Powers Far Beyond Those of Mortal Men...

Power level is an overall measure of effectiveness and power, primarily combat ability, but also generally what sort of tasks a character can be expected to accomplish on a regular basis (assuming the ability to take 10 and take 20).
Power level is a value set by the Gamemaster for the campaign, not for individual characters. It places certain limits on where and how players can spend points when creating heroes for the campaign. Power level affects the following things:

• Attack: Your hero's total attack bonus cannot exceed the campaign's power level.


• Defense: Your hero's total defense bonus cannot exceed the campaign's power level.


• Save Difficulty: The saving throw difficulty modifier for your hero's attacks and powers cannot exceed the campaign's power level. So at PL 8, for example, your hero cannot have a save modifier greater than +8 (a +8 damage attack, or a power with a save DC of 18, for example).


• Toughness Save: Your hero's total Toughness saving throw modifier cannot exceed the campaign's power level.


• Fortitude, Reflex, and Will Saves: Your hero's total Fortitude, Reflex, and Will save modifiers cannot exceed the campaign's power level +5.


• Skill Rank: A character cannot have more ranks in a skill than the campaign's power level +5. So in a PL10 campaign, a player character cannot have more than 15 ranks in any one skill (10 + 5).


• Ability Scores: Ability scores are limited to a bonus no greater than the campaign's power level +5. Strength (since it causes damage) is restricted by the Save Difficulty limit to a bonus no higher than the campaign's power level, as is Constitution by the maxiumum Toughness limit. This means a limit of (10 + twice power level) for Strength and Constitution and (20 + twice power level) for other ability scores. The Strength and Constitution limits may be raised with an attack/defense trade off (see the following section).

Note that the power level limits apply only to traits bought with power points. Things like situational modifiers can change your hero's scores. So the bonus you get for a combat maneuver or the penalty you suffer from being under the effects of an opponent's power don't affect your power level either way.

Attack/Defense Trade-Offs

Although the campaign's power level defines certain limits, there is some flexibility to those limits. Players can choose to lower one power level limit on a hero to raise another related limit. You can adjust power level limits in the following ways:

• Attack & Save Difficulty: You can trade-off attack bonus for the saving throw Difficulty Class modifier with an attack on a one-to-one basis. So a PL 10 hero could have a +8 attack bonus in order to have a +12 save DC modifier, for example, or a hero that has chosen to have a +15 attack bonus is limited to a +5 save DC modifier. This modification does not apply to powers that do not require attack rolls; they remain limited by the campaign’s normal PL limit on save DC modifiers. Strength is considered a damaging attack for purposes of this trade-off, so lowering your attack bonus limit increases your Strength bonus limit.


• Defense & Toughness: You can trade-off defense bonus for Toughness saving throw bonus on a one-to-one basis. So a PL 10 hero with a +7 defense bonus could have a +13 Toughness save bonus. Conversely a hero in the same campaign who has a +15 defense bonus is limited to a +5 Toughness save bonus.

No limit can be reduced to less than 0 in this way and the GM must approve all trade-offs. Attack/defense trade-offs allow for some variety in combat-related bonuses while maintaining power level balance among the heroes overall.

Power Level & NPCs

While the GM should keep the power level guidelines and suggested starting power points for the campaign in mind while creating villains and members of the supporting cast, such non-player characters are not restricted by the campaign's power level and may have as many power points as the GM wants to give them.

Instead, determine an NPC's power level based on the character's highest appropriate trait(s). This power level is simply an approximation to show what level of challenge that NPC offers, and is not necessarily related to the NPC's power point total, which may be greater than or less than the recommended starting power points for that power level. NPCs are often designed to fill a particular niche in the campaign and do not need to be as well rounded or balanced as heroes.

Example: The Gamemaster is creating a villain for a power level 10 campaign. The bad guy has a +8 attack bonus and a primary attack with a +16 damage bonus. Averaging these together gives the GM a power level of (16 + 8)/2 which equals 12. So long as none of the villain's other traits exceed this limit, the GM notes the villain's power level as 12, a reasonable challenge for a group of PL 10 heroes.

Likewise, NPCs may have whatever traits the GM wishes to assign them. In fact, some non-player characters are better treated as plot devices; giving them game stats may limit them too much! For example, an omnipotent cosmic entity doesn't need a comprehensive list of traits; neither does a mysterious alien artifact with vast and unknown powers. They serve whatever dramatic needs the Gamemaster wishes. You can find more about creating non-player characters and plot devices in Chapter 9: Gamemastering.

Power Level and Character Growth

As the heroes earn additional power points through adventuring, the GM may wish to increase the campaign's power level, allowing players to spend some of their earned power points to improve traits already at the campaign's limit. Not raising the power level forces player characters to diversify, improving their less powerful or effective traits, and acquiring new ones, but it can make the players feel constrained and the heroes to start looking the same if it isn't raised occasionally. Increasing power level by one for every 15 earned power points is a good rule of thumb, depending on how quickly the GM wants the heroes to improve in overall power.

Next: Strength, speed, smarts, we look at the primary ability scores defining characters in Mutants & Masterminds. Want a hero with Strength 40 or Intelligence 36? We've got 'em!