[Phantasm]

A few tricks I've discovered for character generation:

Set a point value for the characters before powers - and here I count "super-normal" traits like combat skills above 15, stats above 15, Gadgeteer, Weapon Master, Trained By a Master, and higher levels of Luck as "powers". I find anywhere between 150 and 250 points to be viable.

Set the point values of the power set based off not a single value but off the concept. Remember that some concepts - including a brick or Alternate Form-based battlesuit hero (my preferred method for Iron Man and his kin) - require more points than others. A brick or battlesuit can be 1500 to 2000 points just because of DR, Super ST, and IT:DR alone, while blasters can get away with a single or a small range of under-50-point attacks.

Encourage players to take a single wildcard skill that matches their concept. Players wanting an investigator type (ala Batman in his "Dark Knight Detective" mode) should invest in Detective!, while folks wanting to play Tony Stark, Hank Pym, or Reed Richards may want Inventor!. Not every character needs a wildcard, but they help streamline play for those who otherwise need a lot of skills.


For challenging your players, think about what kind of campaign villains you want to toss at them. Honestly, the worst villains my group ever encountered were the Lex Luthor and J. Jonah Jameson types running smear campaigns against the PCs, folks the heroes could not physically fight without proving the bad guys right and becoming the menaces to society the bad guys were portraying them as. Do yourself a favor and watch a season of Arrow, Supergirl, The Flash (current or 1990 version), DC's Legends of Tomorrow, Justice League, Justice League Unlimited, Batman: The Brave and the Bold, Young Justice, X-Men: The Animated Series, or X-Men Evolution for villain and plotline ideas. (Sad to say, Marvel does not have much in the way of really good team series outside of X-Men.)

Unless the enemy is central to a PC's back-story, discourage the PCs from taking the Enemy trait, especially if you're starting off early on in their careers when they haven't built up a rogues gallery.

Also, be sure what flavor you're going for: the late Silver Age and early Bronze Age where life is not cheap and the death of a PC is a major plot point is contrasted with the later Bronze Age and the Iron/Dark/Dork Age where 90s Anti-Heroes who scowl have no regard for human life. (I don't want to touch the Modern Age "line between hero and villain is so blurred the true villains are making out like bandits while the heroes fight each other every other issue"... getting so tired of it.) And make sure the players know what feel you're going for as well! Nothing is worse than you having a late-Silver/early-Bronze Age idea in mind for the tone and the players having a '90s Anti-Hero mindset. (Me: "You are to be the shining beacons of light and hope." Player: "I want to play a Punisher clone!" Me: *facedesk*)