The Legend Soundtrack

[alex_greene]

I'll always and inextricably associate the early RuneQuest with the sound of Seventies prog rock.

You cannot get away from it. You start playing early RQ, and for some inexplicable reason you start thinking of Procol Harum and The Byrds, Pink Floyd's "The Piper at the Gates of Dawn," the Moody Blues, Yes, Mike Oldfield and all of that.

You know the feeling. Vaguely psychedelic, and the kind of feeling that if you're sober when playing RQ you're kind of missing out a bit.

RQ3 came out in the Eighties, and frankly by then the Prog Rock label had degenerated - for some reason I associate the RQ3 box set version with Genesis.

Then came the Mongoose revival of RuneQuest, and while the traces of old prog rock are still there, like a lingering scent of Old Spice on Grandad's suit that you just pulled out of the wardrobe long after he got planted into the ground, the revivified RQ did look more like ...

... well, this is going to sound heretical, but ...

... it just reminded me of Games Workshop kids' stuff boiled over.

It even had the theme tune of Starship Troopers tromping away in the background.

So.

Legend.

Different feel altogether. The mechanic is the same, but this is not RuneQuest. You can run RQ using Legend rules, and run Legend on some other guy's RQ engine (e.g. Renaissance), but ...

So not Runequest. Not even a reboot.

Which means ... we can put any soundtrack to it that we like. We don't have to play the same tired Moody Blues or Aphrodite's Child soundtracks, not even in our heads. Banish Phil Collins to the Bald Old Cockneys Retirement Home (aka EastEnders' Walford).

What would you truly like to have as the soundtrack to Legend now, seeing as we have been given the greatest blessing of all by Mongoose - a completely fresh start?

My vote: The soundtrack ... to Joss Whedon's Serenity - and also Firefly. And for the epic bits, Paul Dinletir's Soundmachine and Tristan's Two Steps From Hell.

Your turn.

 

[Vile]

Ayreon's Electric Castle.

 

[DrBargle]

Depends what you're doing with your Legend...

You need something that you can talk over - try playing a roleplaying game with Rain Dogs on in the background (I thought it would evoke a chaotic, corrupt, Warhammer-ish city) and you'll go mad!

Soundtracks are good. A bit proggy? Try Alan Parsons' Ladyhawke soundtrack!

 

[Dan True]

I find it hard to consistently stay with one soundtrack. I have one for travelling, one for towns, one for battle, one for scary moments. In my Eberron campaign I also had one for Taverns, but since Deus Vult is not supposed to be cozy, I dropped it

And I believe they all fit Legend The music I played when my group was travelling via Lightning Rail over the summer-green grass plains in Northern Breland, fits it just as well as the music I put on when the group in Deus Vult found a cottage full of prisoners with flayed skin.

Legend does it all I cannot associate a single genre to it.

- Dan

 

[tarkhan bey]

If you are playing any of the Eternal champion settings, it time to dig out those old prog rock 33's again.
Nothing says MM like a bit of Hawkwind. :lol:

I also find that early Bowie works for Hawkmoon. In an early game of Hawkmoon, years ago, the players were at a masked ball in Normandia held in honour of a visiting Granbretan dignitary,Alahdan Zain, the thin White Duke of Bromle.
Ziggy Stardust, Starman,Life on Mars and Suffragette City went down a treat and almost gave proceedings a bit of a 'Knights Tale' feel to them.
The players thought I went to far though, in playing Tiger Feet by Mud for his Tigermask honour guard. :lol:

 

[Loz]

When I was writing Legend (aka MRQII) I was listening to a fair amount of Porcupine Tree, Rush, Jethro Tull and Floyd. A very good mixture of old and new Progressive Rock bands. 'Broadsword and the Beast' and 'Crest of a Knave' are two favourite writing albums.

 

[Loz]

If you are playing any of the Eternal champion settings, it time to dig out those old prog rock 33's again.
Nothing says MM like a bit of Hawkwind. :lol:

I also find that early Bowie works for Hawkmoon. In an early game of Hawkmoon, years ago, the players were at a masked ball in Normandia held in honour of a visiting Granbretan dignitary,Alahdan Zain, the thin White Duke of Bromle.
Ziggy Stardust, Starman,Life on Mars and Suffragette City went down a treat and almost gave proceedings a bit of a 'Knights Tale' feel to them.
The players thought I went to far though, in playing Tiger Feet by Mud for his Tigermask honour guard. :lol:

Yes, Bowie works well for Hawkmoon. In one Hawkmoon I session I ran, set in the decaying city of Milan, 'Fashion', 'Heroes' and 'Golden Years' would've been just perfect.

 

[Mankcam]

When I think of RQ3 I have memories of Guns n Roses 'Appetite For Destruction', 'The Lost Boys' soundtrack, and Jethro Tull's 'Songs From The Wood'. Must be a limbic thing...

I often use pc soundtracks these days, such as 'Worlds of Warcraft' and such. We recently played with the 'Age of Conan' pc soundtrack in the background, as well as the 'Troy' film score and that seemed to hit the spot for fantasy battle scenes, highly recommended. For some reason I had it on shuffle with Tom Waits 'Bone Machine' and a couple of Nick Cave albums, and it seemed to work for us heh heh