All the videos and tutorials mentioned here are good. If you have missed any of them definitely give them another shot. Since I also was lost for quite some time even after following the tutorials. I’m going to give you my text answer, with no screen shots. So… be warned. This may not be useful but as a person who was also lost in the UI/UX for a long time after tutorials I feel you.
TL;DR - Syrinscape’s User Interface and User Experience are pretty effing bad when you are new and don’t understand what you are doing yet. It is WELL WORTH the PAIN of learning how to do it. (Syrinscape staff, no disrespect, it is ok once you have learned it but the nooblets have some serious hurdles in the beginning)
I would recommend first starting here:
Get logged in to the main page so that you can see in the upper right hand side where it says, “Play Now, Username” and image icon with the little v drop down.
Select the Drop Down
Select “Campaigns”
Now you likely have no campaigns listed. Click on the Tab on the left side of your screen that says “Fantasy” It should be next to “All, Fantasy, Sci-fi, boardgame” You MUST click on of the options other than “All” Which is not very intuitive but it gets better.
Now type in a campaign name, then click “add a new campaign” Hooray you started a campaign. Now let’s put some sounds in it. (You haven’t heard any of these yet most likely but I found this to be the easiest way to get started and start understanding the UI/UX. On the right hand side is a list of soundsets with a little search bar above them. Click in the search bar and as you start typing you will see “tags” and it will sort of autofill for you. Start typing “Pathfinder” and choose the pathfinder tag. For the sake of learning. Drag and Drop of couple of items that show up from the search over to the left hand side (below your new campaign) where it says, “drag soundsets here”
Now stop. Breathe. You can do it!
Scroll up to the top of your screen so you can see the “Play Now” button.
Click “Play Now”
In this new screen in the top right, ensure you have the search open. You should see 4 text words. These work more like tabs than just text. Properties, Library, Sample, Search. Then look to the far left and notice the “Soundsets” and again below it “Soundsets +” it’s a bit redundant but will make sense much much later. Below those it should say, “Select a Campaign” and select your campaign from the list!
It will take a moment to load and then you should see on the left, it now says the name of the soundset you dragged and dropped over to your campaign earlier below the text “Moods” Below the text for the soundset you chose it will say “All Elements” below that “Moods”
Click on the play icon next to any of the moods you now see on this left hand side. It’s a universal triangle play symbol with circle. You know. You should hear some sample sounds now.
To the right of this a soundboard type of thing has opened up. You might have music playing, or other effects depending on the “Soundset” and “Mood” you have selected. This soundboard differentiates different sounds with the appropriate icon. Music is a music note, Sound effects are SFX, and one shots have an image that often represents the sound. If you scroll down(if you need to) you will also see, “Global One shots” These can be used as well. One shots are not (to my knowledge) part of the moods but you can manually select them to create an effect. I LOVE doing this to my players.
OK you are hearing sounds and making one shot sounds happen! How do you search out more and play a bit to see what Soundsets you want to add to your campaign??? (feel free to click the stop button on the top of your screen to stop the current mood.
Remember the four words on the upper right hand area? “Properties, Library, Sample, Search” If your search bar isn’t already open. Click “Search”
When the search bar is open it will include “Genre, Status, Type, Library” The icons listed allow mouse over and are how you can filter down the results. My recommendation to start, is to just click the D&D and Pathfinder items under Genre. Then, under type, select “Soundsets” This is just for you to get the feel of things. Don’t click on anything else yet. You can filter results, but if you click “Adventures” it’s going to jumble things up. Just click “Soundsets” for now.
A large list of pre-made soundsets should open up now. If it has a Blue Square with a Blue arrow pointing NE then this means you can click on this soundset and it will open up on the far left side. You will again see the “moods” and can sample some of these to see if you like this “Soundset” If you like it and want it in your campaign. Write it down so you can find it in back in the first steps(at the top of this message) and drag and drop it into your campaign.
This is a good way to get started and get a feel for things. I highly recommend doing this for a while until you get comfortable. Then… re-watching some of the tutorials and you should then start learning about the other tabs and how to make your own Soundsets that you can add.
I mean NO DISRESPECT to the Syrinscape staff but the UI/UX is brutal. It feels as if it was designed by a musician and/or a programmer and not someone with UI/UX experience. It is worth the mental gymnastics to figure out as the the sounds are pretty incredible, the flexibility is pretty great. What it can add to your campaign is pretty stellar especially if you are using licensed campaigns that they have created entire soundsets for each scenario.
I also almost gave up. Then I was billed again, and thought… well sh!t I guess I better figure this out. I’m so glad I did. I hope some of this was useful and you actually made it to the end.
