I think the premise of this thread illustrates one significant issue for designing a system that can bridge a range of play styles.
The OP takes the idea of "at will" magic, as well as the idea of the 1st level PC, as straightforward descriptions of the fictional world in which the game unfolds.
But it is not obligatory to do so. It is possible to look at the PC build rules as rules not for modelling the capabilities of fictional persons, but rather for building up a suite of mechanical resources that a player uses to play a particular fictional person (his/her PC). Likewise, it is possible to look at At-Will powers not as modelling the capacities of a fictional person, but rather as specifying a certain sort of resource type for a player.
Looking at PC build rules and action resolution rules in the second sort of way (ie as pertaining to player resources rather than a model of the fiction) means that the issue the OP is concerned with will not arise unless a player has his/her PC go on a guard-killing spree. NPC wizards, on the other hand, can be handled much as DAT handled Emirikol the Chaotic (in the well-known illustration): until they actually engage the PCs, their exploits can be narrated by the GM as seems appropriate to framing the scene, and consistent with genre constraints; and when they start engaging the PCs, they use whatever the mechanics say they can do. Even if Emirikol, as an NPC, has an at-will death ray power, that doesn't mean it is literally at-will - that only means that, in the confrontation with the PCs there is no constraint on the use of it (but it may be that on another day, were Emirikol more tired, or the stars aligned differently, or whatever other fictional variation you want to introduce, Emirikol couldn't have used so many death rays).
The OP takes the idea of "at will" magic, as well as the idea of the 1st level PC, as straightforward descriptions of the fictional world in which the game unfolds.
But it is not obligatory to do so. It is possible to look at the PC build rules as rules not for modelling the capabilities of fictional persons, but rather for building up a suite of mechanical resources that a player uses to play a particular fictional person (his/her PC). Likewise, it is possible to look at At-Will powers not as modelling the capacities of a fictional person, but rather as specifying a certain sort of resource type for a player.
Looking at PC build rules and action resolution rules in the second sort of way (ie as pertaining to player resources rather than a model of the fiction) means that the issue the OP is concerned with will not arise unless a player has his/her PC go on a guard-killing spree. NPC wizards, on the other hand, can be handled much as DAT handled Emirikol the Chaotic (in the well-known illustration): until they actually engage the PCs, their exploits can be narrated by the GM as seems appropriate to framing the scene, and consistent with genre constraints; and when they start engaging the PCs, they use whatever the mechanics say they can do. Even if Emirikol, as an NPC, has an at-will death ray power, that doesn't mean it is literally at-will - that only means that, in the confrontation with the PCs there is no constraint on the use of it (but it may be that on another day, were Emirikol more tired, or the stars aligned differently, or whatever other fictional variation you want to introduce, Emirikol couldn't have used so many death rays).
