RPGaDay2018 Day 19: What music enhances your game?

Easy answer today: None!

I am possibly the most un-musical person you will ever come across. I own virtually no music and what I do own was, with one exception, bought for me by people who don’t really know me. The one exception has a funny story attached but that comes later. I can only assume that I don’t hear music the same way that other people hear it. For me music is simply noise and has no more merit than someone trying to talk over the noise of a hair dryer or shouting over the sound of road works outside.

So it is funny story time.

So I was on the train coming back from a gaming weekend when the train pulls in to Plymouth (of pilgrim fathers fame). The four seats opposite me are then filled by four clinically obese ladies, tattooed and dressed like teenagers. They are rather drunk and still drinking. They are also extremely loud. They had been to see the Chippendales and were were variously expounding on what they would do to any or all poor Cheppendale if they got them alone in a room.

My ipod is mainly filled with BBC Radio4 comedy and this was insufficient to block out the horror assaulting my ears. I turned to my phone and Google Play and found Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon was a free ‘album’ of the week. So I used Pink Floyd to drown out the auditory hell that was my railway carriage. I can testify that Pink Floyd use way too may really quiet and long intros to songs! I really wish I had bought something like Never Mind the Bollocks, it probably would have been a better choice.

7 Replies to “RPGaDay2018 Day 19: What music enhances your game?”

  1. I mostly regard music as “that stuff you have on when driving.” And I’m not always bothered about that, and I’m perfectly willing to have factual CDs on instead. It’s just a shame most of my factual stuff is still on tape!

    I have considered putting together some audio loops for RPGs though. Just need to find someone able to do it for not too much (so many ideas, so little time!).

  2. I have a ton of music, but don’t really use it for my games. I find it distracting, and discussions tend to start about the music instead of what’s going on in the game (mainly because quite a few of my players are also musically inclined).

  3. There are lots of playlists you can get on Spotify for your RPGing. I tend to prefer the instrumental ones, like the Elder Scrolls soundtracks and things like that, because I find I like my background music to stay in the background.

    I also put on the Conan the Barbarian soundtrack (by Basil Poledouris) for boss fights.

  4. I seldom use music, and if I use instrumental music only. However, I use a lot of ambient sounds. Rain, wind, horse riding, wood sounds, etc. to set the scene for my players.

    1. I imagine these days with having a PC, laptop or tablet at the table it is pretty easy to play an MP3 of a sound effect on demand and at the top of a finger.

      1. It is, and there’s a heck of a lot of stuff out there on RPGNow alone. Background loops and music, ambient loops and sound effects.

  5. None. I don’t like talking over the noise to allow the players to hear what is happening. The players don’t listen to it because they want to hear what is happening in the game. If a player is daydreaming while listening to the music, it gets really annoying to have to say “Hey. John. Hey. John. What do you do?” “What? Oh. Um. What was the question?”

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