We get new people around every week. Its just if they speak up or not.

.
Are the DMT bifolds the butterfly style sharpeners I've seen?
Yep, those are the ones. I typically clamp them down at the pivot with a small vice to make a benchstone out of them when reprofiling, otherwise just holding them works fine. I have a C hone (that's getting pretty worn out) and a F/EF hone, and that's typically good enough for heavy work.
After that I have the option of running them through Spyderco sharpmaker rods, M/F/UF, but I really only use those for recurves, e.g., boning and fillet knives. Those are just the standalone rods, I didn't bother getting doubles or the plastic base. And then I have a King 1k/6k combo waterstone that I use for kitchen knives.
It took me a while to settle on the sharpening equipment I like, but I'm pretty content with these tools. By shopping around I believe I spent ~$100 on all of it over the past couple years, but with very little overlap of function and they can handle just about any sharpening scenario. I probably could've done without the waterstone, but I was curious as to how they work.
Just saw your comment about the strop - I've tried DMT diamond paste in the past, and it was interesting, but I don't strop enough to warrant its cost. One thing I will say, though, is that if you get into stropping you need to tailor it to what grit the knives leave the stones at. For example, me sharpening up to a DMT F and then jumping straight to 1 micron paste wouldn't really do much good, since it's too big of a gap. You probably know all that from sharpening in general, but I found that difference to be especially pronounced between stones and strops, and often overlooked.
All that being said, I question the ability (or efficiency) of the compounds I have been using to sharpen 3V. I will be interested in hearing others experience.
Yeah, I'll use plain buffing compound once in a while on softer steels, and it works great on 1095, VG10 and the like. But definitely not on steels to the level of 3V.
If I'm not mistaken, it's much weaker than the kind you're using (so take what I say with a grain of salt), but if you're having trouble with it it might be worth looking into diamond paste. But I'm not knowledgeable to point you to good deals or brands and all that.