Guest Blogger Articles: Musical Lairs: Using music and sound in your campaign

gnunn

"Musical Lairs: Using music and sound in your campaign":http://www.obsidianportal.com/guest-bloggers/December3009

This article made me super excited! I have been struggling to incorporate a soundtrack into my campaign for a long time. I am totally going to download the "Softrope mixer":http://softrope.net/ as soon as I get home!

Up until this point, when I use sound in my campaign, I often pull from the following sources:

* Soundtrack, __Braveheart__
* Soundtrack, __Fellowship of the Ring__
* Soundtrack, __The Two Towers__
* Soundtrack, __Last of the Mohicans__
* Soundtrack, __Dragonheart__ (Trivia: The main theme from this horrendous movie was used for AFIs 100 years, 100 movies campaign!)
* Soundtrack, __Dances with Wolves__
* Apocalyptica, __Amplified: A Decade of Reinventing the Cello__ (Metal covers played on cello!)
* Holst, __The Planets__ (You know that music 21 & 24 sing in the second episode of _Venture Bros. Season 2_? That is "Mars, Bringer of War" and it is EPIC!)

Other contributions that come from my players:
The temple of time music from Zelda
The chest opening music... also from Zelda (One of my players cues this up everytime they score major loot)
Various Final Fantasy themes.

What music and/or sound do you recommend?

onsilius

If music works for your sessions, that's a fantastic addition. I've tried this out before and found that too often it distracted the players or got them talking about the movies they were from and had them acting out scenes from it and would get them sidetracked, "Oh man this is from Conan!"
Bad Austrian accent, "Do flowers grow here?", "You kill my fazer, you kill my mah-der, YOU KILL MY PEEPOH!" etc.

Now my GM strategy focuses on keeping the game simple and as close to pencil, paper, and dice on a table as possible. I've only got so much time to invest in writing, mapping, and planning anyway. I stopped linking laptops to share info, stopped hooking up displays on the flat screen, and limited stuff to printed handouts and maps. Works more smoothly for us, but if your group can handle all of the above then more power to you!

DM Fred

gnunn

Yeah, music does occasionally prove too distracting for my players too. However, I am much more likely to send a wandering monster around in response to endless Family Guy and Futurama quotes than I am as a result of someone recognizing the source of my soundtrack. I suppose every group has their own idiosyncratic distractions.

ChainsawXIV

We play at a local game shop, so I don't get to roll out the tunes for my game, although I often wish I could. When I do get to use music for a game, I like something simple - ideally, something I can just throw in a CD player and let run on random for atmosphere, or at most one play list for battle, and one for adventuring. Here are a number of my favorite gaming soundtracks, for when it's an option:

* *Hunt for Red October* - _An all around great sound track, surprisingly good for almost any setting. This is a classic choice for me, something I've gamed too for almost 15 years now, and always loved._

* *Pirates of the Caribbean* - _A good mix, energetic enough for combat, but not too much for other activity. Well blended enough to just let it play in the back without worrying about specific tracks and such._

* *300* - _Great for heavy combat, though the modern sound may not suit your tastes in a fantasy game. I think it works well in moderation, but can be a little intrusive at times. It's still a favorite though._

* *Stardust* - _A really fun selection of adventuring music, as you might expect from an adventure film. Probably best with combat and non combat play lists, as some of it is too low key to carry a battle scene._

* *Transformers* - _Phenomenal epic feeling tunes, with the exception of one track (Sam at the Lake) which should be skipped. Always. One of my all time favorite sound tracks, without question._

* *Gettysburg* - _A really well done soundtrack, though the best tracks on it may be too theme specific for your game. A lot of good martial feeling themes here, for long battle scenes and such._

gnunn

I totally forgot about Gettysburg! I even have that soundtrack!

I've been meaning to get __Hunt for Red October__ and __Pirates__ into my collection as well.
The one downside with some of these soundtracks, like __Gettysburg__, __Dragonheart__ and really anything by Randy Edelman is that they used synthesized orchestras. I guess it's not a big deal when it's just being used as an unobtrusive background behind a game, but when I know the music is created on electronic instruments but with an intent to not sound electroninc, I feel like something is lost.

ChainsawXIV

Perhaps my appreciation for the finer points is less developed than it might be, but I honestly never noticed that. I notice it now, going back and listening again, but up to this point I'd just taken it to be part of the sound they were going for. For me, the music itself has always carried the thing. If the end result evokes the feeling I'm looking for, it could be performed on a nose flute, and that would be fine perfectly all right by me.

Granted, a soundtrack I already enjoy might have been even better performed by a live orchestra. From the same perspective though, you might say that a game I already enjoy playing might be even better if the books had been better organized and edited. In either case, if I'm already enjoying the thing, the fact that it _could_ have been better in some way doesn't detract from the experience for me.

gnunn

You make a good point, and I do very much enjoy soundtracks like Gettysburg and have used other electronically generated soundtracks... specifically Last of the Mohicans during game sessions. I guess if you are going to have it quiet enough to not disrupt play, you can't really notice whether those violins are synthesized or real.

Other music I thought of that is potentially good for gaming:

* Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon
* The Gladiator Soundtrack
* Carmina Burana, Il Fortuna (sp?) (It's the really epic theme from the movie Excalibur)

StrangeLittleBoy

If you are doing a more Asian flavored game, The Last Samurai Soundtrack is excellent.

gnunn

I just picked up the soundtrack to Akira. The Taiko drums used in that would also make an excellent background for an Asian-style setting or even a tribal type environment.

drubixcube

under the acknowledgments section of runestone (http://www.obsidianportal.com/campaign/runestone) we keep a list of the movies and music we use most often. i'd love to see other campaigns throw out what they're roleplaying to - i'd even enjoy listening to suggested tracks while i read over campaigns to help set the mood the GM is going for. i personally use iTunes playlists called "RP_x" where x = whatever the mood of the scene is. currently i have:

RP_adventure (general music)
RP_fight (duh)
Rp_travelling (epic, sweeping music for describing vistas, excusing myself to get another cup of tea)
RP_if there's any girls there i wanna do them (bars, pubs and cantinas)
RP_sneaking

etc, etc. there are tons of good soundtracks out there. my issue is no one soundtrack has sustained tone to it - a fight song, an epic song, a sad song. so i like to mix and match into playlists. then i just click over to the appropriate one when the scene warrants.

on a much more interesting note: www.freesound.org is a *HUGELY USEFUL* resource for GMs. i usually type in the weather or setting (pub, campfire, forest, blizzard), find a good loop and let it roll over music. you would shocked how much the players will start acting out holding cloaks and shields over their heads when they hear rain, or sipping from mugs when they hear bar ambience. i've gotten a huge response from my players. it takes a little work to get the right sounds so i usually keep multiple browser tabs open to queued up sound loops.

gnunn

Wow! Thanks drubixcube! I checked out the "freesound":www.freesound.org website this morning and I am definitely going to try to incorporate it into my game tonight!

On another note, I totally agree with what you are saying about playlists. I've been struggling to build a number of them myself. I find that even picking individual tracks can be challenging, since movie soundtracks tend to have each track constructed like an individual scene, complete with a "story" arc. Hence, most epic battle pieces start off quiet and ominous, or peaceful and then build to the fight. While tracks like this might work great in the beginning of an in-game fight, it can be obnoxious to suddenly go back to the "peaceful calm before the storm" music when the next track begins.

Oh, and continuing to run with Asian-themes: _The Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon_ soundtrack is also a good one.

I've also been meaning to pick up some of Joe Hisaishi's music. He does the soundtracks for most of Hayao Miyazaki's films like _Princess Mononoke_ and _Kaze no Tani no Nausicaa_

drubixcube

thanks for the kidness gnunn - glad you found freesound helpful.

i'm giving away all my secrets here, but Harry-Gregson Williams' "Kingdom of Heaven" soundtrack is a godsent. it still hits a lot of different tones, but in general it's pretty consistent throughout. give it a listen.

Knut Avenstroup Haugen's "Age of Conan" soundtrack is great too. Again, a little nit-picking with tracks but overwhelming good throughout and very consistent in terms of a mood.

Finally, Aly Bain and Ale M

gnunn

Okay, so I think one important thing to keep in mind when incorporating sound effects into a game is to have them prepared in advance like any other element of your campaign. Tonight, I tried to pretty much wing things using the Freesound website. Unfortunately, because my group plays straight after work, I didn't have time to prep sounds in advance. I made use of a drawbridge and then a babbling brook during appropriate portions of my session, but because I had to pull up the sound-effects in a search and then adjust the volume, it kind of killed the effect. Still, my players told me that if I polish my presentation a bit, the sounds could go from distracting to enhancing. Perhaps I will incorporate some sound prep for next week.

drubixcube

i hear you -

i never use freesound - or any other service - for incidental noise. i only use it for environment or "walla." queuing up the sounds can be a real hastle so i tend to save them for the places i think the players will spend the most time: tavern (if one is featured in the game), market, plaza, castle, forest, snow storm, etc.

keep working at it. i went and checked out softrope, btw. it seems like a good solution for what you're going for - incidental sound effects. have you DL it and tested it?

gnunn

I have downloaded softrope and I definitely think it has potential. Plus, now that you have tipped me off to freesound, I can build up a library of effects and potentially combine the two for a more affective soundscape.

Of course, when it comes to game planning, I find myself constantly struggling to prioritize my tasks. The adult GM in me says, "Focus on figuring out the next step of the story first!" but the kid GM says "But wouldn't it be cool to add this new shiny thing! SHINY!!"

I suppose it's the sort of thing EVERY GM deals with on some level. Hopefully I'll have some time to prep some soundscapes for next week.

drubixcube

let me know what works for you, i'm interested in making the process a little easier. nothing is a game-killer like having to stop and say "hold on, there was this one sound of snow-storm that would be perfect ..."

luckily my group drinks a lot of tea and i'll usually chime in with a "anyone fancy a cuppa?" that gives me a good 5 minutes to sync up some tracks.

incidentally, the Westerlands wiki is really impressive. i'm going to take some time to go through it. i'd love to send you some notes and have you send some to me in return. would you be down? you can find my campaign at the above address.

gnunn

Hey, I'm glad you like the site! I would totally be down for exchanging notes!

In terms of my initial thoughts on sound design... my gameplan is to sit down with softrope and ask myself, "Okay, what scenes would be most useful" then

# set up blank placeholder scenes for useful settings (Tavern, marketplace, magic shop, potion shop, temple, woodlands, etc.)
# determine which settings will be used in my next session
# figure out the sort of sounds I would want for those scenes
# import those sounds into my library
# start putting together scenes beginning with the ones that could be used next session

Fortunately, my players just hit a town, so a lot of the scenes I will be working on will be the sorts that can be used in a wide variety of situations.

drubixcube

sounds like softrope is quite the program. too bad i use a mac ...

Darkechilde

As an additional source, there's a vendor on www.rpgnow.com called Sonic Legends (http://www.rpgnow.com/index.php?manufacturers_id=3018) that are producing soundscapes. I bought their "Prosperous Tavern" track, which runs about eight and a half minutes, for $3, and it makes great ambient music. As a bonus, I got a code to 'buy one, get one free' from Sonic Legends' own website, which I intend to use. They have quite a few soundscapes to choose from - mostly fantasy, but some sci-fi and post-apocolypse (including "Zombie Apocolypse").

Check 'em out - I've been impressed - and they're mp3s, so they work with SoftRope.

Darkechilde