But plant growth is not an exception to difficult terrain. They're both exceptions to the same rule.
Edit: expounding on this slightly, certainly I may be wrong, but I always thought that the "specific beats general" idea was an explanation that rules could state exceptions to other rules, not that all rules belonged in some weird ordered hierarchy that any time a rule was narrower in scope than another, it took precedence.
No, Sigred has a good point. You've got two conflicting rules (spend 2 points for every 1 foot moved vs spend 4 points for every 1 foot moved.) Difficult terrain is part of the game's general rules. Plant Growth is an exceptional effect with its own rules. You can definitely make the case that Plant Growth is the more specific rule of the two.
It's not necessarily the only valid way to approach the rules conflict but it's a valid option.
Actually no, you have one rule that says you spend 1 extra foot per foot of movement, and a separate rule that says it costs 4 feet of movement for every foot moved.
One replaces the default 1:1 ratio, one increases the resulting cost.
See the Climbing, Swimming and Crawling section of Chapter 8 for "Each foot of movement costs 1 extra foot (2 extra feet in difficult terrain) when you’re climbing, swimming, or crawling" which also provides other extra foot additions.
But plant growth is not an exception to difficult terrain. They're both exceptions to the same rule.
Edit: expounding on this slightly, certainly I may be wrong, but I always thought that the "specific beats general" idea was an explanation that rules could state exceptions to other rules, not that all rules belonged in some weird ordered hierarchy that any time a rule was narrower in scope than another, it took precedence.
I'd say it's a little of both. "Narrower in scope" is a pretty good heuristic for which rule is more specific. Haste is my go-to example for this; even if you have Extra Attack, Haste's "(one weapon attack only)" ought to win out as the most specific rule that applies to the Attack action it gives.
But I guess it doesn't matter since I stand corrected.
Actually no, you have one rule that says you spend 1 extra foot per foot of movement, and a separate rule that says it costs 4 feet of movement for every foot moved.
One replaces the default 1:1 ratio, one increases the resulting cost.
Yeah, after re-reading the Difficult Terrain text in the Combat chapter and especially how it interacts with crawling while prone I agree with the idea that difficult terrain in general is a +1 to your cost-per-movement. Not entirely convinced Plant Growth is intended to stack with it considering multiple instances of difficult terrain don't stack and Plant Growth is just a more extreme version of that, but it does seem to be the most by-the-book ruling.
But plant growth is not an exception to difficult terrain. They're both exceptions to the same rule.
Edit: expounding on this slightly, certainly I may be wrong, but I always thought that the "specific beats general" idea was an explanation that rules could state exceptions to other rules, not that all rules belonged in some weird ordered hierarchy that any time a rule was narrower in scope than another, it took precedence.
I'd say it's a little of both. "Narrower in scope" is a pretty good heuristic for which rule is more specific. Haste is my go-to example for this; even if you have Extra Attack, Haste's "(one weapon attack only)" ought to win out as the most specific rule that applies to the Attack action it gives.
But I guess it doesn't matter since I stand corrected.
Actually no, you have one rule that says you spend 1 extra foot per foot of movement, and a separate rule that says it costs 4 feet of movement for every foot moved.
One replaces the default 1:1 ratio, one increases the resulting cost.
Yeah, after re-reading the Difficult Terrain text in the Combat chapter and especially how it interacts with crawling while prone I agree with the idea that difficult terrain in general is a +1 to your cost-per-movement. Not entirely convinced Plant Growth is intended to stack with it considering multiple instances of difficult terrain don't stack and Plant Growth is just a more extreme version of that, but it does seem to be the most by-the-book ruling.
What I mean is that your heuristic actually doesn't work according to my understanding. A rule isn't simply higher priority due to its narrower scope; it has to except some other rule, and the exception is more specific than the general rule that it excepts because it is an exception. If two rules except the same general rule, and neither excepts the other then neither has priority. It is not frequency of occurrence or obscurity in the text that makes the rule more general or less; rule A is more specific than rule B by the fact that rule A is an exception to rule B (and for no other reason).
At least, according to my theory of this idea. If you understand my position and still disagree, that's fine.
For example, haste makes an exception for what you can do with your action that actually excepts extra attack. Plant Growth doesn't except difficult terrain, only general speed rules, similar to what difficult terrain actually does.
Ok, I messed up my math originally and thought that stacking all effects would cause a Dwarf to have a turn speed of 0 with no save, which would cross a certain line when it comes to enjoyability. However, because it only drops the dwarf down to 5ft, it still allows for a player to attempt to escape the area of effect, albiet very, very slowly.
Personally, I think the idea of needing to spend 20 rounds dashing just to escape an area of effect would be pretty miserable in any session, so in the case of ambiguity, I vote that Plant Growth should replace Difficult Terrain for the sake of sanity. Not that spending a full minute dashing is really much of an improvement.
One thing you might consider is whether you really want to use snap to grid when a creature's speed is only a few feet. If your movement speed is reduced to 4' somehow, I would still consider letting that creature use it's 4' of movement to try to move, even on a grid. I would certainly let them use 2 of those 4 feet to stand.
What I mean is that your heuristic actually doesn't work according to my understanding. A rule isn't simply higher priority due to its narrower scope; it has to except some other rule, and the exception is more specific than the general rule that it excepts because it is an exception. If two rules except the same general rule, and neither excepts the other then neither has priority. It is not frequency of occurrence or obscurity in the text that makes the rule more general or less; rule A is more specific than rule B by the fact that rule A is an exception to rule B (and for no other reason).
This is circular logic. For rule A to be an exception to rule B it must've been more specific in some sense, so you can't then define specificity based on which causes an exception to the other.
For example, haste makes an exception for what you can do with your action that actually excepts extra attack.
Case in point: Haste never references Extra Attack explicitly, and in fact Haste conflicts with both the Attack action and Extra Attack action simultaneously. The Attack action lets you make any attack that doesn't have another action as a prerequisite, including a spell attack (e.g. the monk's Radiant Sun Bolt or a lich's paralyzing touch.) Haste tells you the attack must be a weapon attack. Extra Attack says you can make two attacks instead of one, but Haste says actually, you can only make one (weapon) attack. I think we both intuitively agree Haste "wins" in this situation, but the reason Haste wins is because it's the most specific rule that applies to the Attack action it gives you. We only say it creates an exception to the other rules retroactively.
What I mean is that your heuristic actually doesn't work according to my understanding. A rule isn't simply higher priority due to its narrower scope; it has to except some other rule, and the exception is more specific than the general rule that it excepts because it is an exception. If two rules except the same general rule, and neither excepts the other then neither has priority. It is not frequency of occurrence or obscurity in the text that makes the rule more general or less; rule A is more specific than rule B by the fact that rule A is an exception to rule B (and for no other reason).
This is circular logic. For rule A to be an exception to rule B it must've been more specific in some sense, so you can't then define specificity based on which causes an exception to the other.
For example, haste makes an exception for what you can do with your action that actually excepts extra attack.
Case in point: Haste never references Extra Attack explicitly, and in fact Haste conflicts with both the Attack action and Extra Attack action simultaneously. The Attack action lets you make any attack that doesn't have another action as a prerequisite, including a spell attack (e.g. the monk's Radiant Sun Bolt or a lich's paralyzing touch.) Haste tells you the attack must be a weapon attack. Extra Attack says you can make two attacks instead of one, but Haste says actually, you can only make one (weapon) attack. I think we both intuitively agree Haste "wins" in this situation, but the reason Haste wins is because it's the most specific rule that applies to the Attack action it gives you. We only say it creates an exception to the other rules retroactively.
If you think something different than I do, that is fine; but your comments seem to imply that you actually don’t understand what I’m trying to say.
In my opinion, it is the narrowness of function of the rule, not the narrowness of applicability that makes a rule more specific.
The fact that haste says that you have limited use of the action it provides (its function) precludes any other uses, not the fact that haste is a spell and extra attack is a class feature (the opportunities for application of each). It is an exception because it actually excepts something about another rule. A rule is more specific when it overrides a more general rule, not because it comes up less often in gameplay or applies to a fewer number of characters. Plant growth doesn’t necessarily override difficult terrain. It is what the rule says, and not where it appears in the rulebook that makes it more specific.
Again, if you disagree, I'll drop it. It seemed that you didn't understand what I meant. I want to make sure that my position is clear that way you're free to disagree with it as you see fit, rather than disagreeing with some misunderstanding of what I'm trying to say.
Technically certain rules can be more specific than others without being exceptions (ie haste's "this is my action, so my rules"). But which rules are more specific only matters when they conflict, which difficult terrain and plant growth don't (not necessarily anyway).
There is also a lot more to lose with speed debuffs than there is to gain with speed buffs.
If you get dropped to 0 speed, you might be screwed. Damage over time is guaranteed to kill you. However, the difference between 120ft and 2000ft is almost irrelevant. You still only get a finite number of attacks, and "off the map" is "off the map".
What I mean is that your heuristic actually doesn't work according to my understanding. A rule isn't simply higher priority due to its narrower scope; it has to except some other rule, and the exception is more specific than the general rule that it excepts because it is an exception. If two rules except the same general rule, and neither excepts the other then neither has priority. It is not frequency of occurrence or obscurity in the text that makes the rule more general or less; rule A is more specific than rule B by the fact that rule A is an exception to rule B (and for no other reason).
This is circular logic. For rule A to be an exception to rule B it must've been more specific in some sense, so you can't then define specificity based on which causes an exception to the other.
For example, haste makes an exception for what you can do with your action that actually excepts extra attack.
Case in point: Haste never references Extra Attack explicitly, and in fact Haste conflicts with both the Attack action and Extra Attack action simultaneously. The Attack action lets you make any attack that doesn't have another action as a prerequisite, including a spell attack (e.g. the monk's Radiant Sun Bolt or a lich's paralyzing touch.) Haste tells you the attack must be a weapon attack. Extra Attack says you can make two attacks instead of one, but Haste says actually, you can only make one (weapon) attack. I think we both intuitively agree Haste "wins" in this situation, but the reason Haste wins is because it's the most specific rule that applies to the Attack action it gives you. We only say it creates an exception to the other rules retroactively.
If you think something different than I do, that is fine; but your comments seem to imply that you actually don’t understand what I’m trying to say.
In my opinion, it is the narrowness of function of the rule, not the narrowness of applicability that makes a rule more specific.
The fact that haste says that you have limited use of the action it provides (its function) precludes any other uses, not the fact that haste is a spell and extra attack is a class feature (the opportunities for application of each). It is an exception because it actually excepts something about another rule. A rule is more specific when it overrides a more general rule, not because it comes up less often in gameplay or applies to a fewer number of characters. Plant growth doesn’t necessarily override difficult terrain. It is what the rule says, and not where it appears in the rulebook that makes it more specific.
Again, if you disagree, I'll drop it. It seemed that you didn't understand what I meant. I want to make sure that my position is clear that way you're free to disagree with it as you see fit, rather than disagreeing with some misunderstanding of what I'm trying to say.
Narrowness of applicability is the name of the game for specific v. general because function is already assumed. If the function isn't already in the same vein, there wouldn't be a conflict to begin with, right? Difficult terrain itself is a 1st order specific rule modifying a creature's speed in an environment, and 2nd order to movement in general.
Difficult terrain does apply to specific portions of "special types of movement" which is 1st order to general movement. Climbing/swimming/crawling (2nd order to movement) explicitly says the movement speed cost increases (additively) combine, and jumping (also 2nd order) explicitly calls for an Acrobatics check when landing in DT. The numerical impact of this interaction is identical regardless of the source/potency of DT.
These are the base interactions we have in the system. Plant Growth is a specific spell which creates difficult terrain that is more potent than the normal effect, and it does not list any explicit interactions with other movement altering features. Only the most potent version of a game effect applies when there is an overlap.
Plant Growth's effect is also not a "special type of movement", so there is no indication that the spell stacks with general DT in any way.
You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
Plant Growth is a specific spell which creates difficult terrain that is more potent than the normal effect, and it does not list any explicit interactions with other movement altering features. Only the most potent version of a game effect applies when there is an overlap.
Plant growth does not create difficult terrain at all. In fact, that is the problem. Both affect normal movement, one is a special type of movement, the other is a spell. Which has priority? That is an arbitrary decision because the hierarchy you describe is not laid out in the rules. There's a whole chapter about spellcasting, that seems pretty general to me, more general than special types of movement that are only a tiny part of a subset of a chapter.
Also, your use of specific in this sentence makes me unsure that you grasp my point. I won't explain it again.
No, I do understand your point; something can only be "specific" to the extent that it modifies/overwrites something else that is more broadly applicable to a given scenario.
As for Plant Growth not explicitly calling its effect "difficult terrain", I recognize that as a possible sticking point (FFS WotC...), but I see no reason to believe it is not difficult terrain. They perform the exact same purpose (hinder movement), and use basically the same language (1ft::2ft & 1ft::4ft). The spell is simply more potent. Or are we saying Life Drinker stacks with Extra Attack now?
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
but I see no reason to believe it is not difficult terrain.
No? Not the fact that it isn't described that way?
I have no reason to believe a short sword isn't a long sword.
That is taking two explicitly defined things and saying there could be a conflation between them, which there is not, but they do belong to many of the same definitional groupings the system has. When a game effect that carries no name, but is described and acts near-identically to a defined general game effect, it is not irrational to presume they belong to the same group.
It is concerning to me that the developers do stuff like this--using the same name for different features, different names for the same feature, not naming features that require a defined name for rules interactions, etc--and expect us to know what they really meant... If I see a dog with brown, spotted fur then it's a "brown, spotted dog", right?
Regardless, if they are intended to stack, they would stack additively for a total of 5ft of speed to 1ft of actual movement. Climbing/swimming/jumping in such an area would also require an additional 1ft of speed, for a 6-to-1 total cost.
[edit] and really, when it comes down to it, not being explicitly called "difficult terrain" doesn't work in favor of stacking. There's a spell effect in play on an area explicitly calling for creatures to expend 4ft of movement for every 1ft the creature moves, and the terrain is also naturally "difficult terrain".
What does the spell do? It forces (affected) creature movement to the 4-to-1 ratio while in the area. How does the spell affect the pre-existing difficult terrain? By making the terrain cost 4-to-1 instead of 2-to-1.
The spell does not say a creature must spend 3 more feet of movement per 1 foot actually moved; just a flat 4. Spells say what they do.
You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
But a brown-spotted dog is different from a brown, spotted dog. One has brown spots, the other has some other color spots, and it is nearly impossible to tell which a "brown spotted dog" is.
I see your point in your middle paragraph and maybe agree with it in some sense. But, as soon as you are off of the page of what is actually written, you are in DM adjudication territory, even if it is the most sensible way to rule. That is the thing I want to point out, here in the rules and mechanics forum.
But plant growth is not an exception to difficult terrain. They're both exceptions to the same rule.
Edit: expounding on this slightly, certainly I may be wrong, but I always thought that the "specific beats general" idea was an explanation that rules could state exceptions to other rules, not that all rules belonged in some weird ordered hierarchy that any time a rule was narrower in scope than another, it took precedence.
Actually no, you have one rule that says you spend 1 extra foot per foot of movement, and a separate rule that says it costs 4 feet of movement for every foot moved.
One replaces the default 1:1 ratio, one increases the resulting cost.
See the Climbing, Swimming and Crawling section of Chapter 8 for "Each foot of movement costs 1 extra foot (2 extra feet in difficult terrain) when you’re climbing, swimming, or crawling" which also provides other extra foot additions.
I'd say it's a little of both. "Narrower in scope" is a pretty good heuristic for which rule is more specific. Haste is my go-to example for this; even if you have Extra Attack, Haste's "(one weapon attack only)" ought to win out as the most specific rule that applies to the Attack action it gives.
But I guess it doesn't matter since I stand corrected.
Yeah, after re-reading the Difficult Terrain text in the Combat chapter and especially how it interacts with crawling while prone I agree with the idea that difficult terrain in general is a +1 to your cost-per-movement. Not entirely convinced Plant Growth is intended to stack with it considering multiple instances of difficult terrain don't stack and Plant Growth is just a more extreme version of that, but it does seem to be the most by-the-book ruling.
The Forum Infestation (TM)
I used to think that it was 8 feet per foot but am now leaning towards 5 feet.
Difficult terrain is whatever it is. Having plant growth on top of it wouldn't necessarily make the rubble, or sand, or oil harder to move through.
Plants makes it 4, difficult adds 1.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
What I mean is that your heuristic actually doesn't work according to my understanding. A rule isn't simply higher priority due to its narrower scope; it has to except some other rule, and the exception is more specific than the general rule that it excepts because it is an exception. If two rules except the same general rule, and neither excepts the other then neither has priority. It is not frequency of occurrence or obscurity in the text that makes the rule more general or less; rule A is more specific than rule B by the fact that rule A is an exception to rule B (and for no other reason).
At least, according to my theory of this idea. If you understand my position and still disagree, that's fine.
For example, haste makes an exception for what you can do with your action that actually excepts extra attack. Plant Growth doesn't except difficult terrain, only general speed rules, similar to what difficult terrain actually does.
Ok, so the the takeaway is, if you are Slowed and climbing difficult terrain affected by Plant Growth, you're going to have a bad day.
Ignoring Slow, a Dwarf character would be restricted to the following movement speeds under the previously mentioned conditions:
Climbing + Difficult Terrain --- 15ft [Dash].
Plant Growth --- 10ft [Dash].
Plant Growth + Climbing --- 10ft [Dash].
Plant Growth + Climbing + Difficult Terrain --- 5ft [Dash].
Edit:
Ok, I messed up my math originally and thought that stacking all effects would cause a Dwarf to have a turn speed of 0 with no save, which would cross a certain line when it comes to enjoyability. However, because it only drops the dwarf down to 5ft, it still allows for a player to attempt to escape the area of effect, albiet very, very slowly.
Personally, I think the idea of needing to spend 20 rounds dashing just to escape an area of effect would be pretty miserable in any session, so in the case of ambiguity, I vote that Plant Growth should replace Difficult Terrain for the sake of sanity. Not that spending a full minute dashing is really much of an improvement.
One thing you might consider is whether you really want to use snap to grid when a creature's speed is only a few feet. If your movement speed is reduced to 4' somehow, I would still consider letting that creature use it's 4' of movement to try to move, even on a grid. I would certainly let them use 2 of those 4 feet to stand.
This is circular logic. For rule A to be an exception to rule B it must've been more specific in some sense, so you can't then define specificity based on which causes an exception to the other.
Case in point: Haste never references Extra Attack explicitly, and in fact Haste conflicts with both the Attack action and Extra Attack action simultaneously. The Attack action lets you make any attack that doesn't have another action as a prerequisite, including a spell attack (e.g. the monk's Radiant Sun Bolt or a lich's paralyzing touch.) Haste tells you the attack must be a weapon attack. Extra Attack says you can make two attacks instead of one, but Haste says actually, you can only make one (weapon) attack. I think we both intuitively agree Haste "wins" in this situation, but the reason Haste wins is because it's the most specific rule that applies to the Attack action it gives you. We only say it creates an exception to the other rules retroactively.
The Forum Infestation (TM)
If you think something different than I do, that is fine; but your comments seem to imply that you actually don’t understand what I’m trying to say.
In my opinion, it is the narrowness of function of the rule, not the narrowness of applicability that makes a rule more specific.
The fact that haste says that you have limited use of the action it provides (its function) precludes any other uses, not the fact that haste is a spell and extra attack is a class feature (the opportunities for application of each). It is an exception because it actually excepts something about another rule. A rule is more specific when it overrides a more general rule, not because it comes up less often in gameplay or applies to a fewer number of characters. Plant growth doesn’t necessarily override difficult terrain. It is what the rule says, and not where it appears in the rulebook that makes it more specific.
Again, if you disagree, I'll drop it. It seemed that you didn't understand what I meant. I want to make sure that my position is clear that way you're free to disagree with it as you see fit, rather than disagreeing with some misunderstanding of what I'm trying to say.
Technically certain rules can be more specific than others without being exceptions (ie haste's "this is my action, so my rules"). But which rules are more specific only matters when they conflict, which difficult terrain and plant growth don't (not necessarily anyway).
not sure how people can argue that speed buffs stack but debuffs don't
https://www.dndbeyond.com/forums/d-d-beyond-general/general-discussion/57549-fastest-character
Guide to the Five Factions (PWYW)
Deck of Decks
Because the buffs say something along the line of "double" or "twice as fast"
But the defuffs say "1 extra" or "4 instead of" not half.
"Sooner or later, your Players are going to smash your railroad into a sandbox."
-Vedexent
"real life is a super high CR."
-OboeLauren
"............anybody got any potatoes? We could drop a potato in each hole an' see which ones get viciously mauled by horrible monsters?"
-Ilyara Thundertale
There is also a lot more to lose with speed debuffs than there is to gain with speed buffs.
If you get dropped to 0 speed, you might be screwed. Damage over time is guaranteed to kill you.
However, the difference between 120ft and 2000ft is almost irrelevant. You still only get a finite number of attacks, and "off the map" is "off the map".
Narrowness of applicability is the name of the game for specific v. general because function is already assumed. If the function isn't already in the same vein, there wouldn't be a conflict to begin with, right? Difficult terrain itself is a 1st order specific rule modifying a creature's speed in an environment, and 2nd order to movement in general.
Difficult terrain does apply to specific portions of "special types of movement" which is 1st order to general movement. Climbing/swimming/crawling (2nd order to movement) explicitly says the movement speed cost increases (additively) combine, and jumping (also 2nd order) explicitly calls for an Acrobatics check when landing in DT. The numerical impact of this interaction is identical regardless of the source/potency of DT.
These are the base interactions we have in the system. Plant Growth is a specific spell which creates difficult terrain that is more potent than the normal effect, and it does not list any explicit interactions with other movement altering features. Only the most potent version of a game effect applies when there is an overlap.
Plant Growth's effect is also not a "special type of movement", so there is no indication that the spell stacks with general DT in any way.
You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
Plant growth does not create difficult terrain at all. In fact, that is the problem. Both affect normal movement, one is a special type of movement, the other is a spell. Which has priority? That is an arbitrary decision because the hierarchy you describe is not laid out in the rules. There's a whole chapter about spellcasting, that seems pretty general to me, more general than special types of movement that are only a tiny part of a subset of a chapter.
Also, your use of specific in this sentence makes me unsure that you grasp my point. I won't explain it again.
No, I do understand your point; something can only be "specific" to the extent that it modifies/overwrites something else that is more broadly applicable to a given scenario.
As for Plant Growth not explicitly calling its effect "difficult terrain", I recognize that as a possible sticking point (FFS WotC...), but I see no reason to believe it is not difficult terrain. They perform the exact same purpose (hinder movement), and use basically the same language (1ft::2ft & 1ft::4ft). The spell is simply more potent. Or are we saying Life Drinker stacks with Extra Attack now?
You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
No? Not the fact that it isn't described that way?
(excluding the words in the rulebooks) I have no reason to believe a short sword isn't a long sword.
That is taking two explicitly defined things and saying there could be a conflation between them, which there is not, but they do belong to many of the same definitional groupings the system has. When a game effect that carries no name, but is described and acts near-identically to a defined general game effect, it is not irrational to presume they belong to the same group.
It is concerning to me that the developers do stuff like this--using the same name for different features, different names for the same feature, not naming features that require a defined name for rules interactions, etc--and expect us to know what they really meant... If I see a dog with brown, spotted fur then it's a "brown, spotted dog", right?
Regardless, if they are intended to stack, they would stack additively for a total of 5ft of speed to 1ft of actual movement. Climbing/swimming/jumping in such an area would also require an additional 1ft of speed, for a 6-to-1 total cost.
[edit] and really, when it comes down to it, not being explicitly called "difficult terrain" doesn't work in favor of stacking. There's a spell effect in play on an area explicitly calling for creatures to expend 4ft of movement for every 1ft the creature moves, and the terrain is also naturally "difficult terrain".
What does the spell do? It forces (affected) creature movement to the 4-to-1 ratio while in the area. How does the spell affect the pre-existing difficult terrain? By making the terrain cost 4-to-1 instead of 2-to-1.
The spell does not say a creature must spend 3 more feet of movement per 1 foot actually moved; just a flat 4. Spells say what they do.
You don't know what fear is until you've witnessed a drunk bird divebombing you while carrying a screaming Kobold throwing fire anywhere and everywhere.
But a brown-spotted dog is different from a brown, spotted dog. One has brown spots, the other has some other color spots, and it is nearly impossible to tell which a "brown spotted dog" is.
I see your point in your middle paragraph and maybe agree with it in some sense. But, as soon as you are off of the page of what is actually written, you are in DM adjudication territory, even if it is the most sensible way to rule. That is the thing I want to point out, here in the rules and mechanics forum.
And everyone knows it is impossible to combine "×4" and "+1" so one must take priority over the other.
Yeah, no. They clearly can stack, the only issue is what order. Is it (1+1)×4 or (1×4)+1? It is up to the DM to decide.