One of the keys to being a successful gamemaster is playing to your strengths. One of the ways to identify those strengths is to list out things that you like in the type of setting you want to run, and things you dislike. If you’re running a modern crime drama game, and you like heist stories, you’ll gravitate toward running heist stories. If you crime dramas about rape freak you out, don’t run stories that involve rape.

In the book No Plot? No Problem, Chris Baty calls these lists of likes and dislikes Magna Cartas. He pitches it as a tool for writers, but it’s useful for gamemasters and setting designers as well. Make two lists, one of things you like within the genre you’re working in, character types, stories, movies, TV shows, books. The stuff you dig. It can be as high level or as detailed as you want it to be. The only person who has to understand what it means is you. Make a second list of things you dislike. Keep these in a notebook somewhere, some place where you can refer to them from time to time.

Are these absolutes? Of course not. If you think of a good way to tell a story about something on your negative Magna Carta, do it. It’s simply a tool to help you form an idea of the type of world you want to create, the types of adventures you want to run, at the start of your worldbuilding process.

If you’re looking at running a long-term game with a regular group of players, consider sitting down and brainstorming group Magna Cartas. You find out that two of the people in the group love mafia stories, but someone is tired of stories about street gangs and drug dealers. Guess what? You now have an idea of the types of stories to tell that will make your players happy. Does that mean everyone gets what they want? Of course not. You can’t please all of the people, all of the time. But in knowing what they want, you can make some things pop and push other elements to the background, or make accomodations so that things fit better and feel better. Just go back into your story notes and change that gang-connected drug dealer into a mobster, for instance, or use the drug dealer story idea on the week that one player can’t make it. The players’ likes and dislikes will also feed you story ideas, especially when you start mixing and matching the group Magna Cartas with your own. Everyone will have a better roleplaying experience overall.

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