Opal

Mirror-Mirror

Mirror-Mirror appears to be a human almost completely covered in a reflective costume that shows only their vaguely almond-shaped, dark, eyes. Their form is so distorted and constantly shifting that it is impossible to determine their bodily proportions, and they do not seem to understand any language nor do they speak except to laugh. Laughter that ranges from hideous and maniacal to carefree to lilting to childlike to bitterly ironic or even barely distinguishable from hysterical tears. Mirror-Mirror is a shape changer, or perhaps rather shape-distorter or even space-distorter, and changes size (growth/shrinking) and proportions (stretching) virtually every time they move. It's not at all clear if those powers are voluntary.

Pop-Scare

Bárðarbunga Hvannadalshnúkursdottir is /Huldufólk/, one of an ancient tribe of peaceful other-dimensional fairy-like beings living, from the earthly perspective, in large rocks. When Bárðarbunga's rock was blown to bits for a road-cut, she was, fortunately, out shopping ( /Huldufólk/ do all the same everday things as humans), but when she returned home to find herself homeless, she was miffed. After driving the unfortunate construction company out of business with unexplained accidents, she wandered off in search of a new home. Sadly all the nice big lava rocks on the island were taken, or had exhorbidant rent (again, they're just like people), so she headed overseas. After much wandering, she found a "haunted house" somewhere in North America and participated in the humans' amusing ritual of scaring eachother. It was fun, but it didn't last, so she went looking for similar places, putting several fun houses out of business until Ring Master recruited her.
In her natural form, at least, on the earthly plane, Bárðarbunga is a three inch tall pudgy humanoid with frizzy bright red hair that stands on end prettymuch all the time, and, superfluously, she can turn invisible or shunt herself into the otherworld if she really doesn't want to be seen. In combat, she uses limited telepathy to intuit a victims instinctive or childhood fears and briefly grows to an appropriate size to assume the form of that fear, then vanishes again. Enemies who spot, or worse, hurt her, and those she can't read fears from, she'll attack in a human-sized warty-green-skinned black-haired (still standing on end) superhumanly-strong 'troll' form, preferably employing 'growth momentum' to really wallop them.
While it's a really low bar, Pop-Scare is probably the most dependable member of the group, able, for instance, to patiently wait in ambush or for a signal, and the most nearly likely to stick to a battle plan for a phase or two before getting distracted by someone with a really amusing fear.

The Macronaut

The universe was doomed. Every scientist, ever theologian, every leader agreed. It was inevitable. Afterall the universe was a closed system, even if it was an astounding 1.775e+25 times the radius of the one known inhabbited world within it, and it's central core was inherrently unstable, once the unimaginably masive core split, the cataclysmic energies released would erase existance as everyone knew it. Perhaps some other universe or universes might follow after it, but surely no sentience would survive the transition.
But there was one particularly outre physicist - or perhaps, philosopher, at his level the distinction was often moot - who disagreed. He theorized that the universe was neither finite nor closed, but made up of a potentially infinite number of parallel, separate but similar universes, and that travel out among them, in some vastly greater Macroverse, might be possible. Not for a being as infinitessimal as a person, but for beings, themselves, composed, each, of many usiverses, unnamable beings vaster and older than time itself. To prove his theory, he set out to become one of them, expanding his mind to encompass the whole known universe and slowing his thoughts until whole lifetimes slipped by in an instance, he waited for the inevitable end and harnessed that release of energy, riding outward, ever outward, ever expanding his mind and building for himself a form unimaginably vast...
... Macronaut appears, in our universe, as a transparent, midnight-blue humanoid with brilliant points of lights - almost like stars or galaxies - suspended within it. It is less cohesive than normal matter ( cf: https://www.herogames.com/forums/topic/101181-a-variant-density-decreasealternate-desolid-idea/ ) and can expand it's form eventually becoming intangible, then invisible, then ceasing to exist (X-D move to the next-greater 'macroverse,' perhpas), or compress itself (Shrinking +DI), eventually dropping back into a 'microverse' (XDM again). Unfortunately, it's diffuse body is made up mostly of fissionable atoms, and it needs a steady supply of more to sustain itself, and, even more dangerously, if it chooses to compress itself while feeding, can trigger a fission chain reaction. Thus it is a villain, or at leat a danger. From it's point of view, our world is a place of elder beings of alien form and hideous complexitiy possessed of ponderous, calous, incomprehensible mentalities - to the Macronaut, we are not just monsters, but Lovecraftian horrors.

Paradox

"... we're so sorry for your loss  ..."
           "... take all the time you need ..."
                         "... if you need anything  ..."
"... they're in a better place  ..."
              "... not your fault ..." 
                          "...  just an accident ..."   
                                  "...  random chance  ..."
                                                          "...  it's God's will..."
                                                                    "... uncarring universe ..."
                                                                               "... no one to blame ..."
"... Lina, we haven't heard from you in so long, please, don't do any-"
 
"That's odd!   I've never pulled in a quantum alternate before.  In every other case I've switched universes with the alternate - of course, you'd see me as the alternate - but, there's just no way it could have happened, I may have to revise quantum theory, entirely.  If there is a Lina Bachmann in the alternate, we must swap places, if there isn't, I shouldn't be able to reach it, at all.  Oh, I'm sorry, you look confused.  I forget that not all of me went into theoretical physics.  What did you?"  "Oh, experimental, well, that's important too, why I'm doing experiments now, I couldn't *get* an experimental physists to help me on this project, it's too radical, but I guess you were-"  "No?  Particle physics?  Now I was never interest -"  "Why, no, of course I never married, my work is far more..."  "Now, don't get upset, this takes some adjustment..."  "What?  Who?  No I... oh, that jock I tutored in colllege who killed himself?  Why I'd almost forgotten about it, tragic of course, but what's it got to do wi-"   
 
Lina Bachmann, controversial quantum physicist, was found strangled to death, her lab was ransacked.  Some investigators consider her to be the first victim of the supervillain known a Paradox.  Paradox is a non-humanoid robot or small piloted 'mecha' it has two long leg that bend 'backward' at the knee and several much smaller manipulative and weapon-mounting limbs attached to or housed within it's oblong main body.  It  has something of an improvised appearance.   It appeared suddenly and began a campaign of theft, focusing on high-tech components and materials.  It seems able to vanish (presumably teleport a long distance, or shift to another dimension) or to exist in two places at once or occupy the same space as other objects.  It's purpose remains unknown.  Scientists and engineers have assured investigators that the technologies it is trying to acquire are no more dangerous than the robot itself, indeed, probably much less so, and would only be of interest to a physicist searching for the Higgs boson...
 
 
 
 
 
 

That's weird, I've been reading old threads that have plenty of them.   Oh, well, it'll be less cool, but I'll complete the above without 'em.
 
 
 
In an alternate time line where Charles Darwin joined the newly-created Scottland Yard instead of embarking on the HMS Beagle, he was still inspired to develop his theory of evolution, but the inspirations were not odd animals from around the globe, but a surge of human mutations in Lodon.  Who were the first 8 of The Nine Terrors who terrorized London for 50 years? (the 9th and last being the non-powered Jack the Ripper, of course, who was also, ironically, the only one never identified) 
 
The villains should all be Marvel-style mutants and aren't a team per se, though some of them may have opperated at the same time, most should have appeared in the 1830s and all the mutants should have appeared before 1850, Jack the Ripper was 1880s. I just wanted to be very sure to leave him out of it.  
They should reflect the demogrpahics and dismal conditions of Victorian London.  If we fall short of 9 (which sounded poetic to me) and someone wants to move on, just say "...and the rest, though terrifying serial killers, were just 'normal' people..." and name the next group.   You can decide if your Terror was apprehended, killed, vanished, reformed, disected, has descendents -  or is still at large nearly 200 years later.

The Spitalfields Slasher
 
The Slasher did not draw great attention, only a few of his victims died, and all of them were rough men of violence, themselves, eliciting little sympathy even if they did come forward to report being attacked.  None the less his unique description - a powerfully-built man of no great height, but profusely hairy and downright bestial in appearance - led to his apprehension.  He was shot several times, presumed dead, and partially dissected.  The long deadly claws that gave him his name proved to be natural, retractable, appendages, like those of a cat, rather than an exotic weapon, like the Indian bagh nakh as originally assumed.  Before a more thorough autopsy could be performed the body mysteriously vanished in the night.  

I think the real issue with this sort of thing is that if Stark brand ARC Reactors put OPEC out of business there would be a LOT of knock-of effects and most comic book creators don't want to deal with that.  They want Iron Man punching WhipLash and don't want to tell a story about how gas stations everywhere are out of business because everyone's StarkCar has infinite range now and what that is doing to small town America.  Same with how Spiderman's webshooters aren't standard issue nonlethal side-arms for Police (and pay for Aunt May's healthcare), allowing them to web up low level supercriminals without calling out the Avengers every time Electro holds up a Credit Union.

You do see changed societies in "what if" and alternate future type stories but never in the main continuity.  If Heroes actually changed the world the comics would get further and further from the world people live in.

There is a scene in one of the Batman story lines where he and dead/alive Robin are talking over a beaten/not dead Joker about the futility of just arresting the criminals only to have them escape/get released instead of killing them and ending it permanently. Batman says that if he ever started down that path he would never be able to stop. He knows he can't become the judge, jury and executioner but he also realizes there is a real need (in his world) for someone with the means and commitment keep the fighting the good fight. He doesn't do it for his justice or his glory. He goes after people the normal system can't, for whatever reason, and then steps back as soon as the system can get a hand on the situation. If the system looses control then he is there again to bring control back to the system. That includes controlling the system when it strays from its own stated ideal. Both Bats and Super follow a code but it is a code others can point to and say "See? Here is what you are supposed to do." And they are able to do this despite their personal feelings while having their personal feelings providing the motivation to take what action is needed. 
In super hero storylines the writer always knows who is who and what the back story is. They know who is in the right and who isn't. Sometimes that is the story, that the character may not know but the writer definitely does. In real life we often don't have the full story. We are not the writer and don't know the full back story so when people in real life start acting like they do it scares us because deep down we can see ourselves as the ones being judged without all the facts.
I find it amusing (cynic that I am) that when, as LL pointed out, the heroes are acting directly at the behest of the government or system it ends up being more unforgiving and tyrannical that when individuals do similar things. I guess this leads back to the Warrior/Soldier argument. One is an individual the other part of a group. One has flexibility, one has regulation and standardization.
 
Ok getting sleepy and feel I am beginning to ramble. Night.

That's a great way of putting it.  Superheroes exist not to fight crime, but to fight extraordinary dangers.  True, Superman's first villains were all ordinary people and he was just the ultimate geek's wish fulfillment of going around dealing with problems with massive power to back you up.  But in time the concept developed into something less unnerving and troubling, into one you describe above.
 
Superheroes are moral agents of protection fighting evil in a chaotic world.  Their job isn't to avenge or bring justice, their job is to handle what the regular forces cannot, so that the regular forces can then take over.  Modern comic book (and film) writers don't get this: they think its about defending the powerless and bringing social justice, because they think everything is about that.  Superheroes are a special force that a world with superheroes needs because it has monsters erupting from the ground and aliens from space and VIPER agents trying to blow up the statue of liberty. 
 
To a certain extent its about protecting and serving; like Superman stopping a tornado or Green Lantern corking a volcano, the Flash saving people from a flood, etc.  But when it comes to fighting and putting your life on the line, its not about power or control, its about service and dealing with the extraordinary.  Superheroes can do things like fly food to a starving nation and rush a vaccine to a plague around to everyone.  But their combat "warrior elite" level of action is not about the ordinary.
 
For GMs this is a useful tool to understand how to handle writing and running scenarios.  Champions is not like any other RPG because of this. Every other game you're a free agent doing usually self-serving things.  To get treasure, power, advance a cause, gain things and accomplish goals.  Champions is about none of those things.  You don't go home with treasure or a title.  You go home realizing you did good and helped people.
 
Also, that concept helps explain why it is that its rare in comics for the system to be realistically portrayed as broken, corrupt, and lazy as it really is.  Because the system has to work for any of this to be possible.  Spider-Man cannot stop The Green Goblin and turn him over to the police, if the Attorny General is just going to set him free because he was only helping BLM protesters out.  In a world where you cannot trust the system, superheroes have to become vigilantes carrying out justice, because there's none to appeal to or turn criminals over to.
 
That's why movies such as Death Wish and their like became popular, because the system wasn't working and someone had to step up, at least in fiction.  For a Batman character to turn over things to the system when they can handle it again requires the system to work.

Government leaders, most leaders, really, are elites of one sort or another.  They're not literal warrior elites in modern western society, though some may have military experience, but more often political, academic, scientific, media, economic, etc 'elites.'   
 
You can contrast soldier and warrior that way, though I doubt either word has quite so precise a dictionary meaning, I think it's potentially a fair contrast.  But, by the same token Warriors tend to act as individuals, concerned with their own honor, prefer to intimidate enemies, protect allies, and follow a code or at least their own conscience.  Warriors can be good or bad people.   In contrast, soldiers act collectively, follow orders and rules of engagement, efficiently 'reduce' enemy forces, 'interdict' their sources of supply, and accept 'collateral damage' as part of doing business.   Soldiers may be good or bad individuals, but they can't manage to be much better or worse, collectively, than the system they serve.
 
Oh, and in western culture, particularly American culture (yes there is such a thing), jobs /are/ an important identity.
 
It does happen.  In the Kalevala, the Finnish national epic, Ilmarinen, a major character, is the supernatural smith who makes the wonderous Sampo.  While we have lots of action movies and tv shows about violent heroes, we also revere inventors, the inventor as hero was a strong theme in American literature from the mid 19th through the late 20th century (it's falling out of vogue, today) and that's arguably a crafter archetype (that many superhero origins fit).  Similarly, modern entertainment celebrates and reveres healers - doctors, surgeons, nurses & first responders.  And, getting back to myth, Penelope's maintenance of Ithaca's independence, in spite of a hoard of bullying suitors who would take her husband's place is an important part of the Odyssey, so there's a hearth-tender, too (oh, and another crafter - Trick of the Tapestry, remember).  (And before you call her obscure, how many boys do you know named 'Odysseus'?   )
 
Ultimately, I think we have superheroes for two pretty good reasons:
 
1) America didn't have a stable of pre-Enlightenment heroes, gods & monsters to draw upon.
2) We need stories that illustrate the importance of individual responsibility, and give examples of heroes who are responsible, in spite of having no one to enforce that responsibility on them.  Spiderman's story spells out 'with great power comes great responsibility' very explicitly, but Superman epitomizes it since he has just sooo much power, he absolutely should be corrupted by it, but instead he's a total boy scout.
 
 
 
 

Snapdragon
 
After spending 20 years in Stronghold's 'Hot Sleep,' this notorious late 70s, WITCH-associate supervillain retired to a commune in the Santa Cruz hills.  Since her pyrokinetic powers can simply set enemies on fire with a snap of her fingers, as well as project bolts or cones of flame, it was hard to tell, at first, who she may have been inflicting damage on.  Once the illusion dropped and  her large wings and humanoid-reptilian features were visible she was identified, and it was clear that she had been fighting on the 'same side' as a demonic entity and the obscure Homeland-security-flunky Firely.  Maybe someone thought 'fire' needed to be a theme?
As soon as the chaos sorted itself out, Snapdragon descended to ground level and surrendered to authorities, her parole was violated but we she got off with just a few more years of probation.  She gave a full account of her experience.  She'd been sunning herself on the upper branches of a giant sequoia (one of the downsides of being 'cold blooded') and had just started her first sun salutation, when she suddenly found herself over New York, under attack along with a 'team' she intuitive new were on her side, somehow.  Still not fully warmed up from the cold morning, she spread her wings on thermals to gain heat and altitude, torching 'enemies' that got too close, then coordinated with her 'teammates' to concentrate fire on one enemy at a time (an old tactic from back in the day).   Once the illusion dropped, and the sense sense of 'sides' faded (which was not immediate, she did realize one 'enemy' was armored once she could see him clearly, and set some of his internal systems on fire), she dived into the wooded areas of central park to escape the conflict.  
She latter regretted not getting to meet Tankhunter, who had been an idol of her's in college, when she was still an antiwar student protestor, before she'd turned radical environmentalist and been exposed to the reptilizing serum that granted her powers while freeing lab animals from a medical research facility.
Like any proper reptile, Snapdragon keeps her naughty bits safely tucked away in a tightly sealed cloaca, and lacks any mammary tissue, instead her chest and abdomen are protected by hard bands of yellow-green osteoderms, the rest of her body is covered by finer, darker green-grey scales, so she goes sans costume without rousing comment.  She does, however, retain the narrow waist and wide hips she had as a mammal, so is still readily perceived by humans as female, similarly her face, though hideous, is still a face, not a dragon-like snout.  She has fully jointed wings, rather than ptagia stretched between spines like Gargoyle, pale grey-green (nearly white) on the underside, and much darker above (a typical pattern for soaring animals).  She literally snaps her fingers to evoke her pyrokinetic powers, probably as a learned limitation to help control them, since pyrokinesis is notoriously dangerous (though for years that fanciful 'gesture' led to the perception she was magical or "half-" mystical dragon) .  Until the Air War it had been years since she'd done anything more than light a campfire or a doobie with them.

Snapdragon
 
After spending 20 years in Stronghold's 'Hot Sleep,' this notorious late 70s, WITCH-associate supervillain retired to a commune in the Santa Cruz hills.  Since her pyrokinetic powers can simply set enemies on fire with a snap of her fingers, as well as project bolts or cones of flame, it was hard to tell, at first, who she may have been inflicting damage on.  Once the illusion dropped and  her large wings and humanoid-reptilian features were visible she was identified, and it was clear that she had been fighting on the 'same side' as a demonic entity and the obscure Homeland-security-flunky Firely.  Maybe someone thought 'fire' needed to be a theme?
As soon as the chaos sorted itself out, Snapdragon descended to ground level and surrendered to authorities, her parole was violated but we she got off with just a few more years of probation.  She gave a full account of her experience.  She'd been sunning herself on the upper branches of a giant sequoia (one of the downsides of being 'cold blooded') and had just started her first sun salutation, when she suddenly found herself over New York, under attack along with a 'team' she intuitive new were on her side, somehow.  Still not fully warmed up from the cold morning, she spread her wings on thermals to gain heat and altitude, torching 'enemies' that got too close, then coordinated with her 'teammates' to concentrate fire on one enemy at a time (an old tactic from back in the day).   Once the illusion dropped, and the sense sense of 'sides' faded (which was not immediate, she did realize one 'enemy' was armored once she could see him clearly, and set some of his internal systems on fire), she dived into the wooded areas of central park to escape the conflict.  
She latter regretted not getting to meet Tankhunter, who had been an idol of her's in college, when she was still an antiwar student protestor, before she'd turned radical environmentalist and been exposed to the reptilizing serum that granted her powers while freeing lab animals from a medical research facility.
Like any proper reptile, Snapdragon keeps her naughty bits safely tucked away in a tightly sealed cloaca, and lacks any mammary tissue, instead her chest and abdomen are protected by hard bands of yellow-green osteoderms, the rest of her body is covered by finer, darker green-grey scales, so she goes sans costume without rousing comment.  She does, however, retain the narrow waist and wide hips she had as a mammal, so is still readily perceived by humans as female, similarly her face, though hideous, is still a face, not a dragon-like snout.  She has fully jointed wings, rather than ptagia stretched between spines like Gargoyle, pale grey-green (nearly white) on the underside, and much darker above (a typical pattern for soaring animals).  She literally snaps her fingers to evoke her pyrokinetic powers, probably as a learned limitation to help control them, since pyrokinesis is notoriously dangerous (though for years that fanciful 'gesture' led to the perception she was magical or "half-" mystical dragon) .  Until the Air War it had been years since she'd done anything more than light a campfire or a doobie with them.

Snapdragon
 
After spending 20 years in Stronghold's 'Hot Sleep,' this notorious late 70s, WITCH-associate supervillain retired to a commune in the Santa Cruz hills.  Since her pyrokinetic powers can simply set enemies on fire with a snap of her fingers, as well as project bolts or cones of flame, it was hard to tell, at first, who she may have been inflicting damage on.  Once the illusion dropped and  her large wings and humanoid-reptilian features were visible she was identified, and it was clear that she had been fighting on the 'same side' as a demonic entity and the obscure Homeland-security-flunky Firely.  Maybe someone thought 'fire' needed to be a theme?
As soon as the chaos sorted itself out, Snapdragon descended to ground level and surrendered to authorities, her parole was violated but we she got off with just a few more years of probation.  She gave a full account of her experience.  She'd been sunning herself on the upper branches of a giant sequoia (one of the downsides of being 'cold blooded') and had just started her first sun salutation, when she suddenly found herself over New York, under attack along with a 'team' she intuitive new were on her side, somehow.  Still not fully warmed up from the cold morning, she spread her wings on thermals to gain heat and altitude, torching 'enemies' that got too close, then coordinated with her 'teammates' to concentrate fire on one enemy at a time (an old tactic from back in the day).   Once the illusion dropped, and the sense sense of 'sides' faded (which was not immediate, she did realize one 'enemy' was armored once she could see him clearly, and set some of his internal systems on fire), she dived into the wooded areas of central park to escape the conflict.  
She latter regretted not getting to meet Tankhunter, who had been an idol of her's in college, when she was still an antiwar student protestor, before she'd turned radical environmentalist and been exposed to the reptilizing serum that granted her powers while freeing lab animals from a medical research facility.
Like any proper reptile, Snapdragon keeps her naughty bits safely tucked away in a tightly sealed cloaca, and lacks any mammary tissue, instead her chest and abdomen are protected by hard bands of yellow-green osteoderms, the rest of her body is covered by finer, darker green-grey scales, so she goes sans costume without rousing comment.  She does, however, retain the narrow waist and wide hips she had as a mammal, so is still readily perceived by humans as female, similarly her face, though hideous, is still a face, not a dragon-like snout.  She has fully jointed wings, rather than ptagia stretched between spines like Gargoyle, pale grey-green (nearly white) on the underside, and much darker above (a typical pattern for soaring animals).  She literally snaps her fingers to evoke her pyrokinetic powers, probably as a learned limitation to help control them, since pyrokinesis is notoriously dangerous (though for years that fanciful 'gesture' led to the perception she was magical or "half-" mystical dragon) .  Until the Air War it had been years since she'd done anything more than light a campfire or a doobie with them.

Government leaders, most leaders, really, are elites of one sort or another.  They're not literal warrior elites in modern western society, though some may have military experience, but more often political, academic, scientific, media, economic, etc 'elites.'   
 
You can contrast soldier and warrior that way, though I doubt either word has quite so precise a dictionary meaning, I think it's potentially a fair contrast.  But, by the same token Warriors tend to act as individuals, concerned with their own honor, prefer to intimidate enemies, protect allies, and follow a code or at least their own conscience.  Warriors can be good or bad people.   In contrast, soldiers act collectively, follow orders and rules of engagement, efficiently 'reduce' enemy forces, 'interdict' their sources of supply, and accept 'collateral damage' as part of doing business.   Soldiers may be good or bad individuals, but they can't manage to be much better or worse, collectively, than the system they serve.
 
Oh, and in western culture, particularly American culture (yes there is such a thing), jobs /are/ an important identity.
 
It does happen.  In the Kalevala, the Finnish national epic, Ilmarinen, a major character, is the supernatural smith who makes the wonderous Sampo.  While we have lots of action movies and tv shows about violent heroes, we also revere inventors, the inventor as hero was a strong theme in American literature from the mid 19th through the late 20th century (it's falling out of vogue, today) and that's arguably a crafter archetype (that many superhero origins fit).  Similarly, modern entertainment celebrates and reveres healers - doctors, surgeons, nurses & first responders.  And, getting back to myth, Penelope's maintenance of Ithaca's independence, in spite of a hoard of bullying suitors who would take her husband's place is an important part of the Odyssey, so there's a hearth-tender, too (oh, and another crafter - Trick of the Tapestry, remember).  (And before you call her obscure, how many boys do you know named 'Odysseus'?   )
 
Ultimately, I think we have superheroes for two pretty good reasons:
 
1) America didn't have a stable of pre-Enlightenment heroes, gods & monsters to draw upon.
2) We need stories that illustrate the importance of individual responsibility, and give examples of heroes who are responsible, in spite of having no one to enforce that responsibility on them.  Spiderman's story spells out 'with great power comes great responsibility' very explicitly, but Superman epitomizes it since he has just sooo much power, he absolutely should be corrupted by it, but instead he's a total boy scout.
 
 
 
 

Government leaders, most leaders, really, are elites of one sort or another.  They're not literal warrior elites in modern western society, though some may have military experience, but more often political, academic, scientific, media, economic, etc 'elites.'   
 
You can contrast soldier and warrior that way, though I doubt either word has quite so precise a dictionary meaning, I think it's potentially a fair contrast.  But, by the same token Warriors tend to act as individuals, concerned with their own honor, prefer to intimidate enemies, protect allies, and follow a code or at least their own conscience.  Warriors can be good or bad people.   In contrast, soldiers act collectively, follow orders and rules of engagement, efficiently 'reduce' enemy forces, 'interdict' their sources of supply, and accept 'collateral damage' as part of doing business.   Soldiers may be good or bad individuals, but they can't manage to be much better or worse, collectively, than the system they serve.
 
Oh, and in western culture, particularly American culture (yes there is such a thing), jobs /are/ an important identity.
 
It does happen.  In the Kalevala, the Finnish national epic, Ilmarinen, a major character, is the supernatural smith who makes the wonderous Sampo.  While we have lots of action movies and tv shows about violent heroes, we also revere inventors, the inventor as hero was a strong theme in American literature from the mid 19th through the late 20th century (it's falling out of vogue, today) and that's arguably a crafter archetype (that many superhero origins fit).  Similarly, modern entertainment celebrates and reveres healers - doctors, surgeons, nurses & first responders.  And, getting back to myth, Penelope's maintenance of Ithaca's independence, in spite of a hoard of bullying suitors who would take her husband's place is an important part of the Odyssey, so there's a hearth-tender, too (oh, and another crafter - Trick of the Tapestry, remember).  (And before you call her obscure, how many boys do you know named 'Odysseus'?   )
 
Ultimately, I think we have superheroes for two pretty good reasons:
 
1) America didn't have a stable of pre-Enlightenment heroes, gods & monsters to draw upon.
2) We need stories that illustrate the importance of individual responsibility, and give examples of heroes who are responsible, in spite of having no one to enforce that responsibility on them.  Spiderman's story spells out 'with great power comes great responsibility' very explicitly, but Superman epitomizes it since he has just sooo much power, he absolutely should be corrupted by it, but instead he's a total boy scout.
 
 
 
 

While you are absolutely right on many points, the reason that those types of heroes go astray as much as they do is simply that it makes for better storytelling.  Your argument (I mean that word in the “argument for debate” style) is based on a real world viewpoint.  Two people meeting, falling in love and living happily ever after just isn’t as enjoyable to an audience as Romeo & Juliet or Love Story.
   In gaming a proactive hero means a lot more work for a GM. Because that means that the story is only about what one character in particular wants and it’s not necessarily the one the GM wants to tell.  It can also run the risk of one characters quest being the be all, end all of a campaign.  Regardless of the other players who want to do their own things.  I remember a campaign that I played in got stuck in that mode and the rest of the group complained that the game had devolved into “Batman and his 5 Robins.”
   It’s a delicate balance and tough to pull off, making sure that everyone has their time in the spotlight. Blue-Booking is a good way around this if circumstances preclude one on one sessions. 
   This is an interesting subject.  Are you more interested in nuts & bolts ways to deal with this in books and games or in a more philosophical discussion of the trait in storylines?
     Either way is good for me,  happy trails.

Re: High level Cramming
 

See, that's why I brought up Replaceable.   I don't think there's any precedent, for, say, starting with a mundane piece of gear and 'adding points to it.'
Replaceable was a -1/2 limitation in the original Star Hero, it was to recognize that in a setting where, say, anyone could pick up a 2dRKAe laser pistol, an alien with 2dRKAe laser-eye-beams was not really getting a whole lot for his 30 pts (I believe that was an example, it's been a few... decades).  
 
It was a cool idea and I don't recall it ever being used again.
 
Fantasy Hero, previously, had introduced "Independent" which was another way of dealing with the D&D-esque fantasy bit of "magic items."

Flash Gordon was like the Star Wars of serials, OK, that's a bit obvious, because Lucas was jonesing to do Flash Gordon and settled for creating Star Wars.  Maybe the Marvel movies of the day.  Big budget, special effects (yes, you can see the wires and sparklers but, for a serial, of the day, that was top flight f/x, a lot of serials have been lost so you can't see the worst of them).
 
They're widely available.  The first series, with Priscilla Lawson as princess Aura, is the best.  It was re-packaged into Flas Gordon: ______ movies, "Rocket Ship", "Space Soldiers", Conquers the Universe.  Dr. Zarkof is the good-guy mad scientist.  He does things as diverse as turning Flash invisible or bringing him back from the brink of death, but his go-to throwaway detail for how he does it goes "I've discovered a new ray..."  Rays can do just about anything, apparently, and they don't need to be all Star Trek tech-speak, they can be quite straightforward.  The melting ray melts solid stone, the destroying ray blows space ships out of the sky, the vanishing ray turns the subject invisible, etc.  Pretty much like D&D potions, really, they do what it says on the tin
 
There are other serials & movies you could check out for great Mad Scientists.  The Phantom Creeps with Bela Lugosi, The Invisible Ray with Boris Karloff, the Vanishing Shadow has an interesting take in that the mad scientist enthusiastically helps the hero but is, well, ethically challenged.  Some other serials you could probably find - Rocky Jones, Commando Cody, etc - might have some goofy tech for you, but no strong mad scientist characters. 
 

Flash Gordon was like the Star Wars of serials, OK, that's a bit obvious, because Lucas was jonesing to do Flash Gordon and settled for creating Star Wars.  Maybe the Marvel movies of the day.  Big budget, special effects (yes, you can see the wires and sparklers but, for a serial, of the day, that was top flight f/x, a lot of serials have been lost so you can't see the worst of them).
 
They're widely available.  The first series, with Priscilla Lawson as princess Aura, is the best.  It was re-packaged into Flas Gordon: ______ movies, "Rocket Ship", "Space Soldiers", Conquers the Universe.  Dr. Zarkof is the good-guy mad scientist.  He does things as diverse as turning Flash invisible or bringing him back from the brink of death, but his go-to throwaway detail for how he does it goes "I've discovered a new ray..."  Rays can do just about anything, apparently, and they don't need to be all Star Trek tech-speak, they can be quite straightforward.  The melting ray melts solid stone, the destroying ray blows space ships out of the sky, the vanishing ray turns the subject invisible, etc.  Pretty much like D&D potions, really, they do what it says on the tin
 
There are other serials & movies you could check out for great Mad Scientists.  The Phantom Creeps with Bela Lugosi, The Invisible Ray with Boris Karloff, the Vanishing Shadow has an interesting take in that the mad scientist enthusiastically helps the hero but is, well, ethically challenged.  Some other serials you could probably find - Rocky Jones, Commando Cody, etc - might have some goofy tech for you, but no strong mad scientist characters. 
 

I've alway been a big fan of the Mage: the Ascension setting. The push and pull on the fight for consensus. The gray of the right and wrong of belief. It's ripe with built in conflict. But the Storyteller system itself, not the biggest fan. I've played around with a Fate based conversion, but it ends up looking very similar to Dresden Files magic. I guess this was kind of my impetus towards running my all-mage Hero game (in which I used the Fate/Dresden world building methods with the group in session 0).
 

Iron Man is a little unusual in growing notably through his early career.  It seems like most supers come into their full power right away and they experience crazy variations over time, rather than steadily get better - presumably because of writing/marketing/publishing with retcons and different writers and reboots and whatnot.
 
And I'd never say /couldn't/ do something in Champions!, just that IMX, running some multi-year campaigns, and having a few character accumulate hundreds of exp over the years, a character built at a high-power/cosmic level is very different from a more typical one with the same number of points due to accumulate exp.   Points you spend a few at a time, or maybe save up tens of for a 'radiation accident' (though i can't say I've seen a lot of that), just seem to be spent differently than points spent all at once in chargen.
 
The specific example of a high-fantasy (Fantasy Hero/D&D-esque) wizard with tons of exp, yeah, it'd be nothing like Dr. Strange, not even a little bit like him.  Campaign norms, for one thing, are totally different in kill-crazy, treasure-grubbing, S&S or quest-driven high fantasy (which you honestly don't see so much of in TTRPG thanks to D&D) vs either regular super-heroes, or the 'mystic' variations typified by Strange.  

Back in the day I ran the 3E/BBB equivalent, 'cosmic' level, for a number of years.   Also the other end of the spectrum, 'street' level.   The group was mixed, from serious Hero mavins to relatively casual players.  Both extremes worked well.
 
One thing I noticed was that even with lots of XP, low-power heroes wouldn't cross over to become like their higher-power equivalents.  
 

I actually did run an Urban Fantasy game using that book.  It imploded fairly quickly because there was a lot of disconnect between players about what we were actually trying to do with that game.  Some wanted more fights, some more investigation, and no one was clear on what the genre expectations were.  If you pick a fight with a troll under a bridge, do you have a chance or not?  Conan wins, Fellowship Samwise loses, RotK Samwise has a chance, how does your street magician do?

It wasn't the fault of Hero's book, as the GM I was the one that needed to establish the tone.  That said, I found Urban Fantasy Hero to be generic to the point of not being very helpful.  It laid out broad ideas of what Urban Fantasy could look like, gave you three settings to play in and set you loose.  If you picked one of those three you mostly got a magic system instead of a setting and you exhausted most of what was setup in about 3 game sessions & were then on your own.  You actually needed to roll quite a bit of your own to even get it to the table, unless the PCs did nothing but buy all the package deals. (None of my PCs made magic users, so the detailed Magic Systems didn't really help me)

I've been playing a lot of Hero for a long time so the mechanical comments didn't tell me what I didn't already knew about making my own magic systems.  Maybe if I hadn't been playing Hero in Non-Supers before it would have helped, but there was so much "mile wide/Inch deep" info on a broad genre that I very much felt I was home-brewing everything if I wanted a real game.

Champions Complete actually gives a *lot* more info on what your characters should do and what they should look like than Urban Fantasy Hero does, and imagine if all there was about the Champions Universe was what was written in Champions Complete?  Better than a completely blank slate, but a long way from a game in a book.  I get that you can't lose money on books and can't print books that don't sell, but if you know there is never going to be a Terran Empire setting Star Hero becomes a lot less useful.

It's why I'm hopeful about the discussion going on in another forum about a "Campaign in a Book" instead of another "Genre Hero" overview book.  Something for a GM to pick up & run rather than a "here is a guide to roll your own" is a pretty big gap in the Hero line IMHO.

Sorry to disappoint, I'm an old returning Champions! fan.  I was on Red October when it was still a BBS, then Hero-L, then some other forum that preceded this one (I think, c2000? it was pretty clunky as I recall).  I found & joined this forum in 2008 when my last (so far, last, haven't found anyone else interested since) Champions! campaign wrapped.  I was participating on here as 6th came up, and discussions  left me convinced it wasn't for me.  What little I saw of it once it came out didn't catch my interest.  
Anyway, a few weeks ago, this forum came up on a google search and I found myself sucked back in.  IDK how long that'll last.