Zero Range/Area Effect

[nerdvana]

I am wondering if it is legal to do this... take an attack advantage (Binding, Innate Attack, TK, etc.) and apply Melee Attack to it to make it have a 0 yard range and then Area Effect to that so that everyone in the area is considered "in range" for the attack.

The effect I'm attempting to reproduce is where a treesinger (from my other thread) can effect the roots and/or vines in an area around them and have them come out of the ground to attack or bind (as TK or Binding) any targets in the area. The attacks would be coming from right next to the targets, not the character so I can see an argument for no range penalties.

One possibility I see is building it as a Melee Attack with Area Effect as mentioned above. The other idea would be to build it as a ranged attack that overlaps the area, with Area Effect also and Long Ranged (for the 0 modifier)... just trying to find the most elegant way to build what I'm looking to build.