Looking In On Landon
Landon Cornell is one of our most veteran Curated Play gamemasters, helping us launch the program earlier this year and GMing dozens of sessions of Masks and Urban Shadows. This week, we decided to reach out to Landon to hear more about what's been going on in their neck of the woods and how they came to be a Magpie GM!
Tell us a little bit about yourself! Who are you outside of gaming?
I have a very ‘regular’ life outside of gaming! I work in IT full time and really love my job. When I’m not working or indulging my gaming hobby, I’m a husband and pet parent. My husband and I have three animals—a Maltese dog named Solaire, a fluffy giant black cat named Magick, and a not-quite-as-fluffy brown tabby cat named Hearts. I also like baking and singing off-key loudly around the house! I’m even known to make up silly parodies about things I’m doing.
What’s your background in GMing? What was the first game you ever GM’d? What’s your favorite?
While I’ve been playing roleplaying games for quite a while, I started GMing about three years ago. The first game I ever GMed was Dungeon World; I ran a magical mystery inspired by the song Tragic Kingdom by No Doubt. Since then I’ve picked up GMing quite a few other systems, but—looking at my track record—Masks is my clear favorite. It’s the system that really got me to want to keep GMing.
How would you characterize your GMing style? Do you have any inspirations?
My GMing style is character-focused with an emphasis on story. I like to make things tie back up into the main plot as much as possible, especially when it comes to characters’ backstories. I love when players add things to the fiction, and I’m always happy to roll with their vision! I definitely have a lot of musical inspiration depending on what game I’m running. When it comes to Masks I feel like I pull a lot of notes from X-Men, while my Urban Shadows approach pulls notes from political fantasies like Trickster’s Choice by Tamora Pierce.
What’s been your favorite thing that you’ve seen in a session of the Curated Play Program?
My favorite thing would have to be a one shot session of Masks I ran where the group went to the Halcyon Hall of History. I try to make sure my one shots come to a nice, conclusive end, but there ended up being a lot of drama with the Protege’s mentor and the Doomed’s Doom being shared with another player. It was so intense and felt like it would have kicked off an amazing campaign! The players really got into the roleplay and I just loved how the ending scene was one of the players asking the villain if they ever felt like their friends were keeping something from them. It was so good!
If you could play a TTRPG with anyone in the world, who would it be and why?
My family! I’m the only one in my direct family that plays TTRPG, and I just think it would be really fun to see what would happen if I got my mom, dad, and three sisters to play a game.
And finally, what’s a game that you would love to GM but haven’t had the chance to so far?
I am super excited to run Leatherman Games’ Glitter Hearts at some point. Between podcasting, my home games, and the Curated Play Program, there is definitely too much on my plate right now to start another game, but this one is definitely next in line. The character creation looks super flexible, and I love how the system approaches the magical girl genre!
Thanks for all your hard work Landon! We’re so glad we got a chance to catch up!
If you want to check out one of Landon’s sessions or any other one of our Curated Play games (with our other awesome GMs) head over to https://www.magpiegames.com/cp-session and check out our latest schedule releases!
-Magpie Games HQ
