One happy mistake happened to me during a game. The players were in an abandoned temple and could hear a gibbering mouther but hadn't seen it yet. I used a mix of multiple voices on my computer. As they are exploring and trying to avoid this monster through eerie, dark passageways, it went silent. It went completely silent. I accidentally muted my computer. My players freaked in the deafening and sudden silence. It was glorious.
My favourite song moment in an RPG was when I played a slowed down and deepened sweet dreams are made of this when my players finally encountered the undead sorcerer in Call of Cthulhu. Very effective, my players can’t hear that song without being slightly afraid now.
Conan the Barbarian theme music is the single greatest combat intro music of all time. You know how you can be playing a video game, and when the combat music kicks in, you're in combat mode? You can condition your players like Pavlov's dogs. Play Conan's music and watch them reach for initiative dice.
If you are looking for the complete score of Conan the Barbarian, look for the "Prometheus Edition". Contains ALL the tracks from the movie and some alternate versions of the songs. Plus Basil was not happy with the original recording due to the technology of recording at the time, the Prometheus version fixes that.
We were playing Traveller a few weeks ago and my wife had a scene for us where we had to rush to shut down a space station's self destruct sequence. The "music" she chose for this was a countdown ambiance with an audible computer voice telling you the time you had left every 30 seconds until the self destruct sequence could not be reversed, starting from 8 minutes...We saved the station with 1 minute and 10 seconds left. Genuinely started panicking toward the end, cause she didn't stop the timer for anything. That was the best session we've had so far. Edit: The timer gives you 6 minutes from the start before self destruct is irreversible, meaning after 6 minutes, you'd better be finding your way off the station.
To the point of not using recognizable songs, I have a player who calls out "Skyrim!" whenever she hears a song from skyrim... or a song that she thinks is from skyrim. Honestly, about half the time, the songs aren't from skyrim
The "you're not a DJ" part can be overcome with solid note taking. I've been working musical transitions and stings in to my games for years, and it always goes over extremely well. My tip is: use a laptop not a phone, so you can transition at the click of a finger, and make sure you prep your playlist before the session begins so there's no hunting time.
Me: "Ah yes, I like music for my games, I think I'll take this advice" Also me: Doesn't quite get to the "not too recognizable" part My entire Traveller group: "I WAS BORN IN COLONIES ON FRINGE WORLDS OF THE GALAXY" Me: "Ohhh..." Great stuff. I've always been a fan of a recurring "credits" song to signal the end of a session, but I may well have to start employing the group pump-up song as well.
Me: Enemy NPCs hears... "Mortify! Glorify! Patriotic Parasite! Punishment to fit the tribal! Feeding them to meet the slaughterer!" (Mushroomhead - Qwerty) ... Then they realize what fresh Hell awaits them. lol
Long time listener. First time caller. Similar to what Seth was saying about playing a song before the session to get yourself in the mood, I have started listening to ambient sounds while writing my adventures to help get myself in the proper creative mindset. It has been very helpful having dungeon noises playing in the background while I write up a Classic crawl, or the sounds of a tavern while I’m writing up the obligatory initial meeting of the characters.
an example of the dynamic timer: my DM was running us through the 3.5 version of Ravenloft. we were in the temple trying to re-bless the sunsword. she puts on Newman's "I'm so scared" really good mood music and saying "tick" to indicate turn counts (where we say what we are doing at that moment) right when the lyrics blast in is when Strahd busts down the door....yeah my Paladin developed a nervous tick of rubbing her neck after that encounter
I use a "send out" song to end my play sessions. I use the A-Team theme song. It doesn't matter the genre. I feel it leaves everybody excited for next time and reminds the players that they are playing heroes!
I had a group of players sneaking around a drawevn mine and I couldn't think of any song so I played diggy diggy hole as the drawfs where mineing luckly they had there pcs sing along quitely to help pass the time while sneaking
When running Call of Cthulhu I like playing parts of the L.A Noire soundtrack for when the players are investigating. I think it works pretty well for those moments. Otherwise, I just play sound effects like a thunderstorm if it fits.
I played music only once, and it was awesome. Organ music when the 5e party entered castle ravenloft, as the vampire was playing an audible pipe organ. Pandemonium and terror ensued. It was beautiful.
On the other hand, when someone starts doing a behavior that negatively affects other players, you can always cue the Star Trek Pon Farr Duel music. It's just annoying and stupid enough, and reminder that you're being an unreasoning dick towards your friends.
I've been experimenting with music in my games recently, and it's been a real blast! My players usually get the feeling I'm trying to convey, or they do feel something else unexpected that also makes sense for the story and all... I guess this happens mainly because I use solely instrumental music and sound effects, which gives an eerily feeling to fantastical scenarios. Nonetheless, these were really nice tips! I'll surely use some of these ideas, thank you!
I have not been sub to this channel for very long but I wanted to say I've really enjoyed your thoughts, ideas and opinions on RPGs. Thank you for taking the time and love doing this all for us.
While playing Edge of the Empire, a couple of my party members were fighting their way out of a corporate facility after sabotaging their computers. And every once in a while, we would cut to my shady underworld doctor character being chased through said facility, arms filled supplies stolen from their medical closets, while Yakety Sax played in the background. It was a delightful contrast.
A player at my table has two particular ring tones that come up on his phone during gaming - Yakkity Sax and the Whaugh Waugh Waugh sound of disappointment. The latter is when his wife calls, and she has some excellent comedic timing.
I'm a big proponent of using background music as a gamemaster. In my last long running campaign, whenever there was an interaction with the campaign's main antagonist, I had a specific song play. This stuck in the players' minds after a while and when the song would play they would all react with some variation of "Oh no...". As a GM it was really satisfying to know that the players were so invested that they had formed an emotional connection between the song and the villain, almost dreading the idea that the song *might* start playing. (This was enhanced by that they'd taken to calling the villain by a certain alias, which was a misremembering of his actual alias that they had heard from an npc) When it comes to selecting songs, I favor extended versions of video game music. Movie scores, while often great sounding, are made to enhance story beats, while video game music is intended to be tolerable for much longer lengths of time. Of course YMMV, and there are many exceptions to this.
Thankyou! I did a playlist for my latest game and it really got the players involved - so much so that one of them who doesn't roleplay their character actually started talking as their character. Thankyou!!
The bluetooth speaker is a great idea! I was just gifted one of these. Been thinking about writing and running a campaign - I'll have to come back to this video!
An added benefit of using UA-cam videos is that you can stream both the video and audio to a TV if you have one in your room, which can add a little extra visual element to the atmosphere. It often helps with easily distracted players: instead of reaching for a phone at the table, they'll stare at the cool visuals and get drawn back into the game.
I once ran a CoC scenario where the first half is a pretty noir story about tracking down a missing woman in 1920s Hollywood where you confront oil companies, cults etc and the second half involves entering an underground Yithian bio-preserve with dinosaurs. When the players were going underground I handled the tonal shift from noir style jazz to the Jurassic Park theme and timed it just right so that the part everyone recognizes would play right when they open the door to the Yithian bio-preserve. Players really enjoyed the ‘effect’ and how the music helped transition to something that could easily give tonal whiplash
Several years back, I ran a game I called Jitters with four teenager PCs spending a week at a friend's cabin. They were slowly encountering strange things, ghostly activity, one of which was a loud thump coming from upstairs once two nights in a row. When the nosy one in the group finally picked the lock and stepped in, I used "Under Stars" by Brian Eno as they were greeted by a bedroom that hadn't been touched in quite some time. They realized that someone had once lived in there and with all these belongings just sitting around, collecting dust, the track added this unnatural, spooky yet kind of sad quality to the moment. The best part was this was during the day and nothing strange happened once they were in there. In fact, they discovered a bowling ball that fell from its place and they started to doubt the supernatural elements, at least by a tiny bit. That track and that scene have both been burned into our minds ever since. Music & ambience are absolutely some of my most beloved tools in my GM toolbox.
I started playing a bard in my latest DnD campaign, so for that and a few other reasons, I started taking what we did in our sessions, turning it into lyrics, and actually singing and recording it. The DM decided to play the songs at the beginning of each session to recap the previous session. I'm learning a lot about the process as I go, so win all around.
Regarding the DJ issue, you can also make a session playlist (provided you choose tracks of appropriate length, such as background ambient stuff) and rapidly choose the track you need from a list of just 4 or 5 without needing to scroll and search. I've used this pretty effectively in my in-person sessions, and have found it enables me to change seamlessly from behind the screen while still talking. Also, we don't play CoC, but my D&D 5e campaign is very Lovecraft inspired. I love Cryo Chamber for dark mood ambient music. There are also several great channels on UA-cam for D&D game backgrounds.
I've found success with video game soundtracks. Tracks are often intended to be looped so it's easy to extend it to match your scene. The Cultist Simulator OST really sticks out for setting the mood and being stimulating without being distracting
I agree with this video 110%. I highly recommend music as it does a lot for adding to the mood. I also highly recommend Syrinscape. It is an amazing product. I don't use all the effects. I just preset the music and ambient sounds based on the setting and then have one preset for battle.
Hey, curious, does it work over Discord? I am having to run online now that half my players have moved several hours away from me and Discord is not very amenable to my 4-8 tabs of UA-cam being streamed to try and cover all my layered ambient soundtracks and stuff
@@Walter-McIntyre I haven't tried it via discord via imbed or stream but it does come through via my mic but that led to me always transmitting. I normally use Syrinscape via my phone app but if you check their site you might find info on imbedding it into other programs.
I have never taken the time to thank you for the videos you upload. Your videos have helped me alot in running CoC and DND games and I think they are really really usefull. I love you scenarios from CoC reviews, great tips for us newbies. Keep up the awesome job! :) Greetings from Costa Rica
Been really pleased with Syrinscape’s custom soundset for Masks of Nyartlathotep, which I’ve been using. One other suggestion: Newer models of bluetooth speakers often have the ability to pair to each other in stereo mode, which allows you to create a sort of portable quasi-surround sound to enhance the illusion of really being in that speakeasy/pyramid/whatever, with different ambient noises coming from different directions. (I’ve been using Anker’s Soundcore 2, which have surprisingly good sound quality at a relatively modest price point, in case anyone cares.)
Even as a player, I used pump up songs when a previous group was playing Shadow Run, and to get into the right mindset for my nihilistic dwarf arsonist toon, I always listened to "Up in Here" and "Get It On the Floor" by DMX on the drive to our hosts' house.
Synth wave artist mega drive really hammers down the cyberpunk combat vibe. players love it and all the solos getting pumped to unload clips into NPCs.
Video game tracks are really great to use. My favorites are from Neverwinters Nights, or any soundtrack by Jeremy Soule is a great resource. The Diablo soundtrack as well is great. Video game tracks are great in that they have been put together specifically to invoke the mood you're probably looking for AND a lot of the tracks are 5 to 10 minutes long.
I tried sirynscape and I enjoyed it, I even got to the point to have each character having a personal theme song while they were leading the action, but in the long run, I decided usually not to have any music at all, I think the better the players can concentrate on my voice the easiest is for me to drag them in the mood I want to. I might still have some tune as a backup plan to build tension if my group gets distracted or "cold". BTW thanks for the channel, I think I never wrote it, but you've been a lot helpful to my game!
Holy cow! That band Slough Feg has a concept album based on Traveller?!?! I thought Seth had just artfully pasted the Traveller logo onto an album cover. Nope. It is the actual album cover. Now this I gotta hear...
I really like using songs from the Sunless Sea and Professor Layton games for my sessions, the Sunless Sea sountrack specially I find is great for Call of Cthulhu
My favorite time using music in game was a one shot for a friend's bachelor party I was dming. I had the bard bring in a Bluetooth speaker and he would set the music and tone based on what his character was playing at the time (he constantly had to be playing a form of music as his character's quirk) it all culminated in the his character bringing out his broken violin, having it blessed by the gods and preforming devil went down to Georgia. Nat 20 later and the everyone in the group got a huge advantage and we all had a great time!
I agree 100% with this! Just this last Saturday, we finished a year-long Star Wars campaign. Just like you said, my Jedi was facing down the BBG Sith Lord and our game master put on Duel of the Fates. It was a whole new level of epic! 😎
Great video as always and some really great advice. The pump up song is something I use all the time, when I ran Deadlands: Reloaded i listed to "Evil Ways" by Blues Saraceno on my way to the game. It put me in the right mood for the game in the Weird West.
One of the first things I did when I started GMing earlier this year was test my bluetooth speaker. I was playing at someone elses house, so I had the speaker at my feet under the table. That worked well for a few sessions, but I found it would stop working every so often. Now that I've switched to digital maps, my monitor also has speakers. My music now comes out of the middle of the table. I find this means everyone gets to hear the music at the same level, instead of those closest to me. I started using Syrinscape, but I did find myself getting distracted and not using it effectively. Eventually I ditched it and made my own playlists. I found all of my players are Final Fantasy fans, and I've been collecting the games and music for a couple decades now. Once I get more experience, I will try it again because it is a useful tool with many options. I just didn't have enough time to work out how to use it best while keeping attention on the game. I want to run Cyberpunk 2020 and/or Cyberpunk Red, so I might look back into Syrinscape. Your videos are great. I find you're one of the few that talks about Cyberpunk 2020 and gives advice. Thank you.
Mr. Skorkowsky, just wanted to say thank you so very much for giving me advice on my Halloween one-shot of Call of Cthulhu months ago. I did a variation on the Pulp System where they were all kids, so they only had the normal tenth of size and con hit points, and it was basically Goonies crossed with Monster Squad using plot ideas we had discussed, and it was a smashing success.
I have a 47 minute long playlist of every Star Wars cantina song I could find for my Star Wars D6 games. I also used to have a sound board on my old tablet for my bard full of concertina and hurdy-gurdy music for my kobold bard. I really love the idea of ambient sounds rather than music. I'd really like to go that route in the future!
I have all the same rules if it comes to music and ambient. I use particular pieces only when I know for sure how much time I got. Like NPC monologue or important scene. If it comes to playlists I use mood instead of locations. So I use things like: Calm, Intrigue, Riddle, Horror, Sadness, Action, Combat. I try to have every list around 30-60 minutes and I prefer to have longer pieces in it. Like 5 to 10 minutes per clip. With this, music becomes (as you said) a part of memories. Nostalgia can be powerful drive to play. ;)
My GM for a mixed world of darkness campaign put a short introvideo for us together, including all our characters and the overall theme of the campaign. We always started chatting along until suddenly he would play the video and we knew it was time to play. I once used a song (something from the MI:2 soundtrack if I remember correctly) to design a dungeon based on its lyrics. When the adventurer party arrived at the entrace an animated statue would sing them the song. Took them a while until they managed to recognice the basic design of the rooms with the lyrics but after that it worked realy well.
Three amazing Irish tunes: Rocky Road to Dublin: This one is fast paced, intense, and gives you the feeling you're in a boxing match. Oro se do Bheatha Bhaile: A nice marching tune, nothings happening but exploring. The Foggy Dew: Play Luke Kelly or Sinead O'Connor, this one sets up for something, usually a fight.
The Sea Hawk film score was the inspiration for the original Star Wars film scores it is great to use if you want that John Williams feel without being too recognizable as Star Wars.
Because of the distraction issues described, I've only ever played what I called 'opening and closing credits' tracks. These signified that we were starting and ending the session. This also allowed me to use songs if I wanted. Even pop could work - Fortress Around Your Heart by Sting and Branford Marsalis thematically fit the exploring of an abandoned keep and has a certain 'regal' musical vibe. More often however I used instrumentals - particularly stuff from 70s concept albums by bands like Gryphon. I should, however, in future consider ambient soundscapes as that sounds like it solves the distraction issue.
For game music I can't recommend Groupees enough. There is very often bundles of ambient, Celtic, video game, synthwave, and space themed albums. I run a steady stream of synthwave in my games and I now have literally hundreds of whole albums to choose from thanks to groupees. If you catch them on the presale days you can usually get a bundle of about 10 or so albums for a dollar or two. I find movie or game music too recognizable for my group so this has really helped to give my world it's own sound. Having said that, using well known tunes for a karaoke puzzle that they had to sing in character was one of the highlights of my entire campaign.
I find the recognizable music rule is okay to break under the condition of "is it appropriate and comedic for the scene?" A fun example I can think of was one of my players playing the benny hill theme during a post apoc roleplay that involved an absolutely absurd chase scene across the desert between the players in vehicles and a giant monstrous worm. One of the players was even stuck inside the thing at the beginning of the chase scene, the only reason they didn't immediately die was their vehicle didn't get fully crushed and acted like a shark cage but oh so much worse. It was a good and fun chase scene of them racing around the desert screaming for dear life and frantically trying to rescue their friend while also trying not to get eaten as the benny hill theme played in the background. So I've made it customary to have that music piece on hand just in case something similar happens, it typically ends up with everyone at the table in tears of laughter.
Many years ago I ran a Battlestar Galactica game, Before play, every player had to agree to one thing, I could make any of them be cylons at anytime, (This is something the rpg as written had dropped the ball on in its design, not using the cylon aspect fully) I was aiming at not just a sci fi action adventure, but a psychological thriller, No one knew who would be a cylon, (there were layers to this, 1. The un-conscious cylon, (the player had no idea they were a cylon, they could just loose track of time while the cylon in him wreaked havoc) 2. The semi conscious cylon, (the player suspected he could be a cylon, and acted accordingly) 3. The fully conscious cylon, (SoB!) While the first two types where in GM control while cylon mode, the third was left to the player to control, (Bare in mind, the whole game I’m passing secret notes to the players, and taking them out of the room to chat in private, to help cultivate paranoia,) The teams Battlestar had not left the colonies to look for Earth (they didn’t even consider the possibility, thinking it was only a myth) but instead stayed behind to fight, a desperate hit and run, cat and mouse (mostly the mouse) type conflict against the odds, moving from planet to planet trying to help the survivors to fight back, (trying to save survivors, or bring them medical, weapons and food etc) all the time trying to stay one step ahead of the cylons, while they attacked strategic points, dodged bait and traps, (after they got sucked in to a “distress call” from a fellow battlestar that turned out to be three cylon basestar’s, they got...cautious) and trying to keep functioning, It was a great game, till two of the players had to drop out, Not sure how it would of ended, The games theme song was “Papercut” by Linkin Park (The lyrics played really well to the game, also worked well for space fighter mass combat, missiles and flack while fighting cylon raiders)
I'm always reminded of the three part MegaTraveller scenario 'Behind Blue Eyes' published in issues 48, 50 & 51 of Challenge magazine. At the conclusion of the scenario author Charles Gannon has a short GMs eyes only scene in which two characters have downtime after the scenario. In the course of this one of the characters reveals they collect old audio recordings and proceeds to play The Who's version of the song 'Behind Blue Eyes' which the other character mistakes for Veedback (The Traveller 'House Band')...
As someone who runs Jojo tabletop rpg, I'd say that music is *essential*. I love to introduce enemy stands with their musical reference playing in the background and I also play the character's reference when they do something epic or they are the focus of a section Trust me, having Du Hast play while Rammstein is transforming a player into a donut and starts to mow down the team and then have Sonne play once they discover that it is a multiple entity stand, this is incredibly cool and my player love it And for those who have no idea of what I am saying : read Jojo, it's good (albeit weird at times)
I was running a call of cthulhu campaign where we were doing an extended section at a speakeasy where one group of investigators was meeting with another group and some important NPCs. I put on (most of) the 20s playlist from postmodern jukebox. It worked really well. The idea of a player getting lost in the song translated perfectly to to character staring at the singer on stage and not paying attention to the surroundings.
I made my own table top RPG about a year ago (very loosely put together, not complete, needs LOTS of work, but still) and it was based in real life in the Vietnam War. I’m quite the history buff so this was really fun for me to run, but by far my favorite moment was when my players were in their foxholes awaiting an apparent NVA attack that was supposed to happen that night. It was dark and there was tension in the air as nighttime jungle sounds was blaring from the speaker. Then, the sounds fade, and slowly NIB by Black Sabbath begins to play. As the Base line continues on and on the players become more and more anxious as to when the enemy will arrive. Then, as soon as the guitar comes in, a trip flare goes off in the far distance in the jungle, and I firmly and calmly announce to the players, “They’re coming.” And the rest is history.
Agreed, if the music becomes grating, or distracting then you are either playing it to loud or the wrong kind of music, I always use music to in to game mode on some settings (Star Wars, Star Trek, Ghostbusters etc, basically anything that has its own soundtrack, ironically I don’t use the Lord of the Rings or Conan, but do use Indiana Jones tracks) The amount I use during gaming is less, maybe a fifty-fifty split, some games don’t support soundtracks as well, Like CoC, I find it a subtle vibe to balance, to build up the tension, you don’t need a track undermining or disrupting that, But pulpy, good to go, (think The Shadow, The Rocketeer or The Phantom etc, don’t be afraid to mix it up, I’ve used the theme track from Robin Hood prince of thieves (overture) for Star Trek, and “The firetruck” from the Evolution soundtrack for a Serenity game) Sometimes I will only use music at the beginning to set everyone’s mood, it can help everyone get on the same page, But no music the rest of the game, Sometimes I use music to drive a point, Martika’s “Toy Soldiers” wasn’t just a theme song for Twilight 2000, but it was also played every time a character died (the description in slow motion) to create pathos, it became a tradition, life is cheap in Twilight 2000, but I didn’t want it to become meaningless, (oh you died go roll up another character thing,) I wanted everyone to feel it, If anybody needs help in looking for the right track for their game I’d be happy to help,
I'm really into music so I think about it a lot for the games I run. For one campaign, everyone in the party played an instrument except for the one mute character who communicated with a chalk board he carried. I wrote them a theme song that used all of their instruments and chalk-board sounds as percussion to use as the pump-up music. They all liked that.
I have fond memories of using "into the fog" from the Master & Commander Soundtrack as the opening theme to our Savage Tide adventure path. When it started playing and the drums Hit they knew that game was on. I gave them a quick recap from the last "Episode" while the song was playing and into adventure we went
Excellent as always. I ran an Aliens one-shot years ago that took place on a ship without atmosphere so the characters were all in vac suits. I found a breathing ambient track that worked very well and was very creepy.
In addition to many video game soundtracks (Dragon Age, Sky Rim, Witcher), I've turned to a number of epic instrumental groups like 2WEI, Hidden Citizens, Think Up Anger, and of course the classic Two Step From Hell (if you can only check out one, make it Two Steps, but the others can be previewed easily enough on youtube). Also for some higher energy theme on a bagpipe, Snakecharmer has great covers (Pirates of the Caribbean, Avengers, to name a few). In my humble opinion, she's got as much geek cred as Lindsey Stirling. UA-cam has so many epic music collections, but the recent add interruptions make it less useful unless you have a designated DJ to moderate the play list. Also that designated DJ as the non DM is a great tool with Syrinscape too. Totally agree with your points of volume and potential distraction and energy control. Other ways we have used music at our table - Opening Theme Music to set the mood (Used the theme from Dune and Hunt for Red October for a Forgotten Suns game, Miserlou cover by Tina Gao for a crime heist scene, and so on) - Asking players to identify the 'theme music' for their character. For a super hero table we went so far as to have play lists for individual characters. I've taken that to get into the mindset of specific characters like a halfling brawler by listening to Drowsy Maggie and Devil's in the Kitchen. - For a particular campaign, I listen in the car to a mix of The Chain (Fleetwood Mac), Bury Them Deep (Ghoultown), and the classic Good The Bad & The Ugly (Marcionne), setting the mental scene for Frontier Adventures along the Savage Coast. Please keep the videos coming, love to watch and listen and sometimes even revisit.
I never really considered music for roleplaying until I got with a group that used it sometimes. So when I ran first edition Gamma World as a filler game, I played a bootleg copy of the first 2 Fallout computer games sound tracks and it really did help to set the mood of the post apocalypse world I was creating.
I've used music in gaming since...well, 2nd edition DnD I suppose. Back then it was Conan and Ride of the Valykeries over and over. Years back though I purchased RPG soundmixer and still use that today, importing movie and videogame soundtracks and special effects (lightning, wind, wolves, etc). But thanks to you, I just got the MP3 of Goldsmith's King Solomon and the Omen, both of which should make excellent additions to my Pulp Cthulhu campaign. Thanks!!!
My recommendation for music would be the Bioshock soundtrack (infinite too), Skyrim, Stygian Reign of the Old Ones (An amazing Lovecraft RPG game) and a video full of Lovecraftian music called "The Old Ones and other beings" or something like that. Love the channel, I recomend making a discord server to talk to fans more about video ideas, rpg and more.
I lived in a house full of gamers and we had games going most of the week but not enough energy to play in all of them so pretty often we would assist another game master when they ran a game, either a roommate in the house or a visiting GM. One of my favorite assists was being a DJ for a game, I could do it while focusing on other work I was doing at my desk and I got to be socially involved in a game without having to keep track of the 5th game plot of the week. I bought a 3 CD set of sound effects and would talk to the GM about what effects he wanted and timing of them and queue them up along with the background music. I'm not a sound engineer and don't' have expensive software to mix sound or time to build sound. There are a few soundtracks that are just really good instrumental stuff like Pirates of the Carribean Soundtrack or Tron Legacies.
My brother Gm a Vietnam war game (I forgot the system) and every time the party would be ambushed by Vietcong, or their helicopter would get shot at, my brother would play "Fortunate son". It got to the point where the first couple of notes from that song would give the players dnd ptsd. It got funny when during one of the quiet moments of the session when the party was at an army base preparing an attack on a village. One of the players pulled up a playlist of Vietnam area songs (like his characters was listening to the radio while fixing a jeep), he was getting songs like "sympothy for the devil", "war what is it good for", and "Give peace a chance". Then when the party was nearly done with preparations, the playlist plays "Fortunate son". I have never seen a bunch of players get panic attacks trying to stop a youtube video. To keep with tradition my brother had the Vietcong attack the base.
What I will do for a chronicle/campaign is make a soundtrack. You don't play the music during the game except in certain circumstances. The real purpose is just as you said, a "pump-up." If I'm getting ready to prep or just get me in the mindset, I'll play the soundtrack in the background. This even includes character themes, which my players tend to dig as it's me engaging with the character's backstory. During games, I'll also have ambient music and Syrinscape!
We have it good these days with spotify, mp3s, Tabletop audio soundboard. Back in the days I burned custom CDs with fitting songs on them for almost every adventure. And I would make song lists that I could look at and quickly find a CD for a specific sound theme. For example: CD #12 Cave Adventures, Track #1 scary, Track#2 combat, Track#3 stealthy....and so on. =) A tip is also that you always listen thru the song you are going to use. Many soundtracks is custom made for scenes in a movie and can therefore change tone and tempo in the middle of the song and there is nothing worse then getting "jolly halfling tavern" in the middle of the creepy mood song.
Tabletop Audio has bloody awesome ambient sounds and you can create and save your own custom soundpads using sounds from different existing pads. For background music and other incidental sounds, I use _Linux Show Player_ (no prizes for guessing what OS I run) to have music and sound effects cued up to be invoked (or dismissed) with a single click. This enables me to play specific pre-selected songs at key moments in the game if I desire. e.g. the party (Cyberpunk) were following a gang member through a particular area of town (had ambient futuristic city sounds from Tabletop Audio in the background and I was playing some suitable rock music out of Linux Show Player to set the mood) and - as I wanted to make it clear that the mood was about to take a darker turn, I clicked on the playing song's cue, which put it into 5-second fade out and then clicked on the cue for _Gangsta's Paradise_ - which created a great musical transition. I gave the players a few seconds to note the mood change before bringing in the rival gang members... As to pump up music, we play Queen's _Another One Bites the Dust_ before our Cyberpunk games.
7:18 pregame pump up song? Hm, I like the idea! I was thinking of running a game with my friends in the "Blood War" setting. Basically, demons and devils are both evil, but they are on polar opposites when it comes to the grand scheme of things. The players would be on the side of the devils, trying to stop the demons from wreaking havoc on the world because then there would be no world for the devils to rule if the demons have their way. I feel that cage the elephant "ain't no rest for the wicked" would be a good pregame song for this evil campaign.
I use laptop to run games, use foobar with several playlists for tone and environment too. Very easy to navigate. There were two sessions for Vampire the masquerade for which I pirated a ton of "instrumentals" of Tokyo Hotel, Avril Lavigne and such from 2007. Was a blast. Also I once used sound effects for surprise wild animals, was fun too. Players didn't recognize cougar and thought it was a human screaming. My fav soundtrack for lovecraftian horror breaking free is Sote. They make incredibly dense mix of freakish idm and traditional instruments. My players have already learnt to fear it.
6:45 one of the most terrifying examples I've used this was the Neurosis song "Through Silver in Blood" which I had playing while my players crossed an anomalous collapsed car park in Stalker: The Scifi RPG. I had the track itself play normally with the growing threat of tension, as they felt SOMETHING was in the car park they needed to cross but they weren't sure what as parts of the rubble were moving. They were dragging their feet, and once the song got to around 2:45 once that riff grows and crushes the song, I lowered the volume to describe a pack of animate scrap metal dogs which charged through the rubble, cleaving through steel and cement like a hot knife through butter. You BET my players were trying to hightail it out of there as fast as they could.
I am in the midst of DM'ing a huge homebrew horror themed D&D campaign and we treat it like episodes of a series. The name of the party and therefor the name of the series is The Flying Tigers and our theme music is Crystallize by Lindsey Stirling. So while I play that at the start of the session one of my players does a "previously on" for recap. Each of the pc's also have a theme song; our warforged gunslinger has We Are 138 by The Misfits, our warforged artificer has the theme from Doom and our wood elf ranger , who is a lycanthrope, has Lupen Tooth by Blitzkid. For battle I use some war drums or death metal. I also use ambient for mood, either D&D specific found on yt or the yt channel Cryo Chamber.
I used to DJ as a player in my friend's game, taking hints from him as to what music would be appropriate for certain NPCs/themes/moods, but also using my own creativity as well. It worked very well, and if anyone is musically inclined or has a player that is, I can recommend giving it a try. :) edit: Also, I have had the idea of composing my own music with several adaptive shifts and writing my own music player that lets me fade between them at a press of a button (e.g. bringing in a percussion section during an enemy's combat turn). Haven't implemented that yet though as I don't do as much RP these days.
Very good advice! I've done much of the sound track stuff, but not too much ambient sound. I put together a "Creepy Music" soundtrack for when my players were exploring a haunted town. It's fairly long, so we didn't get too much repetition during our sessions. Well, the third session in the town, and the party leader said to the others "We gotta finish this. This is getting to me." There was a brief pause in the conversation, broken suddenly by the laugh of Vincent Price from Thriller! The player looked at me with that fuck you look, even though the thing had been just playing with no manipulation from me. Good times. I also did the timer thing, though they didn't know. They were doing some stuff secretly at a concert, K.O.ing people, and stashing the folks here & there, all the while I have this nice long violin performance playing. Then, the performance reaches the end and there's a bunch of applause heard. My eyebrows shoot up and I say "Uh-oh! Sounds like it's intermission!" They SCRAMBLED to put things looking right and not seem suspicious! But I heartily agree with using music when it's appropriate. Fighting a boss, let the music play! Fighting a dozen goblins, not so much. I recommend Two Steps From Hell. They have a lot of music only/non-English songs for many styles of games.
One thing to remember about music is you can use songs differently from their original purpose. For instance my main traveling theme is Random Dungeon Theme 3 and my main destroyed town theme is Hidden Land, both from the Explorer trilogy of Pokemon Mystery Dungeon games. Try experimenting as much as possible and see where you can fit songs into.
I don't do music very much because my group is on Roll20 and it can get easily distracting. However I once used a cut from a track for a specific purpose in my Spelljammer game; the first time they launched their ship I played the refrain from the theme to Smokey and the Bandit, you know "east bound and down, loaded up and truckin'..." It was a great moment that set the tone of the campaign. I used Space Truckin', plus Star Lords mix tape for incidental music before the game started. But 99% of the time I don't use music, and very seldom special sound effects.
One happy mistake happened to me during a game. The players were in an abandoned temple and could hear a gibbering mouther but hadn't seen it yet. I used a mix of multiple voices on my computer. As they are exploring and trying to avoid this monster through eerie, dark passageways, it went silent. It went completely silent. I accidentally muted my computer. My players freaked in the deafening and sudden silence. It was glorious.
"We-eee, are never, ever, ever..."
*splits orc skull with axe*
"...getting back together"
This got a good chuckle
*poisons the king and whispers in his ear as he slowly dies*
Now we got bad blood...
My favourite song moment in an RPG was when I played a slowed down and deepened sweet dreams are made of this when my players finally encountered the undead sorcerer in Call of Cthulhu.
Very effective, my players can’t hear that song without being slightly afraid now.
Way cool!!!
My favorite is when the bad guy set a trap where this song played ua-cam.com/video/QUjR8zzsULw/v-deo.html
Daaaamn...
That is one of those songs...
Brilliant version. I can see it work for my manipulator villain too, he actually travelled a lot :D
Conan the Barbarian theme music is the single greatest combat intro music of all time. You know how you can be playing a video game, and when the combat music kicks in, you're in combat mode? You can condition your players like Pavlov's dogs. Play Conan's music and watch them reach for initiative dice.
Basil Poledouris was a true master.
Excalibur has some epic battle music as well for a fantasy setting.
But yea, can't go wrong with Conan! Love both soundtracks.
I came to the comments section for the inevitable Conan soundtrack reference.
Legendary.
If you are looking for the complete score of Conan the Barbarian, look for the "Prometheus Edition". Contains ALL the tracks from the movie and some alternate versions of the songs. Plus Basil was not happy with the original recording due to the technology of recording at the time, the Prometheus version fixes that.
@@michaelgallagher9534 ua-cam.com/video/hEW8wrqQ-Ps/v-deo.html
We were playing Traveller a few weeks ago and my wife had a scene for us where we had to rush to shut down a space station's self destruct sequence. The "music" she chose for this was a countdown ambiance with an audible computer voice telling you the time you had left every 30 seconds until the self destruct sequence could not be reversed, starting from 8 minutes...We saved the station with 1 minute and 10 seconds left.
Genuinely started panicking toward the end, cause she didn't stop the timer for anything. That was the best session we've had so far.
Edit:
The timer gives you 6 minutes from the start before self destruct is irreversible, meaning after 6 minutes, you'd better be finding your way off the station.
That sounds amazing! Holy crap, I bet that got intense.
To the point of not using recognizable songs, I have a player who calls out "Skyrim!" whenever she hears a song from skyrim... or a song that she thinks is from skyrim. Honestly, about half the time, the songs aren't from skyrim
... but about half the time they are! 😆😆
I have a hunch they're all by Jeremy Soule though.
Try the Lord of the Rings Online music, it's not easily recognized and is in the same category.
"It's not from Skyrim Karen, it's from Morrowind!"
Try some Two Steps From Hell. They've got a lot of tunes that fit well for lots of games, and they're not really well known.
The "you're not a DJ" part can be overcome with solid note taking. I've been working musical transitions and stings in to my games for years, and it always goes over extremely well. My tip is: use a laptop not a phone, so you can transition at the click of a finger, and make sure you prep your playlist before the session begins so there's no hunting time.
Me: "Ah yes, I like music for my games, I think I'll take this advice"
Also me: Doesn't quite get to the "not too recognizable" part
My entire Traveller group: "I WAS BORN IN COLONIES ON FRINGE WORLDS OF THE GALAXY"
Me: "Ohhh..."
Great stuff. I've always been a fan of a recurring "credits" song to signal the end of a session, but I may well have to start employing the group pump-up song as well.
Me: Enemy NPCs hears... "Mortify! Glorify! Patriotic Parasite! Punishment to fit the tribal! Feeding them to meet the slaughterer!" (Mushroomhead - Qwerty) ... Then they realize what fresh Hell awaits them. lol
I am not sure I get the song you are referencing.
Long time listener. First time caller. Similar to what Seth was saying about playing a song before the session to get yourself in the mood, I have started listening to ambient sounds while writing my adventures to help get myself in the proper creative mindset. It has been very helpful having dungeon noises playing in the background while I write up a Classic crawl, or the sounds of a tavern while I’m writing up the obligatory initial meeting of the characters.
an example of the dynamic timer: my DM was running us through the 3.5 version of Ravenloft. we were in the temple trying to re-bless the sunsword. she puts on Newman's "I'm so scared" really good mood music and saying "tick" to indicate turn counts (where we say what we are doing at that moment) right when the lyrics blast in is when Strahd busts down the door....yeah my Paladin developed a nervous tick of rubbing her neck after that encounter
I use a "send out" song to end my play sessions. I use the A-Team theme song. It doesn't matter the genre. I feel it leaves everybody excited for next time and reminds the players that they are playing heroes!
I use the Payday sound track while they plan their heists.
I use "Hazy Shade of Winter" by The Bangles (skipping the intro) to end my games after Stranger Things season 1 used it to great effect.
I had a group of players sneaking around a drawevn mine and I couldn't think of any song so I played diggy diggy hole as the drawfs where mineing luckly they had there pcs sing along quitely to help pass the time while sneaking
@@fredricknoe3114
"Master Mind"?
@@BSE1320 yes
When running Call of Cthulhu I like playing parts of the L.A Noire soundtrack for when the players are investigating. I think it works pretty well for those moments. Otherwise, I just play sound effects like a thunderstorm if it fits.
BoSSman yeah honestly the music works well for noire stuff
La Noir ... nice
I like to play this to immerse the players into the characters insanity. ua-cam.com/video/QUjR8zzsULw/v-deo.html
I played music only once, and it was awesome. Organ music when the 5e party entered castle ravenloft, as the vampire was playing an audible pipe organ. Pandemonium and terror ensued. It was beautiful.
Why did you play only once then?
Just don't use the Sonic the Hedgehog water music as a timer. You don't want to give your players an anxiety attack.
Player: This is too far, Seth. I came here to play a fun, light hearted game.
*leaves table*
You know i never really thought that sonic water music was that bad
On the other hand, when someone starts doing a behavior that negatively affects other players, you can always cue the Star Trek Pon Farr Duel music. It's just annoying and stupid enough, and reminder that you're being an unreasoning dick towards your friends.
Jeff would never use that song
I want audio books read by Seth Skorkowsky himself, hands down.
I've been experimenting with music in my games recently, and it's been a real blast! My players usually get the feeling I'm trying to convey, or they do feel something else unexpected that also makes sense for the story and all... I guess this happens mainly because I use solely instrumental music and sound effects, which gives an eerily feeling to fantastical scenarios. Nonetheless, these were really nice tips! I'll surely use some of these ideas, thank you!
I have not been sub to this channel for very long but I wanted to say I've really enjoyed your thoughts, ideas and opinions on RPGs. Thank you for taking the time and love doing this all for us.
I was just thinking about using music for my campaign going forwards, so I'm very happy that this video came out.
As an audio engineer who's very careful with my music during the game... I appreciate this video!
And when there's some 'What the Hell' moment, Yakety Sax, only song you need.
Once, our party tried to catch a small dinosaur-thing, which was a questgiver's pet. Many failed grapple attempts. This was the song I played!
While playing Edge of the Empire, a couple of my party members were fighting their way out of a corporate facility after sabotaging their computers. And every once in a while, we would cut to my shady underworld doctor character being chased through said facility, arms filled supplies stolen from their medical closets, while Yakety Sax played in the background. It was a delightful contrast.
A player at my table has two particular ring tones that come up on his phone during gaming - Yakkity Sax and the Whaugh Waugh Waugh sound of disappointment. The latter is when his wife calls, and she has some excellent comedic timing.
@@screamingblue7 LOL! Wow! Dude's got balls to set his wife's ring to Sad Trombone!!
I'm a big proponent of using background music as a gamemaster. In my last long running campaign, whenever there was an interaction with the campaign's main antagonist, I had a specific song play. This stuck in the players' minds after a while and when the song would play they would all react with some variation of "Oh no...". As a GM it was really satisfying to know that the players were so invested that they had formed an emotional connection between the song and the villain, almost dreading the idea that the song *might* start playing. (This was enhanced by that they'd taken to calling the villain by a certain alias, which was a misremembering of his actual alias that they had heard from an npc)
When it comes to selecting songs, I favor extended versions of video game music. Movie scores, while often great sounding, are made to enhance story beats, while video game music is intended to be tolerable for much longer lengths of time. Of course YMMV, and there are many exceptions to this.
Thankyou! I did a playlist for my latest game and it really got the players involved - so much so that one of them who doesn't roleplay their character actually started talking as their character. Thankyou!!
I love using Darkest Dungeon soundtracks for combat.
The ambient environmental stuff from that game is especially good.
Milkshaketurtle79 oh yeah
filip lykkegaard kastrup yeah definitely, especially for CoC
The bluetooth speaker is a great idea! I was just gifted one of these. Been thinking about writing and running a campaign - I'll have to come back to this video!
An added benefit of using UA-cam videos is that you can stream both the video and audio to a TV if you have one in your room, which can add a little extra visual element to the atmosphere. It often helps with easily distracted players: instead of reaching for a phone at the table, they'll stare at the cool visuals and get drawn back into the game.
I once ran a CoC scenario where the first half is a pretty noir story about tracking down a missing woman in 1920s Hollywood where you confront oil companies, cults etc and the second half involves entering an underground Yithian bio-preserve with dinosaurs. When the players were going underground I handled the tonal shift from noir style jazz to the Jurassic Park theme and timed it just right so that the part everyone recognizes would play right when they open the door to the Yithian bio-preserve. Players really enjoyed the ‘effect’ and how the music helped transition to something that could easily give tonal whiplash
Several years back, I ran a game I called Jitters with four teenager PCs spending a week at a friend's cabin. They were slowly encountering strange things, ghostly activity, one of which was a loud thump coming from upstairs once two nights in a row. When the nosy one in the group finally picked the lock and stepped in, I used "Under Stars" by Brian Eno as they were greeted by a bedroom that hadn't been touched in quite some time. They realized that someone had once lived in there and with all these belongings just sitting around, collecting dust, the track added this unnatural, spooky yet kind of sad quality to the moment. The best part was this was during the day and nothing strange happened once they were in there. In fact, they discovered a bowling ball that fell from its place and they started to doubt the supernatural elements, at least by a tiny bit.
That track and that scene have both been burned into our minds ever since. Music & ambience are absolutely some of my most beloved tools in my GM toolbox.
Witcher 3 soundtrack is great for games.
It's true but when your friend is fan of Witcher it's hard to make iy not recognizable
I started playing a bard in my latest DnD campaign, so for that and a few other reasons, I started taking what we did in our sessions, turning it into lyrics, and actually singing and recording it. The DM decided to play the songs at the beginning of each session to recap the previous session. I'm learning a lot about the process as I go, so win all around.
you played one of the best smashing pumpkin songs before every session of that campaign? absolutely legendary
Regarding the DJ issue, you can also make a session playlist (provided you choose tracks of appropriate length, such as background ambient stuff) and rapidly choose the track you need from a list of just 4 or 5 without needing to scroll and search. I've used this pretty effectively in my in-person sessions, and have found it enables me to change seamlessly from behind the screen while still talking.
Also, we don't play CoC, but my D&D 5e campaign is very Lovecraft inspired. I love Cryo Chamber for dark mood ambient music. There are also several great channels on UA-cam for D&D game backgrounds.
I've found success with video game soundtracks. Tracks are often intended to be looped so it's easy to extend it to match your scene. The Cultist Simulator OST really sticks out for setting the mood and being stimulating without being distracting
For a Necromancer's trap, I had a spinning crystal chandelier, some musically inclined undead, and "I Will Survive" by Gloria Gaynor on repeat.
I agree with this video 110%. I highly recommend music as it does a lot for adding to the mood. I also highly recommend Syrinscape. It is an amazing product. I don't use all the effects. I just preset the music and ambient sounds based on the setting and then have one preset for battle.
For ambient sounds, Syrinscape is awesome!!
I use Syrinscape app on my mobile with a blue tooth speaker. Works great for setting mood. Edit: 9:00 into the video Seth uses Syrinscape too lol.
Hey, curious, does it work over Discord? I am having to run online now that half my players have moved several hours away from me and Discord is not very amenable to my 4-8 tabs of UA-cam being streamed to try and cover all my layered ambient soundtracks and stuff
@@Walter-McIntyre I haven't tried it via discord via imbed or stream but it does come through via my mic but that led to me always transmitting. I normally use Syrinscape via my phone app but if you check their site you might find info on imbedding it into other programs.
I have never taken the time to thank you for the videos you upload. Your videos have helped me alot in running CoC and DND games and I think they are really really usefull. I love you scenarios from CoC reviews, great tips for us newbies. Keep up the awesome job! :)
Greetings from Costa Rica
Wow. Thank you very much, Erick. I'm glad you've found them useful.
Man I wish I could play in one of your campaigns!
Man Seth, why you take that man's dog away?
Been really pleased with Syrinscape’s custom soundset for Masks of Nyartlathotep, which I’ve been using. One other suggestion: Newer models of bluetooth speakers often have the ability to pair to each other in stereo mode, which allows you to create a sort of portable quasi-surround sound to enhance the illusion of really being in that speakeasy/pyramid/whatever, with different ambient noises coming from different directions. (I’ve been using Anker’s Soundcore 2, which have surprisingly good sound quality at a relatively modest price point, in case anyone cares.)
Even as a player, I used pump up songs when a previous group was playing Shadow Run, and to get into the right mindset for my nihilistic dwarf arsonist toon, I always listened to "Up in Here" and "Get It On the Floor" by DMX on the drive to our hosts' house.
Synth wave artist mega drive really hammers down the cyberpunk combat vibe. players love it and all the solos getting pumped to unload clips into NPCs.
Video game tracks are really great to use. My favorites are from Neverwinters Nights, or any soundtrack by Jeremy Soule is a great resource. The Diablo soundtrack as well is great. Video game tracks are great in that they have been put together specifically to invoke the mood you're probably looking for AND a lot of the tracks are 5 to 10 minutes long.
I tried sirynscape and I enjoyed it, I even got to the point to have each character having a personal theme song while they were leading the action, but in the long run, I decided usually not to have any music at all, I think the better the players can concentrate on my voice the easiest is for me to drag them in the mood I want to. I might still have some tune as a backup plan to build tension if my group gets distracted or "cold".
BTW thanks for the channel, I think I never wrote it, but you've been a lot helpful to my game!
Holy cow! That band Slough Feg has a concept album based on Traveller?!?! I thought Seth had just artfully pasted the Traveller logo onto an album cover. Nope. It is the actual album cover. Now this I gotta hear...
Whenever I use gnolls in a game, I always have my hyena sound on my soundboard ready to go. Always helps to punctuate moments with hyena laughs.
Whenever one of my PC's fails a sanity check I play this song so the players can feel the characters. ua-cam.com/video/QUjR8zzsULw/v-deo.html
@@fredricknoe3114 I dislike you.
I really like using songs from the Sunless Sea and Professor Layton games for my sessions, the Sunless Sea sountrack specially I find is great for Call of Cthulhu
Thanks for that, never heard that,
I can see where you were going with that choice, but it would fit the “Shadow of Esteren” rpg more,
I support Seth's recommendation of his books, they are amazing.
My favorite time using music in game was a one shot for a friend's bachelor party I was dming. I had the bard bring in a Bluetooth speaker and he would set the music and tone based on what his character was playing at the time (he constantly had to be playing a form of music as his character's quirk) it all culminated in the his character bringing out his broken violin, having it blessed by the gods and preforming devil went down to Georgia. Nat 20 later and the everyone in the group got a huge advantage and we all had a great time!
I agree 100% with this! Just this last Saturday, we finished a year-long Star Wars campaign. Just like you said, my Jedi was facing down the BBG Sith Lord and our game master put on Duel of the Fates. It was a whole new level of epic! 😎
Great video as always and some really great advice. The pump up song is something I use all the time, when I ran Deadlands: Reloaded i listed to "Evil Ways" by Blues Saraceno on my way to the game. It put me in the right mood for the game in the Weird West.
Lots of good ideas in this video. Thanks, Seth.
One of the first things I did when I started GMing earlier this year was test my bluetooth speaker. I was playing at someone elses house, so I had the speaker at my feet under the table. That worked well for a few sessions, but I found it would stop working every so often. Now that I've switched to digital maps, my monitor also has speakers. My music now comes out of the middle of the table. I find this means everyone gets to hear the music at the same level, instead of those closest to me.
I started using Syrinscape, but I did find myself getting distracted and not using it effectively. Eventually I ditched it and made my own playlists. I found all of my players are Final Fantasy fans, and I've been collecting the games and music for a couple decades now.
Once I get more experience, I will try it again because it is a useful tool with many options. I just didn't have enough time to work out how to use it best while keeping attention on the game.
I want to run Cyberpunk 2020 and/or Cyberpunk Red, so I might look back into Syrinscape.
Your videos are great. I find you're one of the few that talks about Cyberpunk 2020 and gives advice. Thank you.
I like to use the “Darkest Dungeon OST“ ^^
And of course some ambient tracks.
Thanks for the awesome introduction to Slough Feg!! Ever listened to The Sword? the Warp Riders Album is AWESOME!
Mr. Skorkowsky, just wanted to say thank you so very much for giving me advice on my Halloween one-shot of Call of Cthulhu months ago. I did a variation on the Pulp System where they were all kids, so they only had the normal tenth of size and con hit points, and it was basically Goonies crossed with Monster Squad using plot ideas we had discussed, and it was a smashing success.
I have a 47 minute long playlist of every Star Wars cantina song I could find for my Star Wars D6 games. I also used to have a sound board on my old tablet for my bard full of concertina and hurdy-gurdy music for my kobold bard. I really love the idea of ambient sounds rather than music. I'd really like to go that route in the future!
Tabletop Audio is awesome tool. Thanks.
I Love the idea of a personal pump up song! Like some WWF super GM! :D
I have all the same rules if it comes to music and ambient. I use particular pieces only when I know for sure how much time I got. Like NPC monologue or important scene.
If it comes to playlists I use mood instead of locations. So I use things like: Calm, Intrigue, Riddle, Horror, Sadness, Action, Combat. I try to have every list around 30-60 minutes and I prefer to have longer pieces in it. Like 5 to 10 minutes per clip. With this, music becomes (as you said) a part of memories.
Nostalgia can be powerful drive to play. ;)
My GM for a mixed world of darkness campaign put a short introvideo for us together, including all our characters and the overall theme of the campaign. We always started chatting along until suddenly he would play the video and we knew it was time to play.
I once used a song (something from the MI:2 soundtrack if I remember correctly) to design a dungeon based on its lyrics. When the adventurer party arrived at the entrace an animated statue would sing them the song. Took them a while until they managed to recognice the basic design of the rooms with the lyrics but after that it worked realy well.
Three amazing Irish tunes:
Rocky Road to Dublin: This one is fast paced, intense, and gives you the feeling you're in a boxing match.
Oro se do Bheatha Bhaile: A nice marching tune, nothings happening but exploring.
The Foggy Dew: Play Luke Kelly or Sinead O'Connor, this one sets up for something, usually a fight.
The Sea Hawk film score was the inspiration for the original Star Wars film scores it is great to use if you want that John Williams feel without being too recognizable as Star Wars.
Because of the distraction issues described, I've only ever played what I called 'opening and closing credits' tracks. These signified that we were starting and ending the session. This also allowed me to use songs if I wanted. Even pop could work - Fortress Around Your Heart by Sting and Branford Marsalis thematically fit the exploring of an abandoned keep and has a certain 'regal' musical vibe. More often however I used instrumentals - particularly stuff from 70s concept albums by bands like Gryphon.
I should, however, in future consider ambient soundscapes as that sounds like it solves the distraction issue.
When I run my battletech game i use the main theme of the battletech video game to get the mood flowing. It works really well
AWESOME!!
Syrinscape, you are most welcome! :)
For game music I can't recommend Groupees enough. There is very often bundles of ambient, Celtic, video game, synthwave, and space themed albums. I run a steady stream of synthwave in my games and I now have literally hundreds of whole albums to choose from thanks to groupees. If you catch them on the presale days you can usually get a bundle of about 10 or so albums for a dollar or two. I find movie or game music too recognizable for my group so this has really helped to give my world it's own sound. Having said that, using well known tunes for a karaoke puzzle that they had to sing in character was one of the highlights of my entire campaign.
I find the recognizable music rule is okay to break under the condition of "is it appropriate and comedic for the scene?"
A fun example I can think of was one of my players playing the benny hill theme during a post apoc roleplay that involved an absolutely absurd chase scene across the desert between the players in vehicles and a giant monstrous worm. One of the players was even stuck inside the thing at the beginning of the chase scene, the only reason they didn't immediately die was their vehicle didn't get fully crushed and acted like a shark cage but oh so much worse.
It was a good and fun chase scene of them racing around the desert screaming for dear life and frantically trying to rescue their friend while also trying not to get eaten as the benny hill theme played in the background. So I've made it customary to have that music piece on hand just in case something similar happens, it typically ends up with everyone at the table in tears of laughter.
There is no other track suitable in that situation. Good call!
Many years ago I ran a Battlestar Galactica game,
Before play, every player had to agree to one thing,
I could make any of them be cylons at anytime,
(This is something the rpg as written had dropped the ball on in its design, not using the cylon aspect fully)
I was aiming at not just a sci fi action adventure, but a psychological thriller,
No one knew who would be a cylon, (there were layers to this, 1. The un-conscious cylon, (the player had no idea they were a cylon, they could just loose track of time while the cylon in him wreaked havoc) 2. The semi conscious cylon, (the player suspected he could be a cylon, and acted accordingly) 3. The fully conscious cylon, (SoB!)
While the first two types where in GM control while cylon mode, the third was left to the player to control,
(Bare in mind, the whole game I’m passing secret notes to the players, and taking them out of the room to chat in private, to help cultivate paranoia,)
The teams Battlestar had not left the colonies to look for Earth (they didn’t even consider the possibility, thinking it was only a myth) but instead stayed behind to fight, a desperate hit and run, cat and mouse (mostly the mouse) type conflict against the odds, moving from planet to planet trying to help the survivors to fight back, (trying to save survivors, or bring them medical, weapons and food etc) all the time trying to stay one step ahead of the cylons, while they attacked strategic points, dodged bait and traps, (after they got sucked in to a “distress call” from a fellow battlestar that turned out to be three cylon basestar’s, they got...cautious) and trying to keep functioning,
It was a great game, till two of the players had to drop out,
Not sure how it would of ended,
The games theme song was “Papercut” by Linkin Park
(The lyrics played really well to the game, also worked well for space fighter mass combat, missiles and flack while fighting cylon raiders)
I'm always reminded of the three part MegaTraveller scenario 'Behind Blue Eyes' published in issues 48, 50 & 51 of Challenge magazine. At the conclusion of the scenario author Charles Gannon has a short GMs eyes only scene in which two characters have downtime after the scenario. In the course of this one of the characters reveals they collect old audio recordings and proceeds to play The Who's version of the song 'Behind Blue Eyes' which the other character mistakes for Veedback (The Traveller 'House Band')...
As someone who runs Jojo tabletop rpg, I'd say that music is *essential*.
I love to introduce enemy stands with their musical reference playing in the background and I also play the character's reference when they do something epic or they are the focus of a section
Trust me, having Du Hast play while Rammstein is transforming a player into a donut and starts to mow down the team and then have Sonne play once they discover that it is a multiple entity stand, this is incredibly cool and my player love it
And for those who have no idea of what I am saying : read Jojo, it's good (albeit weird at times)
I was running a call of cthulhu campaign where we were doing an extended section at a speakeasy where one group of investigators was meeting with another group and some important NPCs. I put on (most of) the 20s playlist from postmodern jukebox. It worked really well. The idea of a player getting lost in the song translated perfectly to to character staring at the singer on stage and not paying attention to the surroundings.
I made my own table top RPG about a year ago (very loosely put together, not complete, needs LOTS of work, but still) and it was based in real life in the Vietnam War. I’m quite the history buff so this was really fun for me to run, but by far my favorite moment was when my players were in their foxholes awaiting an apparent NVA attack that was supposed to happen that night.
It was dark and there was tension in the air as nighttime jungle sounds was blaring from the speaker. Then, the sounds fade, and slowly NIB by Black Sabbath begins to play. As the Base line continues on and on the players become more and more anxious as to when the enemy will arrive. Then, as soon as the guitar comes in, a trip flare goes off in the far distance in the jungle, and I firmly and calmly announce to the players, “They’re coming.” And the rest is history.
Agreed, if the music becomes grating, or distracting then you are either playing it to loud or the wrong kind of music,
I always use music to in to game mode on some settings (Star Wars, Star Trek, Ghostbusters etc, basically anything that has its own soundtrack, ironically I don’t use the Lord of the Rings or Conan, but do use Indiana Jones tracks)
The amount I use during gaming is less, maybe a fifty-fifty split, some games don’t support soundtracks as well,
Like CoC, I find it a subtle vibe to balance, to build up the tension, you don’t need a track undermining or disrupting that,
But pulpy, good to go, (think The Shadow, The Rocketeer or The Phantom etc, don’t be afraid to mix it up, I’ve used the theme track from Robin Hood prince of thieves (overture) for Star Trek, and “The firetruck” from the Evolution soundtrack for a Serenity game)
Sometimes I will only use music at the beginning to set everyone’s mood, it can help everyone get on the same page,
But no music the rest of the game,
Sometimes I use music to drive a point, Martika’s “Toy Soldiers” wasn’t just a theme song for Twilight 2000, but it was also played every time a character died (the description in slow motion) to create pathos, it became a tradition, life is cheap in Twilight 2000, but I didn’t want it to become meaningless, (oh you died go roll up another character thing,) I wanted everyone to feel it,
If anybody needs help in looking for the right track for their game I’d be happy to help,
I'm really into music so I think about it a lot for the games I run. For one campaign, everyone in the party played an instrument except for the one mute character who communicated with a chalk board he carried. I wrote them a theme song that used all of their instruments and chalk-board sounds as percussion to use as the pump-up music. They all liked that.
I have pump-up songs for specific characters, actually. Helps get in the right mindset for the character.
I have fond memories of using "into the fog" from the Master & Commander Soundtrack as the opening theme to our Savage Tide adventure path. When it started playing and the drums Hit they knew that game was on. I gave them a quick recap from the last "Episode" while the song was playing and into adventure we went
Excellent as always. I ran an Aliens one-shot years ago that took place on a ship without atmosphere so the characters were all in vac suits. I found a breathing ambient track that worked very well and was very creepy.
In addition to many video game soundtracks (Dragon Age, Sky Rim, Witcher), I've turned to a number of epic instrumental groups like 2WEI, Hidden Citizens, Think Up Anger, and of course the classic Two Step From Hell (if you can only check out one, make it Two Steps, but the others can be previewed easily enough on youtube). Also for some higher energy theme on a bagpipe, Snakecharmer has great covers (Pirates of the Caribbean, Avengers, to name a few). In my humble opinion, she's got as much geek cred as Lindsey Stirling.
UA-cam has so many epic music collections, but the recent add interruptions make it less useful unless you have a designated DJ to moderate the play list. Also that designated DJ as the non DM is a great tool with Syrinscape too.
Totally agree with your points of volume and potential distraction and energy control.
Other ways we have used music at our table
- Opening Theme Music to set the mood (Used the theme from Dune and Hunt for Red October for a Forgotten Suns game, Miserlou cover by Tina Gao for a crime heist scene, and so on)
- Asking players to identify the 'theme music' for their character. For a super hero table we went so far as to have play lists for individual characters. I've taken that to get into the mindset of specific characters like a halfling brawler by listening to Drowsy Maggie and Devil's in the Kitchen.
- For a particular campaign, I listen in the car to a mix of The Chain (Fleetwood Mac), Bury Them Deep (Ghoultown), and the classic Good The Bad & The Ugly (Marcionne), setting the mental scene for Frontier Adventures along the Savage Coast.
Please keep the videos coming, love to watch and listen and sometimes even revisit.
I never really considered music for roleplaying until I got with a group that used it sometimes. So when I ran first edition Gamma World as a filler game, I played a bootleg copy of the first 2 Fallout computer games sound tracks and it really did help to set the mood of the post apocalypse world I was creating.
I've used music in gaming since...well, 2nd edition DnD I suppose. Back then it was Conan and Ride of the Valykeries over and over. Years back though I purchased RPG soundmixer and still use that today, importing movie and videogame soundtracks and special effects (lightning, wind, wolves, etc). But thanks to you, I just got the MP3 of Goldsmith's King Solomon and the Omen, both of which should make excellent additions to my Pulp Cthulhu campaign. Thanks!!!
Damn Seth. That Slough Feg band is rocking.
My recommendation for music would be the Bioshock soundtrack (infinite too), Skyrim, Stygian Reign of the Old Ones (An amazing Lovecraft RPG game) and a video full of Lovecraftian music called "The Old Ones and other beings" or something like that. Love the channel, I recomend making a discord server to talk to fans more about video ideas, rpg and more.
Graham Plowman's stuff! It's also on Spotify so not hard to make a playlist
I lived in a house full of gamers and we had games going most of the week but not enough energy to play in all of them so pretty often we would assist another game master when they ran a game, either a roommate in the house or a visiting GM. One of my favorite assists was being a DJ for a game, I could do it while focusing on other work I was doing at my desk and I got to be socially involved in a game without having to keep track of the 5th game plot of the week. I bought a 3 CD set of sound effects and would talk to the GM about what effects he wanted and timing of them and queue them up along with the background music. I'm not a sound engineer and don't' have expensive software to mix sound or time to build sound.
There are a few soundtracks that are just really good instrumental stuff like Pirates of the Carribean Soundtrack or Tron Legacies.
My brother Gm a Vietnam war game (I forgot the system) and every time the party would be ambushed by Vietcong, or their helicopter would get shot at, my brother would play "Fortunate son". It got to the point where the first couple of notes from that song would give the players dnd ptsd. It got funny when during one of the quiet moments of the session when the party was at an army base preparing an attack on a village. One of the players pulled up a playlist of Vietnam area songs (like his characters was listening to the radio while fixing a jeep), he was getting songs like "sympothy for the devil", "war what is it good for", and "Give peace a chance". Then when the party was nearly done with preparations, the playlist plays "Fortunate son". I have never seen a bunch of players get panic attacks trying to stop a youtube video. To keep with tradition my brother had the Vietcong attack the base.
What I will do for a chronicle/campaign is make a soundtrack. You don't play the music during the game except in certain circumstances. The real purpose is just as you said, a "pump-up." If I'm getting ready to prep or just get me in the mindset, I'll play the soundtrack in the background. This even includes character themes, which my players tend to dig as it's me engaging with the character's backstory.
During games, I'll also have ambient music and Syrinscape!
We have it good these days with spotify, mp3s, Tabletop audio soundboard. Back in the days I burned custom CDs with fitting songs on them for almost every adventure.
And I would make song lists that I could look at and quickly find a CD for a specific sound theme. For example: CD #12 Cave Adventures, Track #1 scary, Track#2 combat, Track#3 stealthy....and so on. =)
A tip is also that you always listen thru the song you are going to use. Many soundtracks is custom made for scenes in a movie and can therefore change tone and tempo in the middle of the song and there is nothing worse then getting "jolly halfling tavern" in the middle of the creepy mood song.
I will definitely be checking out SyrinScape. :)
Tabletop Audio has bloody awesome ambient sounds and you can create and save your own custom soundpads using sounds from different existing pads.
For background music and other incidental sounds, I use _Linux Show Player_ (no prizes for guessing what OS I run) to have music and sound effects cued up to be invoked (or dismissed) with a single click.
This enables me to play specific pre-selected songs at key moments in the game if I desire. e.g. the party (Cyberpunk) were following a gang member through a particular area of town (had ambient futuristic city sounds from Tabletop Audio in the background and I was playing some suitable rock music out of Linux Show Player to set the mood) and - as I wanted to make it clear that the mood was about to take a darker turn, I clicked on the playing song's cue, which put it into 5-second fade out and then clicked on the cue for _Gangsta's Paradise_ - which created a great musical transition. I gave the players a few seconds to note the mood change before bringing in the rival gang members...
As to pump up music, we play Queen's _Another One Bites the Dust_ before our Cyberpunk games.
“Ah, music," he said, wiping his eyes. "A magic beyond all we do here!”
Albus Dumbledore
@John Wright -- Ah, a beautiful Harry Potter reference. An Easter Egg that never gets old....;D
7:18 pregame pump up song? Hm, I like the idea!
I was thinking of running a game with my friends in the "Blood War" setting. Basically, demons and devils are both evil, but they are on polar opposites when it comes to the grand scheme of things. The players would be on the side of the devils, trying to stop the demons from wreaking havoc on the world because then there would be no world for the devils to rule if the demons have their way. I feel that cage the elephant "ain't no rest for the wicked" would be a good pregame song for this evil campaign.
I use laptop to run games, use foobar with several playlists for tone and environment too. Very easy to navigate.
There were two sessions for Vampire the masquerade for which I pirated a ton of "instrumentals" of Tokyo Hotel, Avril Lavigne and such from 2007. Was a blast.
Also I once used sound effects for surprise wild animals, was fun too. Players didn't recognize cougar and thought it was a human screaming.
My fav soundtrack for lovecraftian horror breaking free is Sote. They make incredibly dense mix of freakish idm and traditional instruments. My players have already learnt to fear it.
6:45 one of the most terrifying examples I've used this was the Neurosis song "Through Silver in Blood" which I had playing while my players crossed an anomalous collapsed car park in Stalker: The Scifi RPG. I had the track itself play normally with the growing threat of tension, as they felt SOMETHING was in the car park they needed to cross but they weren't sure what as parts of the rubble were moving. They were dragging their feet, and once the song got to around 2:45 once that riff grows and crushes the song, I lowered the volume to describe a pack of animate scrap metal dogs which charged through the rubble, cleaving through steel and cement like a hot knife through butter.
You BET my players were trying to hightail it out of there as fast as they could.
A program for ambient sounds and music such as syrinscape is amazing 😁👍
I am in the midst of DM'ing a huge homebrew horror themed D&D campaign and we treat it like episodes of a series. The name of the party and therefor the name of the series is The Flying Tigers and our theme music is Crystallize by Lindsey Stirling. So while I play that at the start of the session one of my players does a "previously on" for recap. Each of the pc's also have a theme song; our warforged gunslinger has We Are 138 by The Misfits, our warforged artificer has the theme from Doom and our wood elf ranger
, who is a lycanthrope, has Lupen Tooth by Blitzkid. For battle I use some war drums or death metal. I also use ambient for mood, either D&D specific found on yt or the yt channel Cryo Chamber.
I used to DJ as a player in my friend's game, taking hints from him as to what music would be appropriate for certain NPCs/themes/moods, but also using my own creativity as well. It worked very well, and if anyone is musically inclined or has a player that is, I can recommend giving it a try. :)
edit: Also, I have had the idea of composing my own music with several adaptive shifts and writing my own music player that lets me fade between them at a press of a button (e.g. bringing in a percussion section during an enemy's combat turn). Haven't implemented that yet though as I don't do as much RP these days.
Very good advice! I've done much of the sound track stuff, but not too much ambient sound. I put together a "Creepy Music" soundtrack for when my players were exploring a haunted town. It's fairly long, so we didn't get too much repetition during our sessions. Well, the third session in the town, and the party leader said to the others "We gotta finish this. This is getting to me." There was a brief pause in the conversation, broken suddenly by the laugh of Vincent Price from Thriller! The player looked at me with that fuck you look, even though the thing had been just playing with no manipulation from me. Good times. I also did the timer thing, though they didn't know. They were doing some stuff secretly at a concert, K.O.ing people, and stashing the folks here & there, all the while I have this nice long violin performance playing. Then, the performance reaches the end and there's a bunch of applause heard. My eyebrows shoot up and I say "Uh-oh! Sounds like it's intermission!" They SCRAMBLED to put things looking right and not seem suspicious! But I heartily agree with using music when it's appropriate. Fighting a boss, let the music play! Fighting a dozen goblins, not so much. I recommend Two Steps From Hell. They have a lot of music only/non-English songs for many styles of games.
One thing to remember about music is you can use songs differently from their original purpose. For instance my main traveling theme is Random Dungeon Theme 3 and my main destroyed town theme is Hidden Land, both from the Explorer trilogy of Pokemon Mystery Dungeon games. Try experimenting as much as possible and see where you can fit songs into.
I don't do music very much because my group is on Roll20 and it can get easily distracting. However I once used a cut from a track for a specific purpose in my Spelljammer game; the first time they launched their ship I played the refrain from the theme to Smokey and the Bandit, you know "east bound and down, loaded up and truckin'..." It was a great moment that set the tone of the campaign. I used Space Truckin', plus Star Lords mix tape for incidental music before the game started. But 99% of the time I don't use music, and very seldom special sound effects.
Great suggestions thanks a lot.