I wrote this post just after the monster got somehow re-elected. It seems a bit tame now. But it was sat in my drafts folder begging to be published. This is the most transparent clickbait I’ve written. I’m doing it anyway.

Every behaviour that’s making the Trump administration a nightmare maps onto a terrible GM. Not in a vague “power corrupts” way — I mean the specific, recognisable, soul-destroying behaviours that make you dread showing up to a table. If you’ve sat across from a bad GM, you already know this person.

It’s all about him

Trump renamed the Gulf of Mexico. He puts his name on buildings, planes, steaks, casinos, and now apparently bodies of water. Every story — about the economy, about foreign policy, about the weather — eventually becomes a story about Donald Trump.

Every group has had this GM. The BBEG gets a monologue every session whether the players provoked it or not. The players try to go south and somehow end up at the villain’s fortress again. The BBEG is supposed to be dead — he got hit with a nat 20 two sessions ago — but it turns out he had a phylactery nobody mentioned. The story was always going to be about him.

The favourite NPC

Elon Musk wasn’t elected. He has no official title that anyone can fully explain. He turned up mid-campaign with what appear to be god-mode permissions and started firing civil servants, dismantling agencies, and posting on the internet at 3am as if none of the normal rules apply.

Introduce this character at your table and your players will mutiny. An unelected outsider who materialises from nowhere, solves problems the party was supposed to solve, operates by entirely different rules, and commands more attention than the actual protagonists. Every scene he’s in, the players are watching from the sidelines.

Can’t accept a bad roll

January 6th happened because Trump looked at the dice, didn’t like the number, and decided the dice were cheating. He’s currently ignoring court rulings that block his executive orders on the grounds that — as far as anyone can tell — judges are also cheating.

GMs who can’t let bad rolls stand are exhausting in a specific, grinding way. The plan fails even though the dice said it should work. The villain survives the killing blow because the GM had more planned for him. The rules apply right up until they produce an outcome the GM doesn’t want.

Rules for thee, not for me

He pardoned the January 6th rioters — many of them convicted of violent offences — while pursuing and investigating his political opponents. The law is a tool for punishing enemies and protecting allies, applied with no pretence of consistency.

Every group has seen this at a table. The rogue can’t bluff the guard. The fighter can, no explanation given. The players’ characters face consequences for the same actions that slide for the GM’s favourites. Nobody says anything for a session or two, and then someone does, and it gets weird.

Punishes dissent

FBI directors, generals, attorneys general, civil servants — the pattern is consistent. Disagree, show insufficient loyalty, or simply work for someone Trump doesn’t like, and there are consequences. Law firms that represented his opponents are now being targeted. The message is not subtle.

The GMing version is the GM who has a session go badly and decides it was one player’s fault. The next session their character is ambushed. An NPC they liked is now hostile. The encounters are harder. Nothing is said directly — it’s just noticeably worse to be that person at the table.

Tears up the map mid-session

Tariffs are on. Tariffs are off. NATO is finished. NATO is fine, actually. Canada might be the 51st state. Ukraine started the war. Russia is our friend now. Nobody — allies, markets, governments, or the people in the room when the decision was made — knows what the rules are from one day to the next.

The worst GMs have this quality. The world doesn’t feel like a place; it feels like a series of GM decisions. Something that was true last session isn’t true this session. You stop making plans because plans require stable ground.

The railroad

Whatever happens — elections, courts, constitutional constraints, the results of votes — the destination stays the same. The mechanisms designed to produce other outcomes are being systematically dismantled. It’s starting to look like the ending was always decided.

This is the oldest GM sin in the book. The party makes choices. They’ll end up in the dungeon the GM prepared regardless. Players notice a railroad within a session or two; once they realise their decisions don’t change anything, they stop making them with any real investment. If the players’ decisions don’t matter, it’s not a game. It’s a performance.

At least if you’re caught with this kind of GM you’ve wasted a couple of hours and can walk away. It’s all a bit more serious when there’s violence on the streets and the global order is at stake.