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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Thunderfoot" data-source="post: 2478216" data-attributes="member: 34175">Let me piggyback a bit off the earlier post by Steveroo (Great post BTW):  Another thing to consider is party level and access to gear.  Many of Steveroo's comments assumed a bit of level (magic items and skill points as example) - but what of the 2nd level party that has to wander out in the wilderness?  (part of the reason (both historical and practical) for starting in our near a town.) So, you've just been given the job of chasing the BBEG into the ice caves of Summoth and you are a 2nd level group of adventures, first consider a few things:  1) Why are they ICE Caves?  magic, geothermal anomoly, portal to paraplane of  ice?    2) How long are we going to be there?  A 2 day trek & a 2 week trek are 2 different beings  3) Who's going?   1 - If the ice condition is magical, will this magic wear off once BBEG is vanquished?  If so, wearing your artic gear may be practical at the begining, but get out of a now jungle like cave (in comparrison to Frosty's snow fortress) wearing three layers of fur and having no temperate clothing could be a factor for heat exhaustion.   If the conditions change mid adventure or at a designated time, you could literally be caught with your pants down, or even, with them up. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f631.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":eek:" title="Eek!    :eek:"  data-smilie="9"data-shortname=":eek:" />  2 - As an avid backpacker/hiker my pack changes considerably for a 2 day trek and a 2 week trek, If as an adventure I was tracking BBEG and thought it would only take a couple of days, I'm going light, a week of food, a change of clothes, some pitons and rope, maybe a pick ax and whatever I'm going to need to kill Bill.  If it's gonna take more than a week, I'll need a mule to carry the 3 weeks or more of food, extra torches and tinder all wrapped to keep it dry (remember ice cave). at least 3 sets of clothing (for the same reason) and gear to build bridges and stuff so that I can make sure my pack line isn't left on the other side of a crevass.   And that's just for a 2nd level fighter, not even a party.  The reason I picked the ice cave was that fires make the cave melt, causing equipment to be cold and wet (very bad combination), even though the party may be able to vanquish goblins, frostbite, trenchfoot, immersion foot, hypothermia and even heat exhaustion (brought about by dehydration - it gets hot under three layers of fur when you're fighting monsters) are probably more dangerous than any foes.  And if the party can't eat, they freeze and if they can't drink they die.    Extra rations and water are a must. 3 - My example is based on a fighter, what about a cleric?  Will my holy writs become waterlogged if taken into the dank?  What about a wizard - oh, no, I'm not taking my spellbook in there!!!  These potion bottles must be kept stored at ROOM temperature and cannot freeze (uh oh).  How about that bard - do you know what cold and wet does to an instrument? And speaking of that fighter, ever seen cold metal touch skin?  Probably going with leather armor on this outing.   The number of people also increases the amount of ext4ras that need to be brought, how about some tarps to keep every thing dry?  Shouldn't we bring food for the animals?  Maybe we should invest in a small cart or wagon.  How much were we getting paid again? <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f641.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":(" title="Frown    :("  data-smilie="3"data-shortname=":(" />  Of course I could go on, but I think the point has been made, it's the details that can kill a party when weather, climate and terrain start changing.  The above example goes to show how most parties (and GMs for that matter) forget that the world is not a nice place to live in, regardless of whether or not you're fighting goblins or not.  Food for thought, hmmm, I think I had better pack some more undies before I kill that bugbear. <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f642.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":)" title="Smile    :)"  data-smilie="1"data-shortname=":)" /> Hope this helps and happy gaming</blockquote>

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