Charlaquin
Goblin Queen (She/Her/Hers)
I’m working from no premise, and trying to understand what the rules literally say.I'm working from the premise that the natural language-based approach is meant to empower players to interact with the world in naturalistic ways, except where specified to the contrary.
I don’t agree with that assessment, but if it works for you, ¯\(ツ)/¯My readings of all of the rules for checks seem to generally support this premise.
You mean besides the fact that they say you can swim or climb by spending two feet of movement per foot? I don’t see any way to interpret that which suggests the distance swam or climbed would be relevant in determining if failure is possible. Unless, of course, you’re working from a predetermined conclusion and looking for evidence to support it.I definitely agree that lots of stuff in D&D is designed to work very much contrary to what we'd expect in real life, but I don't see any textual reason to think the swimming or climbing rules are designed to do so,
The only rule I see that would make it relevant whether or not the character was carrying adventuring gear is the optional encumbrance rule, which could potentially reduce movement speed (making a climb or swim take longer) and/or impose disadvantage on Strength and Dexterity checks (making one less likely to succeed on climbs or swims where factors like rough water, a lack of hand and footholds, slippery surfaces, or similar make it necessary to succeed on a Strength check to succeed).except to a limited extent to make these things easier to do while wearing adventuring gear.