MP defines three general power level groupings for a campaign; the choice of power level impacts the initial number of points the characters can apply to their traits and abilities and imposes limitations on how those points can be allocated. For our first campaign we decided to go with a “low” power level, which the MP manual describes as follows:
Low Power Level campaigns concern ‘street-level’ crime; gang violence, protection rackets, feuds for the control of neighborhoods, police and political corruption, serial murderers, ethnic tensions, weird crime, and so on. Low Power characters can possess fascinating abilities, but still tend to be vulnerable to groups of normal humans with typical firearms.
We chose this partly for simplicity’s sake and partly because I liked the idea of telling a local story using familiar landmarks in our area.
The campaign will be (very) loosely based in the universe described in the MP manual because it provides a pre-built baseline of secretive organizations, criminal empires, government agencies, etc. to draw from. As I understand it, that universe has a fair amount of detailed lore and a plethora of NPC characters who are well known among long-time V&V players… all of which I know almost nothing about at this stage, and don’t have any specific plans to incorporate (though I’m not opposed to the idea if I run across something that seems a good fit).
In the MP universe, there’s a government hero registration program that confers certain legal protections and benefits. Being accepted for registration generally requires either participating in a training program or having sponsorship from an existing member. Rather than start the campaign assuming the players’ characters are already registered, this process will become part of the story. In MP a famous Chicago-based team called, appropriately enough, the Mighty Protectors, is depicted as having smaller regional affiliates, so players will be recruited (and evaluated) by members of the Philly-based East Coast Protectors (ECP) – to take on smaller local tasks and see how they handle them, with an eye toward future sponsorship.
Players for now will be my wife and daughter, for variety each playing two characters (which may be considered blasphemous in some RPG circles, but that’s how we roll). My older daughter may join in at some point but for now she just wants to contribute throw-away heroes and villains with useless powers, who will all be encountered and insta-defeated because nobody in my family is capable of taking anything completely seriously.