Woodland Stride

[Telperion]

There was a thread here earlier that touched on Woodlands Stride, and it got me thinking: what does this Extraordinary Ability actually do?

The description talks about "natural thorns, briars, overgrown areas and similar terrain". Now, I suppose the question is aimed at that "similar terrain". The way I see it Woodlands Stride is good in forests, plains, meadows, jungles...places were growing things impede movement. But when we move to mountains, glaziers, rivers and other places where movement is also penalized does Woodland Stride help there as well?

I don't think so, but am I being too strict?

 

[Darklone]

I'd say your right. Though I would allow normal tactical movement even in rough areas.

 

[Camarath]

I agree with your interpretation of Woodland Stride.

 

[Li Shenron]

Morjens!

Since the description refers to "moving through any sort of undergrowth" I agree with you. I think it can be applied to local movement also, and in this case it should allow to travel faster at least in forests, hills, jungles, moors... but you may change it for Druids from specific terrain (such as desert, frozen lands and similar).

 

[Stalker0]

by the book I'd say your right.... but I've always house ruled it to allow full movement through any natural terrian (desets, snow, etc) - I mean nature is nature


There's nothing like a party fighting a barb/druid in deep sand

 

[Otterscrubber]

I agree with Stalker0. Woodland stride's flavor seems to be such that a druid/ranger with this ability is in tune with nature enough that he/she can pass obstacles that would hinder others. Nature take many forms and I would not limit it to merely vegetation-type obstacles since there could be desert, polar, swamp or other types druids out there.

 

[RigaMortus]

So could they also move through knee deep or waist high water in a swamp or bog? That is natural right? It's part of nature...

What about the ocean? That's nature/natural as well...

 

[Westwind]

It may have been my old thread that got this one going actually. Looking through the books I think that the rules support the general sentiment here: it needs to be natural and "growing." (Which really sucks since my pass without trace-boots wearing Ranger lives in the Silver Marches) For example, in Dragon 311 they presented alternatives to the standard Druid, one of them being the Winter Warden, an arctic version. Two of its abilities are drift stride (walk on snow with no negative effect) and ice stride (guess what this one does). If those are seen as separate from woodland stride, I guess that rules out snow and ice as viable terrains for the standard Druid and Ranger.

I would have to re-check the 3.5 rules on cover and concealment, but my first guess would be that woodland stride stops working once you're in enough liquid to grant a concealment bonus. Honestly, I don't think water meets the "living" criteria in a fantasy world, but I could see walking across a moor, so I'm hesitant to come up with a hard and fast house rule.