This article is written to inspire the use of environments outside of the classics, and figuratively broaden the horizon on environmental world building.

Environmental Description

A high-pitched call from some unknown bird or monkey pierces through the white noise of slow droplets falling on leaves. The dense fog comes and goes, like the tides, cold and unforgiving flowing through the densely forested hills and ridges. Visibility at times barely extends to your own feet, cocooning you in your own little world, whereas a few minutes later you can again see the writhing mass of leaves and roots in front of you. If you are lucky you can catch a glimpse of the canopy further above, with weak beams of sunlight burning their way through the mists, revealing small patches of soggy humus. Though most of the time the beams rarely reach the forest floor, dissolving in the fog leaving only an eerie gloom, filled with looming dark shapes.

Geographical Origin

When large volumes of vapour-rich air hit steep geographical features such as mountains, the air is forced up the slopes. This air cools down as it gains elevation, producing clouds, condensing the water in the air as well as on any available surface. Regions between 500 (tropics) and 3000 meters elevation battered relatively constantly with such air movements create the correct conditions for cloud forest to form.

Proximity of these clouds to the mountain slopes and valleys creates a highly humid environment, experiencing near constant wetness. Drenched in water, condensed on the canopy itself, and surrounded by clouds and fog that are pressed onto the forest, make this one of the wettest terrestrial environments when it comes to precipitation. Under the canopy some places can receive up to 5 meter of precipitation annually.

Under such massive volumes of water decomposition is slowed, and without access to sufficient sunlight near the ground the soil conditions turn acidic, creating thick layers of humus and peat. These layers, much like the abundant mosses covering branches, trees, and rock, act like sponges, keeping everything soaked even when the weather is good.

Take-aways:

• Visibility can be severely limited, and these conditions can come and go within minutes, rather unpredictably. This is fun to play with as a DM, whether in complicating chases, or catching the party with a cloud and surrounding or ambushing them by natives.
• *With the near constant precipitation and overall wetness i