A Foundry VTT module for a full-screen, GM-controlled overlay — for pauses, intermissions, and scene transitions — with a compact, non-blocking GM preview pane so triggering it never gets in the way of running the game.
📸 Visual Guide — screenshots of every part of the module, if you'd rather look than read.
Four ways to trigger
- Manual — a scene-controls toolbar button. Fire it anytime: a five minute break, a dramatic reveal, whatever the moment calls for.
- Trigger Preset — a separate toolbar button that fires any saved preset directly, as a one-off override that never touches the global-default Settings.
- Automatic on Scene Activation — optionally shows Game Master Screen whenever a GM activates a scene (the "Activate" button, not just viewing it), using whatever media is currently configured (or that scene's own Override, if it has one — see Per-Scene Overrides below).
- Scripting/Macro API —
game.modules.get("game-master-screen").apiexposestrigger(),triggerPreset(nameOrId),close(), andisActive()for macros, other modules, or tile-trigger tools like Monk's Active Tile Triggers. This is what lets something like a door tile fire off a GMS reveal the instant it opens, rather than waiting on a GM's own toolbar click — see Macro/Scripting API below.
Three media modes
- Single Image
- Image List — rotates through a GM-curated, ordered list of images, with optional randomized order each time it's triggered
- Video
Universal audio, fit, and timing — apply regardless of which media mode is active:
- An independent audio track that can pair with any mode (forces a video's own audio off when set, so it doesn't play both at once)
- Picture/Video Fit: Contain, Cover, Stretch, or Original size
- Loop, Mute, and a Volume slider with a live percentage readout
- Duration (auto-close after N seconds, or leave at 0 to close manually)
- Fade In / Fade Out (ms), with audio volume ramped down in sync on fade-out rather than cutting audio dead
Presets — save named configurations and reload them instantly, update an existing preset in place, or save variations as new ones. Manage (rename/reorder/delete) from a dedicated Presets app, reachable from Settings or from core Foundry's own Settings menu. A separate Trigger Preset scene-controls tool fires any saved preset directly as a one-off override — it doesn't touch or read the persisted global-default settings, so it never overwrites your configured look.
GM experience
- A small, draggable, non-blocking preview pane (not a full-screen block) — the GM keeps full canvas access to manage tokens, lighting, and scenes while the players' screens are locked
- Configurable size (Small / Medium / Large / Extra Large) and an opt-in audio toggle, both personal per-GM-account preferences — useful for a co-GM or second-monitor setup that wants a different experience than the primary GM
- Works correctly for both the Gamemaster and Assistant Gamemaster roles
- Any GM account can close it for everyone — including recovering from a crash or dropped connection on whichever GM triggered it
Player experience
- Full-bleed, opaque overlay — no UI bleed-through
- All keyboard and mouse input is inert while it's active, as if the screen were paused
- A client that connects mid-activation (late join, reload, reconnect) catches up automatically instead of missing the moment entirely
Scene playlist coordination — when triggered by scene activation, automatically silences that scene's own linked playlist (if it has one) so it doesn't layer on top of GMS's own audio, and resumes it once GMS's fade-out finishes.
Requires Foundry VTT V14. Built and verified against 14.364. Does not support V13 — the Scene Config per-scene Override tab relies on V13/V14's ApplicationV2 sheet structure in a way that hasn't been tested against earlier or later major versions, so compatibility is capped at V14 until explicitly verified otherwise.
Install via the module manifest URL in Foundry's Add-on Modules browser,
or download and extract into your Data/modules folder.
Scene Controls — a new "Game Master Screen" category appears in the left-hand scene controls toolbar for GMs, with four tools:
- Trigger — fires Game Master Screen using the currently configured media. Safe to click even if it's already active (no-ops with a notification rather than double-firing).
- Trigger Preset — opens a small popup listing saved presets by name, in the same order they're arranged in the Presets Manager. Clicking one fires Game Master Screen with that preset's config immediately, then closes the popup. Ephemeral — it's a one-off override for that single trigger and never reads or changes the global-default Settings.
- Close — ends it for everyone, from any GM account. Safe to click even if nothing's active; this is the "nuke" button for recovering from a crash or a stuck state.
- Settings — opens the configuration form.
Settings — configure media mode, universal audio/fit/timing options, and the automatic scene-activation trigger. Includes:
- Preview — renders the full player-facing overlay locally on your own screen only, using whatever's currently in the form (not yet saved). Click anywhere to dismiss.
- Save as Preset — captures the current form values under a name. If a preset is already selected in the dropdown, offers to update it in place instead of only creating new ones.
Presets Manager — rename, reorder (up/down arrows), or delete saved presets. Reordering here also controls the order presets appear in the Trigger Preset popup.
Personal preferences (Foundry's core Settings list, per GM account):
- GM Popout Size — Small, Medium, Large, or Extra Large
- GM Popout Audio — off by default; opt in if you want to hear the audio in your own preview pane too (mainly useful for fully remote tables)
- Debug Logging — shows on-screen notifications confirming socket events and lifecycle hooks are firing, for troubleshooting without needing to check the browser console
Every scene's own Configure Sheet gets a new Game Master Screen tab, alongside Basics/Grid/Lighting/etc.:
- Inherit (default) — plays whatever the global config is set to when this scene is activated. Requires the global "Trigger on Scene Activation" setting to be on, same as if this tab didn't exist.
- Override — this scene uses its own media/timing config instead of the global default, and always fires on activation regardless of the global "Trigger on Scene Activation" toggle — it's this scene's own explicit choice, not something the global default setting governs. Optionally load a saved preset's values into the fields as a starting point (this scene's override stays its own independent copy afterward — it isn't kept linked to the preset).
- Disable — Game Master Screen never triggers for this scene, full stop, regardless of the global "Trigger on Scene Activation" setting.
If Scene Loading Screens is already configured on a scene, this tab defaults to Disabled the first time you open it for that scene — a soft default, not a lock, so you can still switch to Override or Inherit if you'd rather GMS win for that particular scene.
For triggering GMS from outside its own UI — macros, other modules, or
Monk's Active Tile Triggers'
Run Code action on a tile (e.g. auto-firing when a door tile opens,
rather than only from a GM's own toolbar click):
const api = game.modules.get("game-master-screen").api;
await api.trigger(); // fire with the current global default
await api.triggerPreset("Ambush!"); // fire a saved preset by name or id
await api.close(); // close it early, same as the Close tool
api.isActive(); // true/false — is GMS showing right nowtrigger(), triggerPreset(), and close() all require a GM account —
each resolves false and logs a console warning if called from a
non-GM client, rather than throwing an opaque permissions error further
down. isActive() has no such restriction, since checking whether GMS
is already showing is a reasonable thing for a player-side macro
condition to do too.
triggerPreset() matches on a preset's id first, then falls back to
its display name (case-insensitive) — either the id from the Presets
Manager or the name shown there works as the argument.
Per-scene overrides, the Trigger Preset toolbar tool, and the Macro/Scripting API have all shipped. No further items currently planned — open an issue if you run into something worth adding.
Considered and shelved for now: hijacking Foundry's native spacebar-pause to also show Game Master Screen. The convenience of one fewer click didn't outweigh the risk of an accidental spacebar press triggering a full-screen overlay for every player, versus today's small UX cost of a single deliberate Trigger click.
Game Master Screen's automatic "Trigger on Scene Activation" feature can overlap with other modules that also show something on scene load or change. Known potentially-overlapping modules:
- Scene Loading Screens
— manually-triggered per-scene loading overlays (image/video/audio/text).
Only collides if a GM uses its "Play Loading Screen" action, since that
action calls
scene.activate()internally. - Loading Screen — replaces Foundry's default loading popup automatically on every scene switch by default. Higher chance of collision than the above, since it auto-triggers rather than requiring a manual action.
If you use either alongside GMS, the per-scene Game Master Screen tab (see Per-Scene Overrides above) automatically defaults a scene to Disabled the first time you open its config if Scene Loading Screens is configured there — no manual setup needed for the common case, though you can still override that default per scene.
This list isn't exhaustive — if you run into a conflict with another scene-loading or intermission-style module not listed here, please open an issue.
MIT