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I’m planning on doing an epic, anime inspired game using mutants and masterminds to make the players (and the boss enemies) a bit more challenging and unique. Now my plan is to start the players at lv6 (using pathfinder rules) and then give them 30 points to spend on improving their characters using mutants and masterminds. This should make players to have roughly the equivalent of lv8-lv9 character. Also any power would be limited at lv6. Now I’ve never been good with balance, so is there anything I should be looking out for? Anything that is obviously broken?
I’m planning on doing an epic, anime inspired game using mutants and masterminds to make the players (and the boss enemies) a bit more challenging and unique. Now my plan is to start the players at lv6 (using pathfinder rules) and then give them 30 points to spend on improving their characters using mutants and masterminds. This should make players to have roughly the equivalent of lv8-lv9 character. Also any power would be limited at lv6. Now I’ve never been good with balance, so is there anything I should be looking out for? Anything that is obviously broken?
Why not just play MM with the Warriors and Warlocks book?
Just your chance, it's in sale right now...
As with anything in Mutants and Masterminds, if you have a particular theme in mind, then you'll want to make the character creation process a collaborative effort with you as the DM having a full presence.
Try and make the mutants and masterminds powers bit your first session.
The reason I say this is because the M&M system is designed to basically give you the option of playing literally whatever you want. While a player might think it's awesome to play a character that can shrink down into the subatomic "mini universe" (or vice versa with the macro universe), or have a speed that reaches travelling to distant stars... It's likely something that won't fit with what you had in mind for your campaign.
Basically, let the players have at it with the rules, and then be there to answer any questions they might have on "is this power idea okay?".
Other than that... some of the more modern concepts might leak through into the realm of weirdness for standard fantasy gaming. Things like "radiation" as a power source or damage type might be hard to pin down (can it bypass fire resistance? does it damage undead?).
This is a fairly easy one though, as the "power source" can be pretty much limited by you as GM, so just try and stick with things that can be properly defined in the Pathfinder/D&D rules already (so the elements, sonic and force, and alignments, pretty much.. anything else could be considered "untyped" and thus potentially *much* stronger than the others).
It's been a while, so I can't remember all the different power ideas, but there could be a number of things that could break the game when taken to an extreme level (even staying within the power level 6). Duplicating yourself being one potential issue...
Equipment (and dedicated equipment) works a bit differently (or under different assumptions from standard D&D), so that could become a weird hitch as well, if anyone picks one of those types of powers.
However, what this will do is give non-spellcasters a non-magical way to gain in versatility. I'd heavily suggest reading up on.. what's it called.. power containers? arrays?
Give a bunch of non-magic options as powers in a container, and then make a variant power with the same points using only one extra point. The caveat being that they can't be used at the same time (a defensive power would turn off if you use an offensive power tied to that container, etc).
A melee could gain a number of abilities, which brings them closer to spellcaster versatility.
_
Overall, this sounds like a neat idea. Sounds like a great way to make the "heroes" in an E6 game more unique. Like, there's a reason they are "better than the average human", with the M&M rules beign used to define how.
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I’m planning on doing an epic, anime inspired game using mutants and masterminds to make the players (and the boss enemies) a bit more challenging and unique. Now my plan is to start the players at lv6 (using pathfinder rules) and then give them 30 points to spend on improving their characters using mutants and masterminds. This should make players to have roughly the equivalent of lv8-lv9 character. Also any power would be limited at lv6. Now I’ve never been good with balance, so is there anything I should be looking out for? Anything that is obviously broken?
Mixing the systems could be crazy hard to do.
Powers to watch out for in M&M2e. (I do not have 3rd edition, and am unfamiliar with it.)
Summons or Duplication or Animate Objects with excessive levels of the Progression feature (which allows ever increasing numbers of dupes or critters, up to the hundreds!).
Shapeshifting / Morph (Metamorph). With these powers, the character can add a set number of powers, and can replicate the abilities of a Druid, at the lowest level of scary, to rearrange their stats. Unlike a Druid, with Metamorph, a character could take every point they've got, and spent it in different places, to create a 'tank' build and a 'blaster' build and a 'defensive' build, for surprisingly few points spent, allowing them to take an action and be flat-out awesome at any specific thing they've got a form for. This, at the worst, allows a clever player to gain all the egregious benefits of 'min-maxing' to optimize for one situation, and then utterly avoid it's drawbacks, by switching to a completely different min-maxed build.
Boost can theoretically allow one to 'cheat' the limits. In M&M, just about any effectively-designed character is already at those limits, meaning that a rule that Boost *doesn't* allow one to go over the limits, means that it's a power that does exactly nothing. It's a quandary what to do with this power, although many GMs allow it to soft-break the limits for a very short time, under certain circumstances, to keep it under control.
M&M was not designed to mix with another system. Pay very close attention to how a power like Nullify (magic) or Immunity will impact your game. The power to fire off at will Nullify magic fields, auras or blasts would be a fairly limited-use, highly-specific tool in the X-Men, and would probably be so over-the-top that Elminster would cap your @$$ in the Forgotten Realms.
Note that power costs assume a super-hero world, not D&D. Total invisibility, all day long, is FOUR of those 30 CP you are thinking of awarding. Total incorporeality, providing effective immunity to most forms of attack, is 20 of those 30 CP. At will Flight equal to a Fly spell? 2 CP. It's also relatively cheap to take the Ressurection / Reincarnation add-on to Regeneration, and make a character that might be killable, but won't stay dead for long, and certainly won't need a 9th level Cleric or a crapload of diamonds to get back up.
Shield, Protection and Strike are likely to completely change the AC/DR/Atk numbers, as anyone who wants to spend 6 CP can have a +6 bonus to their AC (via Shield), 6 pts of DR/everything (via Protection, assuming that Protection converts to DR...), and +6 damage on their melee or hand-to-hand attacks from Strike (w/ the Mighty power feat, so that it adds to their Str bonus, and perhaps even purchased as an addition to their 'magic sword').
Transform is the power that, even by superhero standards, is pretty darn broken, which is why Sersi isn't an Avenger, because she's got the power to turn Thor into a puddy tat and Iron Man's armor into a tinfoil helmet. (It's also why classic Element Lad had to be written out of Legion of Three Worlds, because he can wave his hand and turn any foe, including the 'unstoppable' Superboy Prime, into a warm, wet fart of methane gas, expanding on the breeze.) It's the only power that, even in a superhero game, I'd be leery of allowing at full power, without some sort of mitigating factors. It kinda has to be there, in a set of rules meant to allow one to stat up Sersi, Element Lad, Firestorm, Shimmer, Zatanna, etc. but it's just way too good.
I would strongly suggest playing under one rules system or the other. Either use M&M with Warriors & Warlocks for inspiration, or use PFRPG rules, and add whatever super-powers you want as special feats, racial abilities, whatever that you wish, perhaps even via some sort of 'enhanced' template that the PCs take, and gives them some of these super-powers, but using PF rules mechanics instead of M&M rules mechanics.
Instead of concealment, give the character X minutes worth of greater invisibility a day, usable in increments, similar to the powers of a bloodline sorcerer, trickery domain cleric or illusionist.
Instead of growth, X number or rounds, or minutes, of enlarge per day (perhaps even 'greater enlarge' at higher levels, granting higher str bonuses, or even larger size options at the cost of using up more of his daily uses).
Instead of at will healing, a pool of X number of hit points to be distributed by touch like a lay on hands or wholeness of body power.
Instead of at will animal control, charm animal X times / day.
Etc.
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If you choose to go with M&M 2e rules, here's some very rough ideas as to how to build the old Iconic D&D party using that system (note that I didn't even try for accuracy, being more interested in capturing the flavor, which is why the Cleric is just flat out different than the Wizard, instead of being 'just another spellcaster').
Regdar, Iconic guy who bad stuff happens to
Kerwin, Iconic thief who isn't a halfling
Naull, Iconic Wizard who isn't an elven transvestite
Several posts after Naull include templates for the Eberron races, the core races, and various others (aasimar, tiefling, duergar, svirfnebpudigumplestanifraniwhatsiwhoozles, aquatic elf, drow, various genasi, half-dragon, lizardfolk and dragonblooded).
Devis, Iconic Bard who isn't a gnome
For all the reasons Set has mentioned and more, it's probably a good idea to take anything a player wants to do with the Powers system of M&M and figure out how to limit or tone it back into a semblance of what can be done in D&D.
Some Immunities should be either have a duration, or toned back to just partial/resistance, etc.
Some effects you might only want to allow as part of a Device power, such that it can be taken away or destroyed or otherwise short circuited.
All of the best should have a weakness that can shut it down (such as how magic has it's anti-magic).
In M&M, moreso than in D&D, the GM has to be the limiter and say "No". This is quite fundamentally different from how people play D&D since 3e (but not, strangely, previous editions of D&D), so it can depend on the group on how this will be received.
I don't think I'd have a problem with doing something like this with my current set of players, but they are mostly people who I DM'd 2e D&D with, and a new player who's willing to work with a DM on gameplay...
possible problems?
sneak attack is a feat (and feats cost one point per rank and you can add multiple ranks)
movement powers can give speeds in the hundreds of feet per round for next to no points
absorbtion can cure characters when they take damage
immunites are cheap (example = 75 points for full physical damage immunity, limited to half damage for 37.5 points = means you take half damage from all non-energy effects) (numbers may be off)
30 points can equate to plus five to all your saves
points in intangable can leave your spell casters immune to physical damage, able to pass through any gas permeable barrier and still able to cast spells
2E M&M fixed the whole strength bonus adds to damage that plagued 1E M&M- but you would bring it back
And that's just my first thoughts. This could work, but you'll have to be ready to say 'no' alot. You could, however, set up a bunch of pre-built point buys for your characters, then let them choose from your list.
Interesting idea.
I have to say, were it me, I would not mix the systems directly, but, say, create the characters in Pathfinder---
---And THEN entirely RE-create the characters in M&M from scratch, using the Pathfinder character sheet as a baseline/guideline for the abilities I want to give my character (so I know I don't forget anything). And then advance my character from there. That way I can simply add points to abilities I already have than try to make things mesh. And MOREOVER--I don't have to worry about clumsy conversion from HP to Toughness, which would be a real pain.
For example, say I make a first level half-elven fighter according to Pathfinder rules. I will put this below a spoiler to mitigate the Wall of Text:
I then, using that character sheet I just created, make a PL 1 or 2 character in M&M. I don't have M&M's rules in front of me so I can't remember if that would be an appropriate equivalent power level, but bear with me; hopefully you have the idea.
This character's ability scores cost 14 power points total. I spend 2 power points to give him an attack bonus of +1. I spend 2 power points to give him a base Fortitude bonus of +2. I spend another power point to give him a Toughness Save of +1 (or to the extent that the Power Level allows, since he's a fighter he should have max toughness). I spend 2 points for each of his feats, plus another point for his Half Elf Adaptability trait (the bonus skill focus). I put some power points into the Power: Awareness (Low Light Vision) (I think that counts as 1 or 2 points) and to the Power: Immunity (Magic Sleep--that's fairly limited so it's probably a low point cost; again, sorry, I don't have the rules in front of me), and give him some kind of limited Mind Shield, to boost his saves versus Enchantment Spells (a boost to Will saves from mind-affecting abilities with the descriptor "Magic"). And so on and so on.
In the end after skills and equipment, you're looking at a 30 point character which is probably around right for a 1st level character.
Take that idea and apply it to your higher level concept and go from there.
I would allow characters to build their character from there, but ask them to keep reasonably within the limits of their character concept (don't have your gnome fighter blow all 15 power points when he attains the next power level on Time Control).
Why not just play MM with the Warriors and Warlocks book?
Not to be dismissive of your attempt, but I have to ask the same thing. I do not think there is anything in Pathfinder that M&M can not handle. You are going to loose some granularity, but since you are aiming for epic anime, I do not see that as an issue.
Did this campaign ever happen, and if so, how did tacking the powers onto PF characters play out?