I think it should be noted that the core rules and adventure modules should be treated like federal and state governments respectively. The former always applies and takes precedence unless the latter surpasses the former.
That's kind of the issue isn't it though?
WotC hardly if ever uses these rules and even if you do it does end up being more or less boils down to a few rolls per day.
The ask for the DM (and a lot of the time the player) is to create hours worth of content that serves only to make one class features feel worthwhile?
Like I've said combat and social situations evolve more naturally and every class has the ability to participate.
Rangers pillar is by every definition "extra" and is almost exclusively for their benefit. Sure other classes can participate but to a much lower extent then the others.
Not everyone has time to shoehorn these into the game or even wants to when you realize as I have how overtly shallow the experience is even with effort to include it...
It's just not fun to me and I shouldn't have to apologize for stating my experience bluntly.
these elements aren't necessarily shoe horned in. The problem with them is that they are highly variable. But they do exist in various things like various modules that have been created that actually involve travel of some kind. Your Attitude that they are shoe horned in shows more your distaste for them and preference for "just give me encounters to win" more than how "extra" or shoe horned or even in some ways how missing the Exploration Pillar is. Because any attempt to add it in you decide is un-neccessary, a needless few rolls despite the fact that combat, and even more so most social interactions are solved by "a few dice rolls" but your accepting of those because those are what you have decided that you want and focus on.
And here's something that people tend to very purposefully ignore. But Objectively, Most Social Interactions are often just solved with less than 6 rolls, and sometimes as little as 1 or 2, but actually take tons of work about something that is actually heavily undefined except for a few general skills aimed towards it. At least as undefined as anything that has to do with the Exploration pillar and in many ways actually even more so.
The Social Pillar of the Game. Is actually everything that the Exploration Pillar is always accused of. But because people can actually put points into it they value it more highly even though it technically is vastly ill defined overall despite it being necessary. Perhaps even more undefined than the Exploration Pillar in reality. But with more expectation from it.
Yes. Everything but character creation, spells, and combat is basically "up to the DM". The social pillar, and I agree it is at LEAST as terribly unsupported and vague as travel/exploration, gets a lot of "face time" with the general community because of things like critical role and dimension 20. It's not the game that is awesome with social encounters, it's those players/actors.
I think it should be noted that the core rules and adventure modules should be treated like federal and state governments respectively. The former always applies and takes precedence unless the latter surpasses the former.
That's kind of the issue isn't it though?
WotC hardly if ever uses these rules and even if you do it does end up being more or less boils down to a few rolls per day.
The ask for the DM (and a lot of the time the player) is to create hours worth of content that serves only to make one class features feel worthwhile?
Like I've said combat and social situations evolve more naturally and every class has the ability to participate.
Rangers pillar is by every definition "extra" and is almost exclusively for their benefit. Sure other classes can participate but to a much lower extent then the others.
Not everyone has time to shoehorn these into the game or even wants to when you realize as I have how overtly shallow the experience is even with effort to include it...
It's just not fun to me and I shouldn't have to apologize for stating my experience bluntly.
these elements aren't necessarily shoe horned in. The problem with them is that they are highly variable. But they do exist in various things like various modules that have been created that actually involve travel of some kind. Your Attitude that they are shoe horned in shows more your distaste for them and preference for "just give me encounters to win" more than how "extra" or shoe horned or even in some ways how missing the Exploration Pillar is. Because any attempt to add it in you decide is un-neccessary, a needless few rolls despite the fact that combat, and even more so most social interactions are solved by "a few dice rolls" but your accepting of those because those are what you have decided that you want and focus on.
Its my experience and in the adventures I have mentioned (Out of the Abyss and Tomb of Annihilation) both have about half a page for the survival/exploration aspects as it would affect rangers PHB abilities. While this may not be shoehorned....its definitely not a focus of any kind.
Encounters do not have to be to "win" but at least to drive the plot and the survival tells a tale that I do not think needs a lot of time to tell. Its a component to the storytelling and creates situations to tell a story. Combat does the same but has a meatier chunk of the rules set and about 90% of your sheet relates to combat mechanics so you deal with it frequently.
Shoehorning comes in when there is 0 survival components and there are definitely adventures that have that. Making travel along well populated roads, explored areas, or urban environments have naturally less survival/exploration focus to them.
I think it should be noted that the core rules and adventure modules should be treated like federal and state governments respectively. The former always applies and takes precedence unless the latter surpasses the former.
That's kind of the issue isn't it though?
WotC hardly if ever uses these rules and even if you do it does end up being more or less boils down to a few rolls per day.
The ask for the DM (and a lot of the time the player) is to create hours worth of content that serves only to make one class features feel worthwhile?
Like I've said combat and social situations evolve more naturally and every class has the ability to participate.
Rangers pillar is by every definition "extra" and is almost exclusively for their benefit. Sure other classes can participate but to a much lower extent then the others.
Not everyone has time to shoehorn these into the game or even wants to when you realize as I have how overtly shallow the experience is even with effort to include it...
It's just not fun to me and I shouldn't have to apologize for stating my experience bluntly.
In your defense, the “guidance” for travel in the jungles of Chult is considerably lacking from an exploration perspective. I believe the internet was to streamline the travel rules for this book. When I was a player in this adventure we had zero exploration pillar characters in the party. It was all DDAL. So everyone was playing paladins, warlocks, rogues, wizards, and clerics. We spent a dozen, at least, sessions trying to get through the jungle to our destinations, and in retrospect I’d argue the DM was going easy on us. Even someone with proficiency in survival would have helped. And a ranger with a favored terrain of forest would have literally saved days of real game play.
The fact that you had an underwhelming experience with that part of that book because you had someone that could bypass all of the troubles the jungle offers through any kind of exploration/travel abilities, although not sexy at all, demonstrates it’s effectiveness.
the goal with the book I think was to provide a simple path for those who don't want to focus on travel or exploration. and allow a group that understands travel encounters and pacing to fill in the gaps by reading between the lines. this seems to be a common Philosophy with most of their books. just look at the new raven loft book. some people will see very little content and others will be inspired.
Yes. Everything but character creation, spells, and combat is basically "up to the DM". The social pillar, and I agree it is at LEAST as terribly unsupported and vague as travel/exploration, gets a lot of "face time" with the general community because of things like critical role and dimension 20. It's not the game that is awesome with social encounters, it's those players/actors.
Social encounters just come easier as well as its human interaction and conversation which is universal in nature. Not everyone has experience with exploration and survival so they would need to rely on the DM a lot more to create the experience. If the DM senses that people are not engaging the typical tactic is to move on which happens a lot with the exploration pillar.
It ends up being like a combat encounter and you use resources but its typically over and done with fairly quickly. This is another reason why NOT allowing spells like Enhance Ability to work in these situations only makes things worse IMO. If you can't use your spells or class features to benefit you unless you are a ranger then you create a lot more heavy spotlight performance. Which normally is fine but if you actually make it a third of the time you end up with a spotlight for one player a good portion of the time.
You draw the party away from each other if only one person is the focus. You may use that time to incorporate more social/combat but then that draws away from exploration. Ultimately it gets harder and harder to make it feel like it fits other than the few one off rolls.
I can’t criticize you for how you “feel” about something, but the numbers don’t lie, and the numbers point in great favor of the PHB ranger.
Choose a different angle.
What math?
There is no math to say you only benefit in the biome you pick.... It's just how it is.
You pick 1 of 8 possible and you are SOL in the other 7.
Where as the rogue gets their skills in all 8 all the time.
It's just the reality of how limited the feature is.
Now if you are in one biome the entire campaign (underdark/Out of the Abyss) it's a good deal and I would agree it's as good as the rogue since you get it all the time.
If you are in a campaign with 2 or more biomes I would dump it fast.
This sounds like presenting facts not opinion (Up until the last line). I'm done dancing around the mean comments and apologies. that is not what this is about. the past is the past. ranger has useful skills independent of other classes. ranger holds up with exploration by both spells and skills. Tasha's provides options for people who do not understand how to work with PHB ranger. Plenty of people are willing to workshop how to choose a Favored terrain and Favored enemy for any campaign. I and many others have used PHB ranger effectively without ever stepping into Favored terrain. if any one doesn't understand how to use those skills they should create a reaserch thread before claiming provable evidence NE+FE bad.
I think it should be noted that the core rules and adventure modules should be treated like federal and state governments respectively. The former always applies and takes precedence unless the latter surpasses the former.
That's kind of the issue isn't it though?
WotC hardly if ever uses these rules and even if you do it does end up being more or less boils down to a few rolls per day.
The ask for the DM (and a lot of the time the player) is to create hours worth of content that serves only to make one class features feel worthwhile?
Like I've said combat and social situations evolve more naturally and every class has the ability to participate.
Rangers pillar is by every definition "extra" and is almost exclusively for their benefit. Sure other classes can participate but to a much lower extent then the others.
Not everyone has time to shoehorn these into the game or even wants to when you realize as I have how overtly shallow the experience is even with effort to include it...
It's just not fun to me and I shouldn't have to apologize for stating my experience bluntly.
In your defense, the “guidance” for travel in the jungles of Chult is considerably lacking from an exploration perspective. I believe the internet was to streamline the travel rules for this book. When I was a player in this adventure we had zero exploration pillar characters in the party. It was all DDAL. So everyone was playing paladins, warlocks, rogues, wizards, and clerics. We spent a dozen, at least, sessions trying to get through the jungle to our destinations, and in retrospect I’d argue the DM was going easy on us. Even someone with proficiency in survival would have helped. And a ranger with a favored terrain of forest would have literally saved days of real game play.
The fact that you had an underwhelming experience with that part of that book because you had someone that could bypass all of the troubles the jungle offers through any kind of exploration/travel abilities, although not sexy at all, demonstrates it’s effectiveness.
the goal with the book I think was to provide a simple path for those who don't want to focus on travel or exploration. and allow a group that understands travel encounters and pacing to fill in the gaps by reading between the lines. this seems to be a common Philosophy with most of their books. just look at the new raven loft book. some people will see very little content and others will be inspired.
I think thats the rub for me....
Combat and social set pieces are all there with lots of possible combat/social encounters. You get lore and backstory and history to have understanding so that you can have dialogue and you get new creatures with interesting abilities for combat.
For exploration you get.....a survival DC check once per day.
Ravenloft is a great example of this as the bestiary there is one of the best I have seen yet in a book. The lore behind each of the domains is enough I get a feel for the personality of the Dread Lord who owns it. You get new character options that can create tension and distrust in the party.
For survival I get: "Valachan provides the opportunity to exaggerate everything the players and characters know about the threats of nature. The Survival skill proves invaluable in navigating the rain forest, determining what kind of creature mauled a corpse, and understanding how different venoms afflict a jungle survivor."
A survival check.
So I am not exaggerating when I say most exploration comes down to a survival check....its just baked in that way.
Even in the "Encounters" section the more exploration focused encounters rely on....you guessed it.....a survival check.
If WotC would just invest at least SOME time in the exploration aspect I would find the PHB ranger to be a better bet...instead we get the easier approach of Deft Explorer as it just fits better into the system they have created.
The ToA book gives specific guidance for Chult's jungle travel. It is added on top of the general travel/exploration class/game rules.
So the ToA hex rules add to/supplement the core travel rules, same for the travel pace core rules, the navigation rules in the book add to the travel roles from the core rules, so to the food and water rules, and all encounters, random or planned, require other things like perception checks, stealth checks, languages, and knowledge of other creatures native to the land. So the ranger's specific abilities apply here, as do any character with similar abilities. Optimus, your rogue scout, cleric/druid, and wizard examples would be of a big help as well.
Each hex is listed as 10 miles across, so a ranger's primeval awareness ability is easily applied as well. If a ranger used a spell slot for the day within a 10 mile hex, and they randomly encounter a creature type listed on the primeval awareness table, I would give the ranger something for the heads up due to the resource spent, like advantage on a perception check and/or automatically seeing the encounter before the encounter sees the party and from a greater distance. The ranger's natural explorer ability keeps the party from being lost...ever, the party can move much faster, and is operating with multiple skills with expertise and other abilities to make the party's life in the jungle easier. Although not able to directly fix disease, they would possibly have expertise in medicine as this might be their favored terrain and THAT would give the character the ability to deal with it on some level. SO the random encounters have a lot to do with the exploration abilities and rangers in particular.
If the ranger, for some strange reason, did NOT have favored terrain as forests at level one (and this is a a perfect example of how a ranger should fit thematically in a campaign from the start when building a character), it still has the skill proficiency options to be as competent as anyone with the same, has multiple options for favored enemies with beasts and undead along with multiple types of humanoids (including and especially humans), primeval awareness (this is the perfect type of place to use it, and a multitude of spells as well (speak with animals, pass without trace, hunter's mark, etc.).
To address the concern that other party members can't contribute, there is equipment to be carried, multiple directions to be on the look out of, animal handling checks that might need to be made for pack animals, encounters with intelligent humanoids that need to be engaged with, random combat encounters, diseases and post combat encounter wounds that need to be tended to, finding and maintaining a safe place to rest, and perhaps even scouting ahead a bit to avoid being ambushed. This covers pretty much all of the possible roles for every possible class. As the travel in this part of the book IS the adventure, everyone should and can be involved.
I can’t criticize you for how you “feel” about something, but the numbers don’t lie, and the numbers point in great favor of the PHB ranger.
Choose a different angle.
What math?
There is no math to say you only benefit in the biome you pick.... It's just how it is.
You pick 1 of 8 possible and you are SOL in the other 7.
Where as the rogue gets their skills in all 8 all the time.
It's just the reality of how limited the feature is.
Now if you are in one biome the entire campaign (underdark/Out of the Abyss) it's a good deal and I would agree it's as good as the rogue since you get it all the time.
If you are in a campaign with 2 or more biomes I would dump it fast.
This sounds like presenting facts not opinion (Up until the last line). I'm done dancing around the mean comments and apologies. that is not what this is about. the past is the past. ranger has useful skills independent of other classes. ranger holds up with exploration by both spells and skills. Tasha's provides options for people who do not understand how to work with PHB ranger. Plenty of people are willing to workshop how to choose a Favored terrain and Favored enemy for any campaign. I and many others have used PHB ranger effectively without ever stepping into Favored terrain. if any one doesn't understand how to use those skills they should create a reaserch thread before claiming provable evidence NE+FE bad.
When I am saying that you are limted in biomes that is indeed fact....you have 1 biome until 6th level then you get one more....but you are left with several options that you do not get until the campaign is likely over.
I have tried to at least show how the official modules/adventures do not even support the use of PHB ranger features....they are just the same if not more limiting IMO to what other classes get with less cost.
Because most adventures use the "Survival check and done" approach to these things why would you pick a feature that limits your expertise to just one biome when you could have expertise in all of them?
The ToA book gives specific guidance for Chult's jungle travel. It is added on top of the general travel/exploration class/game rules.
So the ToA hex rules add to/supplement the core travel rules, same for the travel pace core rules, the navigation rules in the book add to the travel roles from the core rules, so to the food and water rules, and all encounters, random or planned, require other things like perception checks, stealth checks, languages, and knowledge of other creatures native to the land. So the ranger's specific abilities apply here, as do any character with similar abilities. Optimus, your rogue scout, cleric/druid, and wizard examples would be of a big help as well.
Each hex is listed as 10 miles across, so a ranger's primeval awareness ability is easily applied as well. If a ranger used a spell slot for the day within a 10 mile hex, and they randomly encounter a creature type listed on the primeval awareness table, I would give the ranger something for the heads up due to the resource spent, like advantage on a perception check and/or automatically seeing the encounter before the encounter sees the party and from a greater distance. The ranger's natural explorer ability keeps the party from being lost...ever, the party can move much faster, and is operating with multiple skills with expertise and other abilities to make the party's life in the jungle easier. Although not able to directly fix disease, they would possibly have expertise in medicine as this might be their favored terrain and THAT would give the character the ability to deal with it on some level. SO the random encounters have a lot to do with the exploration abilities and rangers in particular.
If the ranger, for some strange reason, did NOT have favored terrain as forests at level one (and this is a a perfect example of how a ranger should fit thematically in a campaign from the start when building a character), it still has the skill proficiency options to be as competent as anyone with the same, has multiple options for favored enemies with beasts and undead along with multiple types of humanoids (including and especially humans), primeval awareness (this is the perfect type of place to use it, and a multitude of spells as well (speak with animals, pass without trace, hunter's mark, etc.).
To address the concern that other party members can't contribute, there is equipment to be carried, multiple directions to be on the look out of, animal handling checks that might need to be made for pack animals, encounters with intelligent humanoids that need to be engaged with, random combat encounters, diseases and post combat encounter wounds that need to be tended to, finding and maintaining a safe place to rest, and perhaps even scouting ahead a bit to avoid being ambushed. This covers pretty much all of the possible roles for every possible class. As the travel in this part of the book IS the adventure, everyone should and can be involved.
Taking all of this, all of these possibilities from the core rules and this adventure combined, that are part of the game, and over simplifying it to "a single survival roll" once per day (which is NOT even how the books guides the DM, not even close) is the bumper bowling of this pillar of D&D 5E. I won't defend that it's easy to pick up how to adjudicate as a DM for the players, but it does exist, and works well when used well and correctly.
If you, as a DM hand wave the encounter building rules for combat, and end up throwing easy encounter and after easy encounter at the party, even combat will become boring and purposeless.
The basic way to play D&D 5E has an over emphasis on combat overall. It takes a deep dive and extra elbow grease to get the rest of the game to rise to the top as well.
An encounter with a goblin standing in the middle of a room will boil down to one die roll. It takes adding to, flushing out, and expanding the basics of a combat encounter to make it interesting and engaging.
The ToA book gives specific guidance for Chult's jungle travel. It is added on top of the general travel/exploration class/game rules.
So the ToA hex rules add to/supplement the core travel rules, same for the travel pace core rules, the navigation rules in the book add to the travel roles from the core rules, so to the food and water rules, and all encounters, random or planned, require other things like perception checks, stealth checks, languages, and knowledge of other creatures native to the land. So the ranger's specific abilities apply here, as do any character with similar abilities. Optimus, your rogue scout, cleric/druid, and wizard examples would be of a big help as well.
Each hex is listed as 10 miles across, so a ranger's primeval awareness ability is easily applied as well. If a ranger used a spell slot for the day within a 10 mile hex, and they randomly encounter a creature type listed on the primeval awareness table, I would give the ranger something for the heads up due to the resource spent, like advantage on a perception check and/or automatically seeing the encounter before the encounter sees the party and from a greater distance. The ranger's natural explorer ability keeps the party from being lost...ever, the party can move much faster, and is operating with multiple skills with expertise and other abilities to make the party's life in the jungle easier. Although not able to directly fix disease, they would possibly have expertise in medicine as this might be their favored terrain and THAT would give the character the ability to deal with it on some level. SO the random encounters have a lot to do with the exploration abilities and rangers in particular.
If the ranger, for some strange reason, did NOT have favored terrain as forests at level one (and this is a a perfect example of how a ranger should fit thematically in a campaign from the start when building a character), it still has the skill proficiency options to be as competent as anyone with the same, has multiple options for favored enemies with beasts and undead along with multiple types of humanoids (including and especially humans), primeval awareness (this is the perfect type of place to use it, and a multitude of spells as well (speak with animals, pass without trace, hunter's mark, etc.).
To address the concern that other party members can't contribute, there is equipment to be carried, multiple directions to be on the look out of, animal handling checks that might need to be made for pack animals, encounters with intelligent humanoids that need to be engaged with, random combat encounters, diseases and post combat encounter wounds that need to be tended to, finding and maintaining a safe place to rest, and perhaps even scouting ahead a bit to avoid being ambushed. This covers pretty much all of the possible roles for every possible class. As the travel in this part of the book IS the adventure, everyone should and can be involved.
Reading the rules for the Chult jungle it just simply says you need to find water or undergo a check to see if you get exhaustion.
Also the travel pace rules are not affected by the ranger PHB features unless you are by yourself.
The only aspect that is covered is the PP rulings and that is literally something that is passive and not interactive by the party more than deciding on pace. Once you pick that its effectively over interaction wise. Things like Goodberry and Create Food and Water are even called out as needed. Finding food and water is a survival check so once again so the ranger would have expertise but thats only if they picked the right biome. In this case its easy because you have one maybe two to deal with...but the jungle isnt the only area in Chult:
coasts and lakes, jungles, mountains, rivers, swamps, and wastelands are the areas identified in the guidelines.
One could argue a forest ranger might have it for the jungle...but likely not the rest. So you are looking at 1 out of 7 biomes that you are getting the expertise in...when the rogue could easily have it for ALL of them at the same level.
If they had the ability to swap terrain this would not be an issue...you as a ranger could simply spend some time in the type and be beneficial throughout. But as its stands you have to wait 5 levels to pick up another one. And not knowing what is under that hex is part of the fun but also means you could choose poorly.
As for your points about the other ranger stuff spells are always good on the ranger...albiet pretty limited thanks to so few spells known. I prefer the new primeval awareness as I feel its more generally applicable. Favored enemy is one that is a crap shoot....its good for certain campaigns (Decent to Avernus) where its much more likely you will face a certain type of enemy. In Chult there are so many different humanoid types that even picking humanoids you have to pick two races of humanoid which is....limiting seeing as how there is a wide variety of humanoid life in the area.
Undead makes sense here and would likely be the best choice.
For those of you that multiclass and also really have a **** of a DM, a really simple work around to to start with a level of fighter. This gives you a bit to pick your favored terrain and favored enemy AND proficiency in constitution saves and a second fighting style.
If you, as a DM hand wave the encounter building rules for combat, and end up throwing easy encounter and after easy encounter at the party, even combat will become boring and purposeless.
The basic way to play D&D 5E has an over emphasis on combat overall. It takes a deep dive and extra elbow grease to get the rest of the game to rise to the top as well.
An encounter with a goblin standing in the middle of a room will boil down to one die roll. It takes adding to, flushing out, and expanding the basics of a combat encounter to make it interesting and engaging.
Combat is the meat of the game though....most of the rules and bout 80% of your sheet is combat focused so if you do not find that aspect fun then likely its not the best system to be playing in. You can avoid combat altogether if you want but I would think maybe a different system would be better in that case as you would not need to focus so much on it.
For those of you that multiclass and also really have a **** of a DM, a really simple work around to to start with a level of fighter. This gives you a bit to pick your favored terrain and favored enemy AND proficiency in constitution saves and a second fighting style.
Or a level in Rogue and expertise in survival so you get all biomes to start but still get the benefit on the INT based checks.
The ToA book gives specific guidance for Chult's jungle travel. It is added on top of the general travel/exploration class/game rules.
So the ToA hex rules add to/supplement the core travel rules, same for the travel pace core rules, the navigation rules in the book add to the travel roles from the core rules, so to the food and water rules, and all encounters, random or planned, require other things like perception checks, stealth checks, languages, and knowledge of other creatures native to the land. So the ranger's specific abilities apply here, as do any character with similar abilities. Optimus, your rogue scout, cleric/druid, and wizard examples would be of a big help as well.
Each hex is listed as 10 miles across, so a ranger's primeval awareness ability is easily applied as well. If a ranger used a spell slot for the day within a 10 mile hex, and they randomly encounter a creature type listed on the primeval awareness table, I would give the ranger something for the heads up due to the resource spent, like advantage on a perception check and/or automatically seeing the encounter before the encounter sees the party and from a greater distance. The ranger's natural explorer ability keeps the party from being lost...ever, the party can move much faster, and is operating with multiple skills with expertise and other abilities to make the party's life in the jungle easier. Although not able to directly fix disease, they would possibly have expertise in medicine as this might be their favored terrain and THAT would give the character the ability to deal with it on some level. SO the random encounters have a lot to do with the exploration abilities and rangers in particular.
If the ranger, for some strange reason, did NOT have favored terrain as forests at level one (and this is a a perfect example of how a ranger should fit thematically in a campaign from the start when building a character), it still has the skill proficiency options to be as competent as anyone with the same, has multiple options for favored enemies with beasts and undead along with multiple types of humanoids (including and especially humans), primeval awareness (this is the perfect type of place to use it, and a multitude of spells as well (speak with animals, pass without trace, hunter's mark, etc.).
To address the concern that other party members can't contribute, there is equipment to be carried, multiple directions to be on the look out of, animal handling checks that might need to be made for pack animals, encounters with intelligent humanoids that need to be engaged with, random combat encounters, diseases and post combat encounter wounds that need to be tended to, finding and maintaining a safe place to rest, and perhaps even scouting ahead a bit to avoid being ambushed. This covers pretty much all of the possible roles for every possible class. As the travel in this part of the book IS the adventure, everyone should and can be involved.
Reading the rules for the Chult jungle it just simply says you need to find water or undergo a check to see if you get exhaustion.
Also the travel pace rules are not affected by the ranger PHB features unless you are by yourself.
The only aspect that is covered is the PP rulings and that is literally something that is passive and not interactive by the party more than deciding on pace. Once you pick that its effectively over interaction wise. Things like Goodberry and Create Food and Water are even called out as needed. Finding food and water is a survival check so once again so the ranger would have expertise but thats only if they picked the right biome. In this case its easy because you have one maybe two to deal with...but the jungle isnt the only area in Chult:
coasts and lakes, jungles, mountains, rivers, swamps, and wastelands are the areas identified in the guidelines.
One could argue a forest ranger might have it for the jungle...but likely not the rest. So you are looking at 1 out of 7 biomes that you are getting the expertise in...when the rogue could easily have it for ALL of them at the same level.
If they had the ability to swap terrain this would not be an issue...you as a ranger could simply spend some time in the type and be beneficial throughout. But as its stands you have to wait 5 levels to pick up another one. And not knowing what is under that hex is part of the fun but also means you could choose poorly.
As for your points about the other ranger stuff spells are always good on the ranger...albiet pretty limited thanks to so few spells known. I prefer the new primeval awareness as I feel its more generally applicable. Favored enemy is one that is a crap shoot....its good for certain campaigns (Decent to Avernus) where its much more likely you will face a certain type of enemy. In Chult there are so many different humanoid types that even picking humanoids you have to pick two races of humanoid which is....limiting seeing as how there is a wide variety of humanoid life in the area.
Undead makes sense here and would likely be the best choice.
"Reading the rules for the Chult jungle it just simply says you need to find water or undergo a check to see if you get exhaustion." Among other things, yes. There is much more here going on though.
"Also the travel pace rules are not affected by the ranger PHB features unless you are by yourself." That is 100% incorrect. Please read the entire ability. The two of point are, Difficult terrain doesn’t slow your group’s travel. and Your group can’t become lost except by magical means.
"The only aspect that is covered is the PP rulings and that is literally something that is passive and not interactive by the party more than deciding on pace. Once you pick that its effectively over interaction wise. Things like Goodberry and Create Food and Water are even called out as needed. Finding food and water is a survival check so once again so the ranger would have expertise but thats only if they picked the right biome. In this case its easy because you have one maybe two to deal with...but the jungle isn't the only area in Chult:" The DMG has many more bits of information. Have you read it? It seems not, as everything you speak about and reference is from the PHB. One person can not do all of these things while on the move. Passive perception takes place directionally, and is used at the DM's discretion as a tool. Having trouble as a DM engaging your players? Have them make active perception checks with different PCs in different directions. Listing how spells help with exploration and survival only weakens your argument about how others in the party aren't involved and a spotlight is on the ranger. Pick a lane.
"One could argue a forest ranger might have it for the jungle...but likely not the rest. So you are looking at 1 out of 7 biomes that you are getting the expertise in...when the rogue could easily have it for ALL of them at the same level." This is your active choice as a DM to interpret the "rules" this way and actively find ways to cut your ranger off at the knees. The rules for this kind of ruling do not exist, and you are choosing to apply this kind of punishment to a class feature that you don't like, IMHO.
"If they had the ability to swap terrain this would not be an issue...you as a ranger could simply spend some time in the type and be beneficial throughout. But as its stands you have to wait 5 levels to pick up another one. And not knowing what is under that hex is part of the fun but also means you could choose poorly." See above. It is the jungles of Chult. You are in the jungle, that counts as forest, that has mountains in it and coastline around it. This is a level of biased harshness that has no other function other than to punish class features you already don't like.
"As for your points about the other ranger stuff spells are always good on the ranger...albiet pretty limited thanks to so few spells known. I prefer the new primeval awareness as I feel its more generally applicable. Favored enemy is one that is a crap shoot....its good for certain campaigns (Decent to Avernus) where its much more likely you will face a certain type of enemy. In Chult there are so many different humanoid types that even picking humanoids you have to pick two races of humanoid which is....limiting seeing as how there is a wide variety of humanoid life in the area." Again your argument points clash with one another. Do you want the ranger to be an expert all of the time or do you think the entire party should all be active when exploring and traveling the world over? Please pick a side of the conversation and stick to it. [REDACTED]
The ToA book gives specific guidance for Chult's jungle travel. It is added on top of the general travel/exploration class/game rules.
So the ToA hex rules add to/supplement the core travel rules, same for the travel pace core rules, the navigation rules in the book add to the travel roles from the core rules, so to the food and water rules, and all encounters, random or planned, require other things like perception checks, stealth checks, languages, and knowledge of other creatures native to the land. So the ranger's specific abilities apply here, as do any character with similar abilities. Optimus, your rogue scout, cleric/druid, and wizard examples would be of a big help as well.
Each hex is listed as 10 miles across, so a ranger's primeval awareness ability is easily applied as well. If a ranger used a spell slot for the day within a 10 mile hex, and they randomly encounter a creature type listed on the primeval awareness table, I would give the ranger something for the heads up due to the resource spent, like advantage on a perception check and/or automatically seeing the encounter before the encounter sees the party and from a greater distance. The ranger's natural explorer ability keeps the party from being lost...ever, the party can move much faster, and is operating with multiple skills with expertise and other abilities to make the party's life in the jungle easier. Although not able to directly fix disease, they would possibly have expertise in medicine as this might be their favored terrain and THAT would give the character the ability to deal with it on some level. SO the random encounters have a lot to do with the exploration abilities and rangers in particular.
If the ranger, for some strange reason, did NOT have favored terrain as forests at level one (and this is a a perfect example of how a ranger should fit thematically in a campaign from the start when building a character), it still has the skill proficiency options to be as competent as anyone with the same, has multiple options for favored enemies with beasts and undead along with multiple types of humanoids (including and especially humans), primeval awareness (this is the perfect type of place to use it, and a multitude of spells as well (speak with animals, pass without trace, hunter's mark, etc.).
To address the concern that other party members can't contribute, there is equipment to be carried, multiple directions to be on the look out of, animal handling checks that might need to be made for pack animals, encounters with intelligent humanoids that need to be engaged with, random combat encounters, diseases and post combat encounter wounds that need to be tended to, finding and maintaining a safe place to rest, and perhaps even scouting ahead a bit to avoid being ambushed. This covers pretty much all of the possible roles for every possible class. As the travel in this part of the book IS the adventure, everyone should and can be involved.
Reading the rules for the Chult jungle it just simply says you need to find water or undergo a check to see if you get exhaustion.
Also the travel pace rules are not affected by the ranger PHB features unless you are by yourself.
The only aspect that is covered is the PP rulings and that is literally something that is passive and not interactive by the party more than deciding on pace. Once you pick that its effectively over interaction wise. Things like Goodberry and Create Food and Water are even called out as needed. Finding food and water is a survival check so once again so the ranger would have expertise but thats only if they picked the right biome. In this case its easy because you have one maybe two to deal with...but the jungle isnt the only area in Chult:
coasts and lakes, jungles, mountains, rivers, swamps, and wastelands are the areas identified in the guidelines.
One could argue a forest ranger might have it for the jungle...but likely not the rest. So you are looking at 1 out of 7 biomes that you are getting the expertise in...when the rogue could easily have it for ALL of them at the same level.
If they had the ability to swap terrain this would not be an issue...you as a ranger could simply spend some time in the type and be beneficial throughout. But as its stands you have to wait 5 levels to pick up another one. And not knowing what is under that hex is part of the fun but also means you could choose poorly.
As for your points about the other ranger stuff spells are always good on the ranger...albiet pretty limited thanks to so few spells known. I prefer the new primeval awareness as I feel its more generally applicable. Favored enemy is one that is a crap shoot....its good for certain campaigns (Decent to Avernus) where its much more likely you will face a certain type of enemy. In Chult there are so many different humanoid types that even picking humanoids you have to pick two races of humanoid which is....limiting seeing as how there is a wide variety of humanoid life in the area.
Undead makes sense here and would likely be the best choice.
"Reading the rules for the Chult jungle it just simply says you need to find water or undergo a check to see if you get exhaustion." Among other things, yes. There is much more here going on though.
"Also the travel pace rules are not affected by the ranger PHB features unless you are by yourself." That is 100% incorrect. Please read the entire ability. The two of point are, Difficult terrain doesn’t slow your group’s travel. and Your group can’t become lost except by magical means.
"The only aspect that is covered is the PP rulings and that is literally something that is passive and not interactive by the party more than deciding on pace. Once you pick that its effectively over interaction wise. Things like Goodberry and Create Food and Water are even called out as needed. Finding food and water is a survival check so once again so the ranger would have expertise but thats only if they picked the right biome. In this case its easy because you have one maybe two to deal with...but the jungle isn't the only area in Chult:" The DMG has many more bits of information. Have you read it? It seems not, as everything you speak about and reference is from the PHB. One person can not do all of these things while on the move. Passive perception takes place directionally, and is used at the DM's discretion as a tool. Having trouble as a DM engaging your players? Have them make active perception checks with different PCs in different directions. Listing how spells help with exploration and survival only weakens your argument about how others in the party aren't involved and a spotlight is on the ranger. Pick a lane.
"One could argue a forest ranger might have it for the jungle...but likely not the rest. So you are looking at 1 out of 7 biomes that you are getting the expertise in...when the rogue could easily have it for ALL of them at the same level." This is your active choice as a DM to interpret the "rules" this way and actively find ways to cut your ranger off at the knees. The rules for this kind of ruling do not exist, and you are choosing to apply this kind of punishment to a class feature that you don't like, IMHO.
"If they had the ability to swap terrain this would not be an issue...you as a ranger could simply spend some time in the type and be beneficial throughout. But as its stands you have to wait 5 levels to pick up another one. And not knowing what is under that hex is part of the fun but also means you could choose poorly." See above. It is the jungles of Chult. You are in the jungle, that counts as forest, that has mountains in it and coastline around it. This is a level of biased harshness that has no other function other than to punish class features you already don't like.
"As for your points about the other ranger stuff spells are always good on the ranger...albiet pretty limited thanks to so few spells known. I prefer the new primeval awareness as I feel its more generally applicable. Favored enemy is one that is a crap shoot....its good for certain campaigns (Decent to Avernus) where its much more likely you will face a certain type of enemy. In Chult there are so many different humanoid types that even picking humanoids you have to pick two races of humanoid which is....limiting seeing as how there is a wide variety of humanoid life in the area." Again your argument points clash with one another. Do you want the ranger to be an expert all of the time or do you think the entire party should all be active when exploring and traveling the world over? Please pick a side of the conversation and stick to it. This is an example others have mentioned where you seem to be trolling and arguing just to argue and not stating an opinion.
Pace is not what you said there....Difficult terrain isnt even mentioned in the Chult piece so its not applicable unless you add it....which was my point.
I stand corrected on the getting lost piece....you simply do not have to roll...so even less interaction which was my other point.
The rules state that the ranger only gets their benefits in their biome. Their biome is forest then technically you wont even get it in the jungle....as they are COMPLETELY different biomes. Giving the forest biome ranger jungle is already being generous.
Also its clearly listed that there are several biomes at work here...even in a jungle island there are coasts and lakes, jungles, mountains, rivers, swamps, and wasteland. All of these are clearly listed in the rules for the adventure and the DM version of the hex grid shows different biomes in different hexes.
By the rules you would not give the ranger the benefits in these other regions because they did not pick these as their NE benefit. If you are giving them all from the get go that is a completely different discussion.
The approach is the problem....you are either so good at what you do you avoid the roll (see getting lost) or you do not get a benefit at all (See biomes).
The game only has the listed biomes in the game, and they are the most common categories of biomes. Also, biomes doesn't appear in the rules, just so everyone knows.
Forest is the terrain used n the ToA book. Trees. If all of the biomes you mentioned mention in the book had mechanical weight like that it would use game terms. It doesn't.
These are situations and active decisions you are making for your gamer as the DM and imposing on your players as a DM. There is zero support for these opinions in the game, or at any reasonable table.
Are these still you just stating your opinion?
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these elements aren't necessarily shoe horned in. The problem with them is that they are highly variable. But they do exist in various things like various modules that have been created that actually involve travel of some kind. Your Attitude that they are shoe horned in shows more your distaste for them and preference for "just give me encounters to win" more than how "extra" or shoe horned or even in some ways how missing the Exploration Pillar is. Because any attempt to add it in you decide is un-neccessary, a needless few rolls despite the fact that combat, and even more so most social interactions are solved by "a few dice rolls" but your accepting of those because those are what you have decided that you want and focus on.
And here's something that people tend to very purposefully ignore. But Objectively, Most Social Interactions are often just solved with less than 6 rolls, and sometimes as little as 1 or 2, but actually take tons of work about something that is actually heavily undefined except for a few general skills aimed towards it. At least as undefined as anything that has to do with the Exploration pillar and in many ways actually even more so.
The Social Pillar of the Game. Is actually everything that the Exploration Pillar is always accused of. But because people can actually put points into it they value it more highly even though it technically is vastly ill defined overall despite it being necessary. Perhaps even more undefined than the Exploration Pillar in reality. But with more expectation from it.
Yes. Everything but character creation, spells, and combat is basically "up to the DM". The social pillar, and I agree it is at LEAST as terribly unsupported and vague as travel/exploration, gets a lot of "face time" with the general community because of things like critical role and dimension 20. It's not the game that is awesome with social encounters, it's those players/actors.
Its my experience and in the adventures I have mentioned (Out of the Abyss and Tomb of Annihilation) both have about half a page for the survival/exploration aspects as it would affect rangers PHB abilities. While this may not be shoehorned....its definitely not a focus of any kind.
Encounters do not have to be to "win" but at least to drive the plot and the survival tells a tale that I do not think needs a lot of time to tell. Its a component to the storytelling and creates situations to tell a story. Combat does the same but has a meatier chunk of the rules set and about 90% of your sheet relates to combat mechanics so you deal with it frequently.
Shoehorning comes in when there is 0 survival components and there are definitely adventures that have that. Making travel along well populated roads, explored areas, or urban environments have naturally less survival/exploration focus to them.
the goal with the book I think was to provide a simple path for those who don't want to focus on travel or exploration. and allow a group that understands travel encounters and pacing to fill in the gaps by reading between the lines. this seems to be a common Philosophy with most of their books. just look at the new raven loft book. some people will see very little content and others will be inspired.
Social encounters just come easier as well as its human interaction and conversation which is universal in nature. Not everyone has experience with exploration and survival so they would need to rely on the DM a lot more to create the experience. If the DM senses that people are not engaging the typical tactic is to move on which happens a lot with the exploration pillar.
It ends up being like a combat encounter and you use resources but its typically over and done with fairly quickly. This is another reason why NOT allowing spells like Enhance Ability to work in these situations only makes things worse IMO. If you can't use your spells or class features to benefit you unless you are a ranger then you create a lot more heavy spotlight performance. Which normally is fine but if you actually make it a third of the time you end up with a spotlight for one player a good portion of the time.
You draw the party away from each other if only one person is the focus. You may use that time to incorporate more social/combat but then that draws away from exploration. Ultimately it gets harder and harder to make it feel like it fits other than the few one off rolls.
This sounds like presenting facts not opinion (Up until the last line). I'm done dancing around the mean comments and apologies. that is not what this is about. the past is the past. ranger has useful skills independent of other classes. ranger holds up with exploration by both spells and skills. Tasha's provides options for people who do not understand how to work with PHB ranger. Plenty of people are willing to workshop how to choose a Favored terrain and Favored enemy for any campaign. I and many others have used PHB ranger effectively without ever stepping into Favored terrain. if any one doesn't understand how to use those skills they should create a reaserch thread before claiming provable evidence NE+FE bad.
I think thats the rub for me....
Combat and social set pieces are all there with lots of possible combat/social encounters. You get lore and backstory and history to have understanding so that you can have dialogue and you get new creatures with interesting abilities for combat.
For exploration you get.....a survival DC check once per day.
Ravenloft is a great example of this as the bestiary there is one of the best I have seen yet in a book. The lore behind each of the domains is enough I get a feel for the personality of the Dread Lord who owns it. You get new character options that can create tension and distrust in the party.
For survival I get: "Valachan provides the opportunity to exaggerate everything the players and characters know about the threats of nature. The Survival skill proves invaluable in navigating the rain forest, determining what kind of creature mauled a corpse, and understanding how different venoms afflict a jungle survivor."
A survival check.
So I am not exaggerating when I say most exploration comes down to a survival check....its just baked in that way.
Even in the "Encounters" section the more exploration focused encounters rely on....you guessed it.....a survival check.
If WotC would just invest at least SOME time in the exploration aspect I would find the PHB ranger to be a better bet...instead we get the easier approach of Deft Explorer as it just fits better into the system they have created.
The ToA book gives specific guidance for Chult's jungle travel. It is added on top of the general travel/exploration class/game rules.
So the ToA hex rules add to/supplement the core travel rules, same for the travel pace core rules, the navigation rules in the book add to the travel roles from the core rules, so to the food and water rules, and all encounters, random or planned, require other things like perception checks, stealth checks, languages, and knowledge of other creatures native to the land. So the ranger's specific abilities apply here, as do any character with similar abilities. Optimus, your rogue scout, cleric/druid, and wizard examples would be of a big help as well.
Each hex is listed as 10 miles across, so a ranger's primeval awareness ability is easily applied as well. If a ranger used a spell slot for the day within a 10 mile hex, and they randomly encounter a creature type listed on the primeval awareness table, I would give the ranger something for the heads up due to the resource spent, like advantage on a perception check and/or automatically seeing the encounter before the encounter sees the party and from a greater distance. The ranger's natural explorer ability keeps the party from being lost...ever, the party can move much faster, and is operating with multiple skills with expertise and other abilities to make the party's life in the jungle easier. Although not able to directly fix disease, they would possibly have expertise in medicine as this might be their favored terrain and THAT would give the character the ability to deal with it on some level. SO the random encounters have a lot to do with the exploration abilities and rangers in particular.
If the ranger, for some strange reason, did NOT have favored terrain as forests at level one (and this is a a perfect example of how a ranger should fit thematically in a campaign from the start when building a character), it still has the skill proficiency options to be as competent as anyone with the same, has multiple options for favored enemies with beasts and undead along with multiple types of humanoids (including and especially humans), primeval awareness (this is the perfect type of place to use it, and a multitude of spells as well (speak with animals, pass without trace, hunter's mark, etc.).
To address the concern that other party members can't contribute, there is equipment to be carried, multiple directions to be on the look out of, animal handling checks that might need to be made for pack animals, encounters with intelligent humanoids that need to be engaged with, random combat encounters, diseases and post combat encounter wounds that need to be tended to, finding and maintaining a safe place to rest, and perhaps even scouting ahead a bit to avoid being ambushed. This covers pretty much all of the possible roles for every possible class. As the travel in this part of the book IS the adventure, everyone should and can be involved.
When I am saying that you are limted in biomes that is indeed fact....you have 1 biome until 6th level then you get one more....but you are left with several options that you do not get until the campaign is likely over.
I have tried to at least show how the official modules/adventures do not even support the use of PHB ranger features....they are just the same if not more limiting IMO to what other classes get with less cost.
Because most adventures use the "Survival check and done" approach to these things why would you pick a feature that limits your expertise to just one biome when you could have expertise in all of them?
I would like to point out I created a thread about travel and getting all classes involved yesterday before chult ever came up.
Taking all of this, all of these possibilities from the core rules and this adventure combined, that are part of the game, and over simplifying it to "a single survival roll" once per day (which is NOT even how the books guides the DM, not even close) is the bumper bowling of this pillar of D&D 5E. I won't defend that it's easy to pick up how to adjudicate as a DM for the players, but it does exist, and works well when used well and correctly.
If you, as a DM hand wave the encounter building rules for combat, and end up throwing easy encounter and after easy encounter at the party, even combat will become boring and purposeless.
The basic way to play D&D 5E has an over emphasis on combat overall. It takes a deep dive and extra elbow grease to get the rest of the game to rise to the top as well.
An encounter with a goblin standing in the middle of a room will boil down to one die roll. It takes adding to, flushing out, and expanding the basics of a combat encounter to make it interesting and engaging.
Reading the rules for the Chult jungle it just simply says you need to find water or undergo a check to see if you get exhaustion.
Also the travel pace rules are not affected by the ranger PHB features unless you are by yourself.
The only aspect that is covered is the PP rulings and that is literally something that is passive and not interactive by the party more than deciding on pace. Once you pick that its effectively over interaction wise. Things like Goodberry and Create Food and Water are even called out as needed. Finding food and water is a survival check so once again so the ranger would have expertise but thats only if they picked the right biome. In this case its easy because you have one maybe two to deal with...but the jungle isnt the only area in Chult:
coasts and lakes, jungles, mountains, rivers, swamps, and wastelands are the areas identified in the guidelines.
One could argue a forest ranger might have it for the jungle...but likely not the rest. So you are looking at 1 out of 7 biomes that you are getting the expertise in...when the rogue could easily have it for ALL of them at the same level.
If they had the ability to swap terrain this would not be an issue...you as a ranger could simply spend some time in the type and be beneficial throughout. But as its stands you have to wait 5 levels to pick up another one. And not knowing what is under that hex is part of the fun but also means you could choose poorly.
As for your points about the other ranger stuff spells are always good on the ranger...albiet pretty limited thanks to so few spells known. I prefer the new primeval awareness as I feel its more generally applicable. Favored enemy is one that is a crap shoot....its good for certain campaigns (Decent to Avernus) where its much more likely you will face a certain type of enemy. In Chult there are so many different humanoid types that even picking humanoids you have to pick two races of humanoid which is....limiting seeing as how there is a wide variety of humanoid life in the area.
Undead makes sense here and would likely be the best choice.
For those of you that multiclass and also really have a **** of a DM, a really simple work around to to start with a level of fighter. This gives you a bit to pick your favored terrain and favored enemy AND proficiency in constitution saves and a second fighting style.
Combat is the meat of the game though....most of the rules and bout 80% of your sheet is combat focused so if you do not find that aspect fun then likely its not the best system to be playing in. You can avoid combat altogether if you want but I would think maybe a different system would be better in that case as you would not need to focus so much on it.
Or a level in Rogue and expertise in survival so you get all biomes to start but still get the benefit on the INT based checks.
"Reading the rules for the Chult jungle it just simply says you need to find water or undergo a check to see if you get exhaustion." Among other things, yes. There is much more here going on though.
"Also the travel pace rules are not affected by the ranger PHB features unless you are by yourself." That is 100% incorrect. Please read the entire ability. The two of point are, Difficult terrain doesn’t slow your group’s travel. and Your group can’t become lost except by magical means.
"The only aspect that is covered is the PP rulings and that is literally something that is passive and not interactive by the party more than deciding on pace. Once you pick that its effectively over interaction wise. Things like Goodberry and Create Food and Water are even called out as needed. Finding food and water is a survival check so once again so the ranger would have expertise but thats only if they picked the right biome. In this case its easy because you have one maybe two to deal with...but the jungle isn't the only area in Chult:" The DMG has many more bits of information. Have you read it? It seems not, as everything you speak about and reference is from the PHB. One person can not do all of these things while on the move. Passive perception takes place directionally, and is used at the DM's discretion as a tool. Having trouble as a DM engaging your players? Have them make active perception checks with different PCs in different directions. Listing how spells help with exploration and survival only weakens your argument about how others in the party aren't involved and a spotlight is on the ranger. Pick a lane.
"One could argue a forest ranger might have it for the jungle...but likely not the rest. So you are looking at 1 out of 7 biomes that you are getting the expertise in...when the rogue could easily have it for ALL of them at the same level." This is your active choice as a DM to interpret the "rules" this way and actively find ways to cut your ranger off at the knees. The rules for this kind of ruling do not exist, and you are choosing to apply this kind of punishment to a class feature that you don't like, IMHO.
"If they had the ability to swap terrain this would not be an issue...you as a ranger could simply spend some time in the type and be beneficial throughout. But as its stands you have to wait 5 levels to pick up another one. And not knowing what is under that hex is part of the fun but also means you could choose poorly." See above. It is the jungles of Chult. You are in the jungle, that counts as forest, that has mountains in it and coastline around it. This is a level of biased harshness that has no other function other than to punish class features you already don't like.
"As for your points about the other ranger stuff spells are always good on the ranger...albiet pretty limited thanks to so few spells known. I prefer the new primeval awareness as I feel its more generally applicable. Favored enemy is one that is a crap shoot....its good for certain campaigns (Decent to Avernus) where its much more likely you will face a certain type of enemy. In Chult there are so many different humanoid types that even picking humanoids you have to pick two races of humanoid which is....limiting seeing as how there is a wide variety of humanoid life in the area." Again your argument points clash with one another. Do you want the ranger to be an expert all of the time or do you think the entire party should all be active when exploring and traveling the world over? Please pick a side of the conversation and stick to it. [REDACTED]
Pace is not what you said there....Difficult terrain isnt even mentioned in the Chult piece so its not applicable unless you add it....which was my point.
I stand corrected on the getting lost piece....you simply do not have to roll...so even less interaction which was my other point.
The rules state that the ranger only gets their benefits in their biome. Their biome is forest then technically you wont even get it in the jungle....as they are COMPLETELY different biomes. Giving the forest biome ranger jungle is already being generous.
Also its clearly listed that there are several biomes at work here...even in a jungle island there are coasts and lakes, jungles, mountains, rivers, swamps, and wasteland. All of these are clearly listed in the rules for the adventure and the DM version of the hex grid shows different biomes in different hexes.
By the rules you would not give the ranger the benefits in these other regions because they did not pick these as their NE benefit. If you are giving them all from the get go that is a completely different discussion.
The approach is the problem....you are either so good at what you do you avoid the roll (see getting lost) or you do not get a benefit at all (See biomes).
The game only has the listed biomes in the game, and they are the most common categories of biomes. Also, biomes doesn't appear in the rules, just so everyone knows.
Forest is the terrain used n the ToA book. Trees. If all of the biomes you mentioned mention in the book had mechanical weight like that it would use game terms. It doesn't.
These are situations and active decisions you are making for your gamer as the DM and imposing on your players as a DM. There is zero support for these opinions in the game, or at any reasonable table.
Are these still you just stating your opinion?