A muffler in the place of the primary cat would kill almost all the sound right at the engine, and hardly any would make it to the tips unless you're at WOT. Unless stock-quiet is what you want until you rip on it?
My car is running with stock manifolds->stock primary cat->resonator->two resonators at the tips.
It is currently loud enough to make me nervous pacing next to a police car. Removing a main cat would be a definate noise citation, but so will my headers. No doubt headers will sound better than no cat converter.. so I frankly don't care
Though, headers+cat delete, back to a resonator is just asking for ear-burning loud. jmo.