punch or superpowered blast. The Mastermind's Manual rulebook includes notes for conversion to traditional hit points if desired. Advancement In M&M, characters are awarded experience points, called "power points" (pp), that can do many beneficial things for the character. As described above, power points are used to purchase powers, feats, skills, abilities, and devices. The specific nature of power points was changed drastically with the 2nd edition of Mutants & Masterminds. In the first edition, when a character accrues 15 pp, they advance a power level, thus raising the caps on power and skill ranks, as well as on power bonus stacking. Under the second edition, power points and power levels are independent, the latter being set by the gamemaster as a function of the campaign. The 2nd edition version of power level determines only the maximum bonus that any power can give, and does not imply that a character does or does not have the points required to purchase enough levels in any power to reach this limit. Though the two are described as being entirely independent, the Mutants & Masterminds manual recommends that the power level be increased by one with each 15 Power Points awarded. Hero points Like many other super-hero role-playing games, M&M uses "hero points". Hero points allow an unlucky player to be able to hold their own in a battle, thus reducing the amount that luck plays into the gameplay. A hero point can do several things, like allow the reroll of a failed roll of any sort at a crucial moment, including toughness saves to avoid damage. On this reroll numbers under 11 have ten added to them, resulting in a range of 11-20, and a very slim chance of failing. A player may also use a hero point to ignore fatigue, allowing them to use temporary feats without the negative effects of fatigue that normally occur with such feat usage. Hero points are generally awarded to a player by the gamemaster when something bad befalls the character, such as the villain escaping without them having a chance of stopping him. This is particularly encouraged if the bad thing in question is something related to one of their disadvantages, and many disadvantages provide no other benefit aside from acting as a source of hero points. Settings No edition of the core M&M book comes with a default setting, but 2E and 3E include