Do druids and rangers make the wilderness too freindly?

[Wiseblood]

Do you take it easier on parties that include a ranger or druid when they are in the wilderness? When it comes to the dangers of the wild do they help every time or just occasionally?

 

[Elf Witch]

Do you take it easier on parties that include a ranger or druid when they are in the wilderness? When it comes to the dangers of the wild do they help every time or just occasionally?

Yes it makes it easier it can still be dangerous but this is where the ranger and the druid get to shine.

I have noticed that many DMs I have played in don't tend to use the wilderness as an encounter they make it feel like a walk in an urban park. If they do use an encounter it is always seems to be goblins or orcs but never critters or simply getting lost.

 

[Tonguez]

I tend to use wolves as a challenge to rangers and druids. Wolf packs view rangers as lone wolves, they generally wont attack but if the ranger comes into their territory they will confront him.

I also have a few dire wolves who will actively challenge rangers/druids for dominance of a territory, so it actually makes it more dangerous for them.

Druids don't tend to get lost but sometimes the fey will actively target them too.

 

[Gilladian]

I think the major problem is NOT that druids and rangers make the wilderness too friendly, as that WE mostly don't realize how UNfriendly the wilderness should be.

Getting lost in the woods, even woods that you know pretty well, isn't hard. I'll never forget when I was about 10, we went to the local state park. We'd been there Many Times, and my brothers and I ran around there all the time. That day, we went off the path in a new place. We got about 30' from the path, got turned around, and it took us nearly an hour to find our way back. We only did it because we ran into a creek, followed it to the river, and from there we were able to find the main trail. This was in a park that was less than 3 miles in any direction...

Had we met goblins, or even just a wild dog pack, we might never have made it back.

Getting lost, not finding enough food (or water, or bad food/water), getting caught in bad weather, running into very dangerous terrain, is all very easy. A ranger or druid, even at 1st level, can minimize SOME of that, but not all... IMC not having anyone with wilderness lore skills means you WILL get in trouble; having them just means you get skill checks; having someone with ranger or druid type skills just improves those checks a good bit.

 

[Neonchameleon]

Yes it makes it easier it can still be dangerous but this is where the ranger and the druid get to shine.

I have noticed that many DMs I have played in don't tend to use the wilderness as an encounter they make it feel like a walk in an urban park. If they do use an encounter it is always seems to be goblins or orcs but never critters or simply getting lost.

That's because smart animals won't attack an armoured group of adventurers - instant Darwin Award. Smart predators don't normally attack humans at the best of times, and the most danagerous animal in the world to humans is the hippo. (Don't get between one and its drinking hole whatever you do). That said, getting lost should be an issue.

 

[Razjah]

I think rangers and druids can definitely make wilderness adventures easier. But that is their job. If they make the wilderness too easy, then rogues make dungeon adventures too easy, and bards make urban adventures too easy. In many wilderness encounters, they are often poorly set up by the GM and not challenging the players correctly.

In the wilds, you don't often die of combat with some animals. Thirst, food, getting lost, exposure, injuries untreated, etc are what kill. But these are often trivial beyond the first couple levels. Rations in a bag of holding on a pony- got food. Purify food and water- got water. Exposure- tent, bedroll, clothes, abstract system covering exposure that I have never seen used in a game (even the ones I run). Injuries untreated- hit points abstract that, cure light wounds solves it.

So, no rangers and druids don't make wilderness encounters too easy. D&D makes wilderness encounters too easy. In the Lord of the Rings books, the wilderness did more damage to most of the Fellowship (oddly the book always called them the Companions). Getting lost, having no food and water, hiding in the dirt, depleting morale, inadequate sleep over long periods, etc. This is what made the characters struggle even more to overcome their conflicts. But in a tabletop game? Item management and a really arduous adventure. I haven't looked enough at The One Ring rpg, but it probably covers these adventures much better than D&D.

 

[Alzrius]

I think the major problem is NOT that druids and rangers make the wilderness too friendly, as that WE mostly don't realize how UNfriendly the wilderness should be.

...and that we don't have the game reflect this. In 3.X/Pathfinder, Survival is a skill that can be used untrained, and only requires a DC 10 check to find sufficient food and water for yourself for a day, and for another person for every 2 by which you exceed that (which, thanks to things like Wisdom bonus and class skill bonuses, isn't that hard).

Since anyone can take 10 on the check, that means that securing provisions isn't really an issue for anyone lost in the wild, which isn't how I'd set the game's default.

 

[RangerWickett]

I have a friend who ran a one-shot, where the party was supposed to go into the moors and kill some trolls. Easy, simple, hack-and-slash.

Then he cracked out the random weather chart.

A week later three of us had died from hypothermia after being lost in the foggy moors and caught in an early snowstorm. One of the two survivors failed a Fortitude save trying to drink brackish water, and the last survivor abandoned him and managed to crawl back to civilization.

I can't say the session was particularly 'fun,' but it was damned memorable.

 

[Razjah]

A week later three of us had died from hypothermia after being lost in the foggy moors and caught in an early snowstorm. One of the two survivors failed a Fortitude save trying to drink brackish water, and the last survivor abandoned him and managed to crawl back to civilization.

I can't say the session was particularly 'fun,' but it was damned memorable.

This is what we need. Well, not exactly- but close. I think games like Mouseguard (where you can fail, get lost, get a penalty, then make it to town which makes the rest of mission harder), Burning Wheel, and other non-d20 games model this better. In d20 if a GM plays hard with the weather (and PCs can't control the weather) it becomes a grind. It does accomplish the difficult increase due to the wilds, but not often properly for a fun game. I think d20 needs to bump the DCs up for wilderness type skills, and make them trained only.

If I wanted to make the wilds more terrifying, I would do it that way. Find food? DC 15 +2 per extra person to feed, then have circumstantial modifiers (allowed time, weather, climate, environment, etc) to make this more difficult. Then bring in the nocturnal predators. Lions- nocturnal hunters. Good luck getting a full night's rest if you camp near the lion's den. This way, you challenge the players and their characters. Did you prepare for the wilds? Then you will struggle for food, and have a much higher chance of a random encounter (especially at night) because you hunkered down in the wrong place [inspiration taken liberally from Man Vs. Wild, Dual Survival, Survivor Man, and Man, Woman, Wild.

These same difficulties can be applied to urban games, wander into a gang or guild's turf armed and you'll probably be visited at night. Many modern cities don't have nice smooth terrain throughout the entire thing- why would a medieval styled city? Slate, cobblestone, mud, wheel ruts, and more chop up roads (and horse poop, but that is something I don't really want in my games). Tight alleys can invoke penalties, but most GMs I've seen (self included) have just made streets and alleys have widths in 5' increments. If you have a rogue or bard with appropriate urban skills you can void this. A paladin with nobility can simply order the masses aside (really who wants to bump into the guest of the duke and spend the night with the guards?).


I think I found my GM new year's resolution. Make better use of environment based skills so that PCs with those skills can shine, and those without will want to find hirelings and the like with them. Make Urban areas harsher so that you understand why people like to avoid cities, and Wilderness darker and more grim like many works of fiction.

 

[Alzrius]

By the by, best weather-specific product I've ever seen for Pathfinder: Dodeca Weather.

In a nutshell, this product lets you specify the weather in a variety of ways, lending greater verisimilitude to your game without changing any of the existing rules. I used it in my last game, and it was a big hit. I'd definitely recommend it!