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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Dausuul" data-source="post: 5402386" data-attributes="member: 58197">Two problems with this.First, the way these powers are currently formatted, the "you or one ally in the burst" part is not on the same line as "close burst 5" and therefore easy to miss. If you don't see it, you won't parse it. I have had players who thought Healing Word affected everyone within 5 squares, because they saw that the power said "close burst 5" and didn't notice the place in the "target" line where it specifies only one creature.Fortunately, I've played leader-types and know how their healing powers tend to operate, so I was able to nip that in the bud... but if it had been a different power, I wouldn't know until they started breaking encounters with it. As seems to be the case with most 4E DMs, I don't understand how all the PCs' powers and class abilities work; I rely on my players to handle them properly, only stepping in to say "Hey, are you sure it works like that?" when something seems grossly overpowered.It's a weakness of exception-based design. In a system with heavy EBD on the player side, rules text needs to be clear enough that all players can understand it and apply it correctly, not just the rules lawyers at the table... because there are just too many rules for the lawyers to remember them all.Second problem, closely related to the first: People are not computers. It is bad practice to take a concept designed to do one thing and kludge it into something totally different--it undermines the whole concept in the player's head and leads to confusion.When players see "burst," they are trained to expect an area effect which works on every legitimate target within the area. Trying to use "burst" as a backdoor way of producing a ranged effect that does not provoke is just asking for confusion. If you can have "close burst (one target)," why not instead say "ranged (does not provoke)?" No new keywords required and far less counterintuitive.</blockquote>

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