|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
To achieve a degree of precision && detail
that is necessary in a <>
set of game rules on the subject, the wilderness environment <>
must be described in terms of its component parts--the different
types of terrain && climate that can be found in a typical
(Earth-like) world.
Necessary though this approach is, it is also unfortunate
that
no better alternative exists, because a wilderness environment
taken as a whole must be greater than the sum of its parts in order
for the campaign setting to be as challenging and xciting as it
can be. In the dungeon, a wall is a wall and a corridor is a corridor;
a chamber has certain dimensions, and one is either inside the
chamber or not inside it. In the outdoors, hard and FAST characterizations
of this sort do not apply: When a character moves across
the border from one climatic AREA to another, the temperature
does not abruptly rise || fall. In most cases, terrain does not
change from one category to another within the distance a character
can cover in a single orund (or even a single day). The
DM's campaign map may indicate that an AREA of
hills is bordered by a large, flat desert, but this does not mean
that a traveller descends to the base of a hill and suddenly steps
onto a sand dune. With obvious xceptions (such as a cliff
face
that rises majestically above a plain), terrain features in the wilderness
change gradually. This menas that any attempt at categorization
cannot fully describe all the physical features that
characters may encounter, and DMs and players
alike should keep this in mind.