EPIC HOW TO: DJing and DMing well in the Online Player

Pro Tips
#1

This is a REALLY SUPER USEFUL video with some great tips for how to DJ the easiest, quickest, most fun, most effective way while you DM games for your friends. Watch it! You won’t regret you did!

2 Likes
#2

Info here on getting set up with the Syrinscape Online Player:
https://www.syrinscape.com/online/

#3

Hi Ben-

Thanks for posting this video. It’s helpful to watch and learn from another person’s workflow. It does however point to a problem I have that maybe some others have and unfortunately I’m going to say up front I don’t have a good suggestion or idea to try and solve it.

Watching you work one thing that jumps out to me is part of what makes your workflow so efficient is your deep knowledge of everything that’s been created for Syrinscape. It makes sense since…well you made them, right?

As an example from this from the video above, you said something to the effect of “I need Bugbears for this battle and luckily there is a soundset called Bugbear Battle so let’s search for that!” and in a couple of clicks BOOM you have what you want. But for me as an end user I don’t know the name of every soundset or can recall what every element in each one entails so there are times when I’m using Syrinscape that I feel overwhelmed navigating everything that is now available in the program.

I think part of the problem is the program has grown very organically so there aren’t strict naming conventions (for instance, you have an element named “What was that?”) which aren’t particularly useful when you’re trying to come up with sounds on the fly. I’d really like more ways to sort/categorize sounds, or even just consistent and more descriptive name conventions.

Anyways, I love the system and will continue to use it but wanted to share some feedback!

3 Likes
#4

Hi @rich

Thanks for taking the time to comment! :slight_smile:

I have two replies here… :smiley:

  1. You’re right. Search is not very good at the moment… BUT we are in the middle of dev for a MUCH better solution for search in the Online Player and apps. We did some user research a month or so back and got lots of good feedback… so expect that to get a LOT better soon.

  2. You’re wrong… he he… I mean it… I really thought about what i did in the app as I searched and clicked.

The things I did include:

  • going to the “Bugbear Battle” SoundSet. This is one of the first SoundSets anyone would download. It is FREE with the player, and comes near the top of the alphabet. And of course, I just took a stab in the dark that there might be a ‘bugbear’ SoundSet… I would have got an equally useful search return from typing ‘goblin’ or ‘gnoll’ or ‘manticor’, and I would have still been able to add those sounds quickly and easily.
  • I searched for several spells, once again, I didn’t need to know these spells existed in Syrinscape, I literally just typed int he name of the spell. I even showed what to do if a Spell didn’t show up. (yes, you’d need to know there are generic spells calls 0th, 1st, 2nd etc)
  • I mentioned I had played with a certain module before and liked the music there and remembered the name… I might have taken notice of that when I played… or I might have searched for that music some time recently
  • When I looked for the Avernus music… I new there was a Descent to Avernus SoundPack and it had cool music, so I just went straight into the SoundSet and had a look around.

I suppose, as the level of knowledge is less, then more of this would need to happen in prep, rather than live… but then each time I’ve done that prep then my knowledge goes up… so I have more of those secrets.

Does that make sense?

I suppose the best thing to do, is to put in some time exploring and playing around… seeing what’s in Syrinscape… and definitely asking for hints about appropriate content here on the forums as well.