Now, I'm as susceptible as the next man when it comes to spending money. I'm swayed by pretty boxes and flashy graphics. I've spent money in the name of completeness, stupidity, or for the sheer hell of it. I hate to think of the amount of cash I've parted with, simply on a whim. I mean, I've bought sandpaintings I never look at, instruments I can't play and those strange 3-D pictures I can't understand. I've even bought GURPS Callahan's Crosstime Saloon! I'm a fool and I know it.

But there's one product I have an in-built resistance to. It's a common enough sight across the gaming tables, but I have to confess to being utterly perplexed. Why does anybody buy a gamesmaster's screen? What is its purpose? Why spend £5-95 (or more) on a bit of coloured card? (Of course, it is inevitably more than just £5-95 as you need a screen for each system. And, for that matter, each edition of each system.) I know full well that I won't use any of the useful tables printed in garish colours across proprietary gaming screens. I know this for two reasons.

First, my grasp of a game's rules is usually so hazy that attempting to use a table or chart is entirely futile.

Second, I had a screen once. In the spirit of Blue Peter I took three bits of card, taped them together and built my own GM's screen. I even decorated it with appropriate newspaper cuttings (I was running a Call of Cthulhu game at the time). And there were tables, photocopied from the rulebook.This was it, I thought. I'm a real GM now. And I took my screen along to the next session.

That's when I hit my first dilemma - where should I put it? As a GM, should I place my screen directly before me, a kind of barrier between me (minor deity and master of all I survey) and the players (the great unwashed). Alternatively, do I place the screen discreetly to one side, and fraternise with the players? Or do I not bother with a screen at all, forsaking any security and encouraging players to peruse my notes at their leisure? Well, I set the screen up before me. It stayed there for about an hour before I realised that it was in the way. (I tend to wave my arms a lot.) So I put it away and it hasn't seen the light of day since. That sums up my experience of running a game with a GM's screen: it was in the way.

As a player I find the indiscriminate use of a GM's screen highly offensive. I become subversive, filled with undesirable urges to tip the screen over. Such screens actually encourage me to peek, something I have no inclination to do when GMs are more relaxed about their reference material. Yes a screen can hide all those handouts the players have yet to receive. But it's really quite unnecessary - on the few occasions when I haven't been able to grab the comfy chair and side table, I've made do with a notepad and carrier bag. And as I said above, the bloody thing is a nuisance.

But there is a more fundamental reason why I believe GM's screens should be taken out to the bonfire and burnt with extreme prejudice. I instinctively shy away from anything which creates a barrier between me and the players. I subscribe to the school of thought that a GM's screen only serves to encourage a confrontational style of play. And call me old-fashioned if you will, but I happen to believe that this is a bad thing. I have nothing against confrontation in the game. But a screen acts like the net does in tennis: it splits the GM and the players into two teams. 'Winning' then rears its ugly head, a concept which has no place in any RPG. Competitive roleplaying makes little sense at conventions - let alone in the home. Anything which promotes such play should be banned.

Well, perhaps not banned; shunned maybe. But until those games masters refusing to cast away their screens become the pariahs of the roleplaying world, we must be vigilant. The GM's screen is a gaming scourge and we must work together to fight it.

The easiest way to prevent an outbreak of screen fever is to avoid their favourite habitat: the table. Screens thrive during round-the-table sessions. Try gaming while slumped on the sofa in the living room instead. See? There isn't any need for a screen at all. Try this a few times and pretty soon you should feel comfortable without its deceiving presence.

The gamesmaster's screen is an example of brainwashing through the power of marketing. We only buy the damn things because they're there. Only because we think we'll be inferior gamesmasters without them. Only because we have been brainwashed into believing that the gamesmaster's screen is essential to good roleplaying.

Which is complete rot, of course.

Copyright (c) 1995 Steve Hatherley

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