From:	Terry Amburgey <XANTH@****.UKY.EDU>
Subject:	Good GM's
Date:	Wed, 8 Feb 1995 13:02:29 EST

Luke: There were 2 things that stuck out in my mind. The first was Mr. Dowd's
ability to generate atmosphere with literally no props but his face and voice.
There were a few humorous spots and it was FUNNY. There were some gross spots
at the end and it was enough to make a ghoul hurl. The second was his ability
to take control of the game in a very subtle way. There were 6 people in the
[5 normals and the obligatory idiot] and only 2 of us had ever played together.
As Gurth pointed out, Mr. Dowd can run things from memory, which helps the flow
of the game but he also knows what to ignore and what not to ignore. We worked
well as a team in short order and things moved right along [important when play
ing with a time limit].

Since our Fearless Leader has slandered roll-playing there's something else I
want to toss out. Mr. Dowd had a Q&A period that went on for about 3 hours. At
one point he discussed 2 different 'themes' in the gaming industry, RPG's and
'improvisational theatre'. He said that there's a place for both but that
sometimes it's nice to ...just roll the dice and get on with it. I admit that
he made a life-long fan out of me with that statement. It's nice to know that
there's at least one other person who tries to find a BALANCE between role
playing and roll playing. Terry