != nrow(getParam(object, "paths.design")))) {
+        (nrow(value) != nrow(getParam(object, "cells.design")))) {
         warning("cells.design reset to match paths.design")
         cells.design <- data.frame(Path = value$Path,
                                    Probability = 1 / nrow(value),
-                                   Alpha = 0, Beta = 1)
+                                   Alpha = 1, Beta = 0)
         object <- setParamUnchecked(object, "cells.design", cells.design)
     }
 
@@ -280,6 +285,15 @@ setMethod("setParams", "SplotchParams", function(object, update = NULL, ...) {
 
     update <- c(update, list(...))
 
+    # If both cells.design and paths.design are given set cells.design first
+    # to avoid reset warning
+    if ("cells.design" %in% names(update) &&
+        "paths.design" %in% names(update)) {
+        object <- setParamUnchecked(object, "cells.design",
+                                    update$cells.design)
+        update$cells.design <- NULL
+    }
+
     update <- bringItemsForward(update, c("network.graph", "paths.design"))
 
     object <- callNextMethod(object, update)