I think the logic for Yellow>Red>Green is that once you are in Yellow Zone, you can always take a Minor Twist to use a Red Ability.
I keep forgetting that. Not sure I even like that rule.
I definitely don't like that rule, especially for Reds that have long-term effects (e.g. Summoned Allies and persistent boosts).
Also, with just the scene tracker, you spend the same amount of time with Red as with Green as your best-rated ablities. With just the normal scene tracker, you spend 1-2 rounds with Greens only, 4-6 rounds with Greens or Yellows, and 1-2 rounds with Reds, Yellows, or Greens. However, you can reach Red with your health as well.
I try to choose Green abilities that have lasting impact even when you have access to rerolls. Innate and Reaction abilities are the best, but niche abilities are good, too. Unless they're just amazing.
It's been 6 months; I figured I'd resurrect this thread again.
I now have several months of play experience under my belt and I can offer some thoughts on advancement based on actual play. As usual, YMMV, IMHO, etc. etc.
I *do* think that anyone who wants to run this as a long-term campaign (i.e., more than 30 or so sessions of play) will want to include some sort of more detailed advancement system. I've read over and collated all the thoughts in this thread and have arrived at some conclusions.
1) You could just skip thinking about this all together, even in a long-term campaign. At the 48-issue mark, however, your heroes will be able to use a Collection every single round of an Action Scene. I'm not saying you couldn't challenge such heroes, but I think it would be a little dull. Sure, you can use Collections for other things besides maxing out die rolls, but the mileage of the other two options seems like it would vary a lot from group to group. My group often forgets collections, but when they use them, it's always for a max die (and I don't think it's ever worth spending it to avoid a Minor Twist).
2) I don't think Status dice should be changeable. It would make more sense to allow someone to change Personality in lieu of changing a Principle instead. But changing the level of status dice is a permanent, every roll upgrade that doesn't make a lot of narrative sense beyond, "I'm just that good now." But if that's the case, it's a waste to want to increase any Power or Quality.
3) I don't think you should be able to acquire new Abilities. Abilities are so powerful and so defining of a character in play that adding a brand new one without losing old ones is an exponential increase in options and power. The default villain system could not keep up with this.
4) That leaves increasing Powers or Qualities, and maybe adding Powers and Qualities.
4a) It doesn't matter much mathmatically whether you're increasing a d8 to a d10 or a d10 to a d12. Yes, the max increases, but the chances of that coming up are significantly less than in a single die roll. If you raise something one die, and then use it every round of an Action Scene, it would average about a +2 to +2.5 increase overall (average a .33 increase per roll). It *could* be a +16 overall (max on every roll)...or it could be a +0. Compare this to a Collection, which can often be used for a single +7, 9, or 11 (presuming you're increasing a rolled 1 to a max result). Therefore, I think you could safely say that increasing a Power or Quality for the permanent cost of 1 Collection would be pretty balanced.
4b) Getting new Powers or Qualities is trickier. They increase flexibility but the descriptions are so wide and vague that most heroes would rapidly reach a point of diminishing returns. E.g., do I really need Leadership when I can just justify Conviction to command people? I think it would be fine to spend 2 Collections to add a new d6 Power or Quality that comes from a character's Background, Power Source, or Archetype, and allow him or her to change out an existing Power or Quality attached to an Ability for this new one (but why would you trade out for a d6?)
5) I'd put limits on spending Collections this way. I wouldn't allow it all until the hero had earned 3 Collections. I could see further restriciting any permanent increase to needing a narratively good reason to do so. I'd also only allow one increase per Collection earned (i.e., you couldn't "save up" Collections and then "spend" them all at once to upgrade everything.
Overall, you can see my ideas are conservative. I want to expand the possibilities for long-term character growth, but I've come to see that the system works pretty well as written. I'd love to hear comments on this before I present it to my players, but I think I'm pretty confident about what I have here.
I think the main problem is balance.
As your heroes grow stronger, so must your villains and challenges, or you'll end up in a game with very little suspense.
So in the end, after reducing fractions, you'll end up right where you started. And that is a good thing, because everything else would ruin the game.
My conclusion is, advancement is all about having a feeling of advancement, but without actually touching the mechanical balance.
And that is something a makeover or retcon does nicely. Keep the dice, but change a few names and parameters so that they look more powerful. Like, echange your gutter-learnt brawling for Iron fist's mystical power punch. Same dice, but feels like a big step up. Ditch Speed for Teleportation, or Fire for Cosmic Power; whatever suits you - effectively do the same but in a more flashy way.
Perhaps it was a case of TL;DR, but *in general,* I agree with you, der andere jan.
However, if you're concerned about balance and lack of suspense, then a long-term game (again, probably more than 35 sessions, definitely more than 50 sessions) has to address the Elephant in the Room that is accumulated Collections.
I noted that some groups like spending Collections to change the narrative, but undoubtedly most groups use them to max dice. When every roll (or even almost every roll) in a scene can be maxed out, you'll have a balance problem. Hence, my conservative idea to remove a few Collections to occasionally increase a die size.
There is another caveat to this: if you run multiple Action Scenes in one issue, this means the heroes can't max out every roll. This may be another consideration. However, I've run 8 sessions with my group, playing 4-5 hours, and we've only once had time for 2 Action Scenes in one issue, and that's because one scene was so easy they'd never use Collections in the 1st place.