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Hypnotism (Heroes of Fallen Lands p205):
Hit: [...] The target uses a free action to make a melee basic attack against a creature of your choice[...]
Friendly Fire (Dragon 384):
Effect: The target repeats the attack as a free action against a creature you choose within 2 squares of the target of its original attack. The new target must still be legal for the attack.
Can I make the target of Hypnotism or Friendly Fire target itself with the MBA?
The answer is yes.
First, it's important to differentiate the two powers. Friendly Fire is clearly yes, as long as it is within 2 squares of its original target- the target is 1) a creature and 2) within two squares of the target of its original attack.
With Hypnotism, there are two arguments against, as noted in "Can the target of Drunken Monkey attack himself?"
The first argument is whether a power needs to specify that the creature can target itself. This is necessary if a power specifies "allies," because you are not your own ally, or if it is a Close Burst, because Close Burst powers by rule exclude the caster/monster making the attack. But otherwise, there is no requirement for it to specify; a creature is still a creature.
The second argument against comes from PHB1's rule about Melee 1 (pg 56):
Melee 1: A melee power that has a range of 1 can be used only on an adjacent target.
In this case, there is no official rule as to whether or not a creature is adjacent to itself, so it would be possible that a creature couldn't attack itself with a Melee 1 attack. But that text was superseded by the Rules Compendium, page 100:
Melee [number]: The power can be used against a target that is within the specified number of squares of the power’s origin square. For example, a melee power that has a range of 1 can normally be used only against an adjacent target, whereas a melee power that has a range of 0 can be used only against a target sharing the attacker’s space.
Clearly, a creature is within 1 square of itself (in fact it is actually within 0 squares of itself). So while it's not clear that it's an adjacent creature, that is no longer a requirement of melee 1, and they can make the attack.
Yes. It would still need to make an attack roll and then damage roll. I did that in a campaign I ran a while ago.
