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Message: <blockquote data-quote="AbdulAlhazred" data-source="post: 5376080" data-attributes="member: 82106">No, actually I can't see why it is this way at all DS. It has BECOME codified as a meaningful distinction over time, it didn't START OUT as one. The same result could easily have been achieved by other means that were less confusing. We're only talking about a very few specific situations. I mean really, there are HOW MANY opportunity action powers which attack that aren't Opportunity Attacks? Seriously, this would have been trivial to write in a clearer and more straightforward way. What I'm saying is it is an obtuse enough rule that even people who ARE experienced with RPGs and game systems CAN be confused by it. They are neither idiots nor lazy, they are simply ordinary 4e players, like you find at most tables. They have books, they have undoubtedly read them. They obviously didn't go over every bit of the rules with a fine toothed comb. That IS what it takes to unravel stuff like this. You can call my players lazy bums all you want, but that doesn't make it true. Now YOU may be playing with nothing but rules hounds that spend loads of time but you may want to unbend and learn to appreciate that this is not the usual situation.These people play 4e once a week for 4-5 hours. They don't DM, they also play plenty of other games, and generally speaking they have a reasonable grasp of the rules. THIS particular rule tends to trip up pretty much everyone in that category. It IS a problem rule. NO IT ISN'T!!!!!!!!! I have the actual observational evidence to prove it! You have theorycrafting and a hypothesis. Right, except the names for the two things are nearly identical and easy to confuse. The game uses plenty of 'terminology' so loosely in other places that such distinctions can easily seem meaningless. It is (and again I am citing evidence not opinion) OBVIOUSLY not that clear. An Opportunity Action which results in an MBA and an Opportunity Attack which results in an MBA, hmmmm, those aren't similar at all! ROFLMAO! It is hard to even take any attempt to call them easily distinguished seriously. Worse than this there is really no significant in-game reason for the two situations to call for different modifiers. They cover essentially exactly the same type of situation and the only distinction is how the ability to use them is granted, not what they do. Meaningless distinctions are NOT good RPG design.</blockquote>

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