What multimedia have you used?

[Mikael Hasselstein]

I'm preparing a new SWD6 game, and I'm tempted to use media such as websites (like Obsidian Portal, or something homebrew) to help with between-game knowledge development, as well as in-game things like plotting hyperspace times.

Also, I'm thinking of using a soundboard to have some audio sfx during the game.

However, I'm wondering if those sort of things provide more distraction than they're worth.

What are your experiences?

[CRMcNeill]

I used to play D&D with a guy who played fantasy-ish music to help set the mood. It worked fine until the day he was in the bathroom and I added the Dead Alewives to his playlist...
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"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index

[Guardian_A]

I ran a World of Darkness campaign that spanned about 8 years. In that time, I maintained a website that kept track of the entire city the game took place in. When the players would encounter a new location or person, I would add information to the website. This allowed the players to reference any information that their characters knew. In the end, it was a lot of effort, but it was really worth it. It was really easy for me to reference the site to see what powers a NPC had used in the presence of a character, so I would know what tricks the NPC still had in its arsenal.

It takes a little effort to add the basic information at the beginning, but once you get moving, you shouldnt have to add much at any one time. And be careful not to post complete character sheets or anything like that on there, just post the information that the characters know about. Does an NPC have a blaster and a boot knife, but the players have only seen the blaster? Has a Sith used force push, but not force lightning?

A little mood music is great. It should be pretty easy to find the movie soundtracks, playing the correct soundtrack can really energize a space battle or cantina brawl!

[Fallon Kell]

It's a little tough to be a GM and a DJ at the same time, but If you like to put together title crawls and things like that to get your players oriented for an adventure, that kind of thing has worked well for me both as a player and a GM.
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Or that excessively long "Noooooooooo" was the Whining Side of the Force leaving him. - Dustflier

Complete Starship Construction System

[The Brain]

Well there was the time I served everyone lifeboat survival "biscuits" (which have the taste and texture of waxed cardboard) and canned pickled eggs when a shipjacker and her droids once stowed away and was trying to make the crew abandon ship by sabotaging systems starting with the auto-chef and other galley equipment.

[Guardian_A]

[Bren]

We often set the soundtracks to the Star Wars movies as background. The music isn't loud and often the effect is only subliminal, but the opening fanfare is good to set the mood and announce that the game is starting. Sometimes I'll skip a track or two if they don't suit the mood e.g. cantina music during a somber discussion, but sometimes you get really lucky and the music hits a rising dramatic note just as a player is doing something cool and dramatic in the game and that heightens the experience. We also typically have handouts of some sort, Bounties for Bounty Hunters, datapads or scan docs with mission orders or background intel, that sort of thing.

I did run one long adventure, Love is a Battlefield, with a musical theme. The adventure focused on the redemption of a failed Jedi and the rescue of a bunch of innocents (including many children) who had been kidnapped and terrorized by Inquisitor Tremayne as part of a plot to bring the Jedi into the open. Each scene was based on a Pat Benatar song title and I played the song as a lead in to the scenes. The song provided a bit of a hint about the scene and I like 80s rock.

The most recent SW adventure they were moving through the effect of a pulsar and I used a mistuned radio to provide background static. That only worked so-so since it was too annoying for me and I had to shut it off periodically. I also created a set of pictures for all the important NPCs that they were meeting. Then I had specific handouts based on how successful they were with alien species, streetwise, etc.

Long ago I ran a Call of Cthulhu scenario where we played in the dark and I had separate rooms for the characters who were separated from the group. I had created a special sound track with period jazz numbers as well as spooky music and creepy sound affects for the haunted house. The players all had mini flashlights and glow sticks so they could see there notes and dice. It was pretty popular. In fact we've done more effects for CoC than for Star Wars. Mood and atmosphere just seem more critical there to me. But lots of those ideas could be ported over.

So I agree with others, that unless you are using an assistant GM to handle the DJ and SFX duties, you want to keep such effects to a minimum so it doesn't distract you or slow play too much. But background music - no trouble. A few carefully selected audio or video SFX - perfect. Providing pictures (hard copy or displayed on a laptop) of NPCs or photos or drawings that show a location and set a mood - perfect.

It may help to try adding one or two things at a time and see how you are able to handle the additional effects, DJ skills, etc. while you GM.

[JT Swift]

I’m obsessive about media in my RPGs. My Star Wars RPG has the following…

* An instant soundboard of buttons for lightsabre power ups, blaster shots, wookiee growl, etc. Found at
http://starwarsrpgsoundboard.googlepages.com/sw_soundboardSMALL.swf

* The Star Wars soundboards are great for ewokes, wookiees, blasters, and jawas.
The Millennium Falcon board is always up when scenes are happening on a transport.
http://www.starwars.com/games/playnow/soundboards/#/?theme=42

* I don’t use it often [cuz it’s a pain to look things up] but I’ve got that Star Wars Sound FX book/player that was released a few years ago tied into my lap top so if there’s something that’s essential to the game I can look the number up before the game starts.

* A collection of playlists on realplayer for ambient sounds. This includes lots of stuff pulled off that Star Wars Sound FX book/player I just mentioned. Its got alien bar talk, speeder traffic, starship rumble, starfighter hum, swamp, wind, big blaster fighter, big lightsabre fight, etc…

* About 24 hours worth of Star Wars sound track music sorted into the following playlists: Action, Tension, Soft, Happy/Victory, and In Universe (cantina stuff). Its got tracks from all 6 movies, the clones wars, various SW video games, etc… So each playlist ends up being hours of mood music that I can run in the background. Its run on windows media player so I can use realplayer for ambient FX and WMP for music at the same time. Just click and forget about it until you get to a scene with a new tone. I even allow the Force Users in the group use the music I play as a feeling from the Force about how safe they are.

All of this can be played at the same time and is hooked up through a nice surround sound system.

Each session opens with a big Star Wars opening crawl with a re-cap from last week’s using…
http://www.starwars.com/games/playnow/crawl_creator/index.html

* Pics of aliens, vehicles, and droids from wookieepedia…
http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Main_Page

* Occasional video clips from the movies or youtube [but these are planned well in advanced and only happen 2-3 times a year].

All of this show on a 58 inch TV.

I also keep a blaster, comlink, and datapad props handy for adding a bit more body language flair to the NPCs I’m playing.
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- J.T. Swift

For Everything about the TARDIS check out
http://www.whoniverse.net/tardis/

For all things Gallifreyan check out
http://meshyfish.com/~roo/index.html

[mdlake]

We've started using wikidot.com to keep game sites for our campaigns. Very useful! It serves two main functions.

First, the GM can lay out important up-front game information: power level, house rules, a couple pages of setting description, directions for maintaining (explaining that this game is gritty or silly or light-hearted, whether certain character concepts are forbidden, recommended reading, that sort of thing).

Second, we can maintain a game log. Sadly, the responsibility for recording the log seems to fall to the GM by default, but it should be the players doing it. They're the ones who will use it, after all--to remind themselves what happened last time (Villain McBaddypants stole the Orb of Politeness), what events need a follow-up (recover the Orb from McBaddypants), and to compare notes on what seemed significant ("He took the ORB?! Oh man, that's bad. I thought he was just disrupting the Convocation on general principle.")

A wiki can serve other functions, too. I'm particularly fond of keeping a quote log. Some players like to post their character stats or portraits, and a GM may want all players to post their stats and/or back stories for reference.

[Urban Spaceman]

For Star Wars I use the film music in the background, sometimes selecting specific tracks for certain scenes (dropping out of hyperspace and in to an Imperial blockade works even better with the Imperial March playing).
I have a few other soundtracks too, just for variety, and sometimes different music fits scenes better. I try to avoid anything too recognisable though.
I also tend to keep a copy of the Alien Species pdf around, to show/remind the players of certain species looks, as not all my players know these things. Sometimes I show the picture, sometimes I use the picture just to help me describe the species.

Player hand outs work well, as players like having something to look at other than a map or character sheet.

In other games I've used music, lighting (low lighting works well for horror games) and badges (for Paranoia security clearances).
Years ago I used a computer with a data base set up when they were hacking in to one. This was way back in the 8bit era, when I could program. It worked pretty well, but I wouldn't have a clue how to do that nowadays.
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"The ships hung in the sky in much the same way that bricks don't."

[Bren]

[Mikael Hasselstein]

[CRMcNeill]

[Mikael Hasselstein]

[CRMcNeill]

Worked for me, too. Thanks.
_________________
"No set of rules can cover every situation. It's expected that you will make up new rules to suit the needs of your game." - The Star Wars Roleplaying Game, 2R&E, pg. 69, WEG, 1996.

The CRMcNeill Stat/Rule Index