GM's Screen

bocephus · 01-12-2023, 03:31 AM

You can also make your own which allows you to do other things.

I built mine using a pair of A3 Art portfolios, some plastic page sleeves and some binder clips.

The GM side has stuff *I* typically have to refer to but I can easily add other notes by just clipping a page over them or sliding a page over one I don't need right now.

I can display various items for the players by using the other side of the binder clip to hold it on their side. Sometimes its a representation of the town, village, city to set the tone for what they are seeing. Sometimes its a general 'map' of an area (something that would be considered common knowledge info easily gathered by asking or looking at road signs), images of creatures/people they are encountering, sometimes its just a piece of art that I feel communicates something about the upcoming session, sometimes its the who comes next in the attack stack. There is a lot of space to use, so its often multiples of these things.

This setup works better for me because I know what tables I need (Reaction Table) vs things I don't (Hit locations and DR for vehicles). If I run a space campaign I can easily add tables for energy weapons and drop the magic chart.

I like the idea of GM screens, I just don't find the preprinted ones as useful as they purport to be, just because each GM is different and what you need as reference is different. Typically I find 50% or less of what is one the screen of actual value to me as the GM and generic art is... well generic, it might not even fit your campaign, but your old west group is still going to be looking at that rampaging dragon.

01-12-2023, 03:31 AM	#5
bocephus Join Date: Apr 2019	Re: GM's Screen You can also make your own which allows you to do other things. I built mine using a pair of A3 Art portfolios, some plastic page sleeves and some binder clips. The GM side has stuff I typically have to refer to but I can easily add other notes by just clipping a page over them or sliding a page over one I don't need right now. I can display various items for the players by using the other side of the binder clip to hold it on their side. Sometimes its a representation of the town, village, city to set the tone for what they are seeing. Sometimes its a general 'map' of an area (something that would be considered common knowledge info easily gathered by asking or looking at road signs), images of creatures/people they are encountering, sometimes its just a piece of art that I feel communicates something about the upcoming session, sometimes its the who comes next in the attack stack. There is a lot of space to use, so its often multiples of these things. This setup works better for me because I know what tables I need (Reaction Table) vs things I don't (Hit locations and DR for vehicles). If I run a space campaign I can easily add tables for energy weapons and drop the magic chart. I like the idea of GM screens, I just don't find the preprinted ones as useful as they purport to be, just because each GM is different and what you need as reference is different. Typically I find 50% or less of what is one the screen of actual value to me as the GM and generic art is... well generic, it might not even fit your campaign, but your old west group is still going to be looking at that rampaging dragon.