DM's screens

Just picked up the 5e DM's screen at my FLGS, and I think it's... alright. Not perfect, but pretty nice. What does Veeky Forums like to see on a DM's screen? How do you use DM's screens? DO you use DM's screens?

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The hard part about a 'General' GM's screen is that GMs often have different ideas about what needs to be on it. Personally I kind of like the screens from Hammerdog where you can create your own inserts and use whatever information you think you'll need in it. I'm running a game of Mutant: Year Zero and the half the screen is random generation tables for Zone sectors rather than dice modifiers for various skills that I really need. So it's an example of where I'll end up creating my own stuff.

>The hard part about a 'General' GM's screen is that GMs often have different ideas about what needs to be on it.

While it wouldn't work for every game, something like Apocalypse World's (or even Dungeon World's) Agenda and Principles would be useful.

I always made my own DM screens. Some presentation cardboard, a printer and some clear packing tape works wonders

Sounds like, in general, you all use DM's screens, though, yeah? This will actually be my first time using one. I'm interested to give it a shot. Usually I just have three different books open at a time, and it's absolute chaos. Hoping to mitigate some of that this time around.

I found that I almost never use the middle part (not only my laptop is there, but also the status effects aren't really so important).

The NPC generator is nice but when you have to make up someone's personality on the fly, you won't roll dice, you just pick out whichever you want.

I use the NPC name generator way more than anything else there, to be honest. Again, I won't roll dice after a player asks the fucking horse merchant his name, but I will pick out some bits of the name and add fitting twist on it or something.

The screen is alright, I just wish it had more relevant stuff in the middle, like vendor and price generators.

What kind of things do you guys like on your DM screens?

Good DM screens are filled with convenient reference materials to make GMing easier.

Bonus points if you also make them serve double duty, showing images/maps to the players, and possibly also give them the things they could want to reference midgame.

But that's what they're for, quick reference stuff.

The only good reason to hide the dice is if the players seeing their roll will influence their actions (perception checks, diplomacy).

A mug of that tea would be pretty nice, desu user.

Looking at the 5e screen, summaries of the less-commonly used actions (Disengage, Grapple, Shove, etc.) would be nice, since I'm less likely to remember that off-hand.

i've modified my 5E gm screen by splicing in parts of this mini GM screen and a few random print outs. i can share pictures if interested.

>t b h corrects to desu??

Honestly I kinda like that screen. High enough that people can't look over it without being obvious but low enough to allow me to keep everything in check without making the impression of a giraffe, and has all the data that you may find yourself forgetting about mid-session more often than not.

I use 2 binders, taped together, with plastic sleeves for 8.5x11 sheets.

For those sheets, it varies by system, but things like:
>Task difficulty examples
>On the fly NPC stat guidelines
>Common equipment statistics
>Any Useful combat rules.
>PC Social + Information Skill + Saving Throw Values (because those are good to roll behind the screen).

Are things I commonly want on it.

Thank you. I'm trying to build my own DM screen for my first time.

If you're running 5e, I'd also use it's "group check" rules for knowledge and investigation and social skills, and would suggest putting them on there.

Chase rules might also be of use.

If you go with 2 binders + sleeves, you can have more pages than you have binder sides, and can set it up with different configurations you can switch between (takes some planning).

You can also make stuff that clips on the top, such as NPC portraits, or an initiative tracker.

If using sleeves, printing the sheets on cardstock helps them not flop around.

I agree, I am at the point where my notes and info is on my laptop, and I can use a app for rolling if keeping rolls hidden is that big of a deal. But when I did use one I had found a tri fold white board roughly the size of a DM screen and used it.

>something like Apocalypse World's (or even Dungeon World's) Agenda and Principles would be useful.

I'll have to check those out.

I like any of the products where I can pick what I need, print out the sheets and slide them in. On the one I posted you can do that on both sides so I can post things the players are going to use a lot on their side too.

Each section has a copy of a player's character sheet.

I don't use a screen, I use a laptop.

If I was using a screen, I'd want it to focus on winging, because when I'm prepared I'll be looking at my notes instead. If the party decided to introduce themselves to everyone in town then wander five miles due east into the wilderness to see what they'll find though, then I need a bunch of random tables. Names (people, towns) and encounters especially.

Also I'd really like it - in general but a screen is a fine place to put this - if someone published a bunch of half-tables of random encounters. Like a bunch of tables with field/hills/forest/swamp stuff labeled 1-10, then a bunch of tables with undead/orcish/bandit/mystical entries labeled 11-20. So if I decide this is an undead-infested swamp, I have the table I need right there.

So far I have never used a gm screen, and have never played under a gm who uses one.

If anything, people generally tend to use laptops these days.

I always just end up paper-clipping pages of info to the inside of any screen I use.

Sooner or later you reach the point where you don't need the GM screen because one of two things happen.

A: you play the system long enough that you know the rules.

B: you realize that an enjoyable session or campaign hinges on the group of people at the table, not the system, and switch to something that's streamlined and simple to remember without needing a giant cheat-sheet.

The only notes I keep in front of me are about player characters.

>Pick what I need and slide them in
I have yet to see one that's an improvement over using - two 3-ring-binders held together with masking tape, with sleeves on the rings - in any way other than portability.

You don't use both?

I use both.

Laptop for campaign notes. GM screen for easy reference materials. Only time I found the laptop kept up with laptop+GM screen on my end was when I was at home and running it from my PC with 2 monitors, but that did fuck all for the players.

I could see computer only being better if It had a minimum of three screens, two for me and one for the PCs; otherwise I'd much rather have both.

I guess I just generally don't use a lot of reference material other than what I have up in my campaign notes on my computer I suppose.

What kind of information is actually generally found on your stand gm screen?

I use custom ones, not standard ones.

I have player stats in a table, sometimes I have a big sheet of weapons, other times a table of skill examples to help me benchmark skill TNs.

I've had sheets with more complicated combat rules. Or in a kingdom building game, a cheat sheet for the kingdom building.

Sometimes I've got tables for improvised NPC stats on the fly.

I tried having NPC generators at one point, but I think if I did it again I'd rather do that on PC or my cellphone, and write a simple app if I can't find one I like.

I see. I generally have an index card for each player that has their stats and saves on them, and I use them for keeping initiative order, a technique acquired from one of my old GMs.

I guess I've just played with rules lawyers long enough that I have learned to remember most rules without needing a reference.

I play a lot of different systems, and try new ones all the time. Memorizing all of them isn't in the cards.

I can remember the common stuff in Pathfinder though. We've played that a lot over the years.

Oh yeah, I agree that memorization isn't the perfect strategy. That said, most of the other systems I have run have been pretty simple in comparison.

Index cards are an option.

I like (using dnd as an example) having all their social skill totals, saving throws, and knowledge skills values in a single handy table, so I can roll those things and give them the results without them having the name knowledge of how high they rolled.

Yeah, I think for the most part our games come out to WoD complexity or higher.

Unisystem, Rolemaster, Mutants and Masterminds, GURPS, Shadowrun 4 & 5, FFG Star Wars, Savage Worlds, Pathfinder, 5e, nWoD, cWoD, Aberrant, Deadlands classic, to name some of the ones we've played a bunch of.

youtu.be/YRMVTmbe-Is

Most of the other systems I have run have been rules-light things like the cypher system. I would love to run a shadowrun game, but my group seems oddly adverse to any kind of cyberpunkery.

I haven't played cypher yet.

The new cypher setting sounds pretty interesting, and I'm considering getting it, but I don't know that I'll actually use cypher if I want to run it.

From what I've seen of it, it doesn't seem to do much any better than the other games I'd consider for it.

The system has one good point, in that it is super easy to gm. Besides that, I am not overly fond of it. As somebody who has played it more than they have run it, it is fairly boring from a player standpoint. I would avoid the system.

Yeah, I figured.

I'm inclined to use Unisystem, Cinematic Unisystem, or GURPS instead.

But I collect interesting setting books, and the new one that's basically Terra Nova looks neat.

My group seems to have fallen into a super annoying "anti-complexity" movement as of late. It is hard enough to even get them to play D&D these days.

It is quite discouraging.

I always do my DM screens by myself. This way I can be sure that I will have only the info I need. The DM screen only packs the most vital info (usually combat related). It allows me to run the most frequent situations without having to go through books and it hides my dice rolls. Next to the DM screen, I have a small binder with background related info (price lists, equipment charts, maps, charts for special situations...). It's useful because I don't have to go through rulebooks to find the info I need. Therefore, rulebooks are almost never used.

>I use both.

Same here - I've got a screen up for commonly used tables on my side, and images / tables for the players on the other. The laptop does the rolling for complex stuff, and helps me keep notes quickly.

The real question: Portrait or Landscape?

I just use two three ring binders with all the notes and stuff that I'd need in the pockets, and art in the plastic parts of the outside. I never understood why you'd use anything else. Currently running SKT with four of the giant lords profiles facing the players, which gave them a lot more character. Other times I'll put their character art there so everyone has a visual of each other's characters.

Inside, I usually have a list of shopkeeper/npc traits, session notes, initiative/checks prerolled, and loose paper for whatever.

5e DM screen is pretty lacking, but if you put all the rules on it yourself, it's pretty alright

Any tips for making my own GM screen? I would like to have Deathwatch screen for the next session, but way too high price for 1 right now. I was thinking about printing out the PDF file or something with the art and all.

I generally use some old screen I have lying around and then paperclip sheets of paper I print out to it. I've never had to go out and buy one, but I bet you could find something cheap if you don't care what game it's from. Maybe there's also something similar that's not game related?

Anyway, if you've played a couple of times, you probably have a good idea of the tables and lists you need to access most, so all you have to do is throw them together. And if you print them out onto normal paper, it's not like it's super expensive or anything, so you can always refine shit later, and print out new pages.

Make your screen in MS Word or Photoshop, designed for four 8.5x11 sheets. Print it in b&w, on cardstock.

Go to a print shop and get 4 pages of deathwatch related art, also on 8.5x11, color printed on cardstock. (Or some mix of art and useful player-facing reference rules if your choice.

Buy two black, narrow, 3-ring binders, with the laminated sleeve covers. Art goes on the outside.

Use clear packing tape to attach the two middle binder covers together in the middle, as a hinge.

Buy a pack of plastic binder sleeves. Put your cardstock in the sleeves, so that you can fan them out, one on each panel, giving you the inside of the GM screen. You could do a more complicated setup that takes advantage of being able to use the rings to switch GM screen configurations, if you need to, but for our purposes I'll assume 4 panels is sufficient.

Buy small binder clips, you want at least 4. Use them to hold the four sheets in place when in use so they don't move around.

Best GM screen.