I can definitely sympathize, Imaginos, with the desire to keep the damn games from turning into forensic accounting audits - this is what killed
D&D 3.0/.5,
et al with our gaming group. When the games start to become about the numbers, the feats and skill cross-comparison checks, the whole role-playing bit gets the big flushie and it turns into the "winners" crying "I won the accounting audit!" While Steve Kenson's
Mutants & Masterminds 2e has some excellent game design (at least as I would call it), the game
system has some serious balance and logic problems, not the least of which being the
interminable character creation process. That stated, I'd still
majorly recommend DSumner's Empire City (on this site), created for
V&V, and the
M&M Freedom City and Paragons settings if you're looking for places to scrap bad guys. Mr. Kenson's recent
ICONS superheroes' game - which I've recently gotten into - seems, from my reading on it, a much more straight-forward and fast-moving work than the previous
M&M.
I also applaud your last note, regarding going back to
V&V 2.0 and the Str/Agi swap. Others in my gaming group have chosen to ignore this, claiming, "But it'd take
forever to recalculate all the old villains!" My response: Don't. Just leave the
Most Wanted and
Opponents Unlimited and modules' bad guys as is and stick to keeping the PCs (and NPCs, if doable) in line with the reconfiguration. Imaginos, all my best hopes for you and your gaming group with the
V&V uptake.