Thaumaturgy has five screens. Play is where you run the game. Environments is where you build the sound of a place. Boards is where you build your buttons. Music is the app's own library of tracks, tagged by mood and by place. Campaigns keeps separate games apart, and needs the free account. The whole app is free — no ads, no paid tier, and nothing held back for one.
1. Hear it
Open the app. The Play screen has an environment at the top ("Dripping Cave") and a Combat board underneath. Press PLAY. Tap a few buttons on the board. Press the red STOP ALL (or Esc) and everything goes quiet.
On a phone the first sound needs a tap — PLAY or a scene counts. The stop button floats at the bottom right so it's always under your thumb.
2. Pick an environment
The dropdown next to the environment's name lists the built-in ones. Pick one and press PLAY. The chips under the name are the layers it's made of; press Edit environments (or the Environments tab) to open them up.
3. Make it yours
Change a layer's sound, move a dial, add a layer, remove one. Everything changes live — no stop and restart. When it sounds right, press Save a copy as… and name it. It lands under "My environments" in the list and the dropdown, and from then on your edits to it save themselves. See Environments & layers.
4. Build a board
Go to Boards → + New board. Add sounds from the library on the right (listen with ▶ first), name the buttons, add notes. Press Load in Play. See Boards.
5. Save it as a scene
Back on Play, with your environment and boards loaded, press + New scene and name it. From now on that one tap brings the whole scene back — and starts the sound. See Scenes.
6. Keep it
Everything above is saved in your browser. To have it on your phone at the table and your laptop at home, sign in — an email and a link, no password.
Recipes for a particular place
Fifteen of the built-in environments written up one at a time: what the place sounds like, the exact dial settings as they ship, what to load alongside it, and how to bend it into the room next door.
Cave ambience for D&D — A cave is one quiet air loop and resonant drips every four seconds. The dial-by-dial recipe, and the environment ready to play.
Tavern ambience for D&D — A tavern is a crowd loop at 60%, a hearth under it, and mugs every eight seconds. The full recipe and the environment, ready to play.
Dungeon ambience for D&D — A dungeon is iron at three distances over a bed that already has voices in it. The recipe, dial by dial, and the environment to play.
Forest ambience for D&D — Daytime woodland: a leaf bed, birds every five seconds, and a branch snapping once a minute. Recipe and environment, free.
Rain and thunder ambience — The built-in storm is two loops and one scheduled layer. Why it is built that way, and how to take the thunder back under your control.
Battlefield ambience for D&D — A battle is almost entirely far away: a distant roar, steel every three seconds, and shouts close by. The recipe, and where the fight goes.
Haunted house ambience — The haunted corridor runs the highest wander in the whole library — 90%. Why unpredictable timing is the entire effect, with the recipe.
Underdark ambience for D&D — Seven layers, two of them loops, and drums at the edge of hearing. The recipe for a cave that something else is already using.
Castle ambience for D&D — A great hall is a hearth, a tight room on the bed, and footsteps carrying from far away. The recipe and the environment to play.
Campfire ambience for D&D — Three loops, embers every six seconds, and a wolf twice an hour. The recipe for the scene players actually talk through.
Ship at sea ambience — A ship is a structure under load: hull every five seconds, rigging every eight, and a bell twice an hour. Recipe and environment.
Desert ambience for D&D — Four layers and a vulture: the smallest environment of these fifteen, and why an honest desert is a scene-length tool, not a session one.
Swamp ambience for D&D — Frogs every six seconds, mud every ten, and something large every eighty. The recipe for a place with no far away in it.
Crypt and tomb ambience — Every event layer in a crypt carries a large room. Five of them are on, two wait in reserve — including the one that sits up.
Medieval market ambience — A market is a crowd with work in it: coins nearby every fifteen seconds, carts and chickens further off. Recipe and environment.
How it compares
There are a lot of tabletop audio apps, several of them good, and two of them free. Written honestly, with every price and feature read off the maker's own page on the date each page states.
Thaumaturgy vs Syrinscape — Syrinscape has licensed adventures and far more music, at $8.50 a month. Thaumaturgy is free, builds environments live, and has 250 tracks of its own.
Thaumaturgy vs Tabletop Audio — Both are free and run in a browser. Tabletop Audio has 500 composed ambiences and far more music. Thaumaturgy has 250 tracks and layers you tune live.
Free D&D ambience apps compared — Ten tabletop audio apps: prices, platforms, sound effects, and which ones you can record and stream without a credit. Checked on the makers' own pages.
RPG soundboard alternatives — Six soundboards for tabletop games: which come with sound effects, which take your own audio files, which run on a phone, and what each one costs.
