Lessons Learned The Hard Way
(or "Why The DM Is NOT Obligated To Remind You Of Your Gear.")

My son & his girlfriend are playing an adventure.
He's a Cleric, she's a Druid with a Wolf companion.

Earlier in the Adventure, they were desparate for some form of conveyance that would allow them to carry large loads of goods without violating their coin purses.
They ran into a rather crafty / talented Shipwright who, for a small sum of money, took one of his already-built shallow-draft hulls, & added a set of braces, axels, & wheels.
The brace/axel/wheel assemblies could be easily untied, disassembled, & stored in the bottom of the hull, leaving the "cart" to function in its original capacity within a few minutes.
They KNOW what it is - a modified boat with wheels.
They have been using this thing for the past month of real time gaming.

So, tonight, they encounter an area of swamp.
There are parts where the ground is ALMOST firm enough to support the weight of the "cart" on the narrow wheels, but the going is tough & it's wearing them out trying to drag this thing.
The Cleric gets the bright idea to cast "Dessicate" on the ground ahead of them, leaving a trail of firm-but-ashen ground for them to travel.
This angers the resident Lizardmen, who rush the party to try & stop the "Hero's" from destroying their home swamp...
The Druid responds by raining down fire on the Lizardmen, & due to a REALLY good roll, destroys *almost all* the attackers.
The few that survive stand there stunned at the carnage.
The Cleric turns to them & says "BOO!" and they immediately run away.
This gives the Cleric & Druid the "bright idea" to use this "one-two-punch" tactic in order to cross the entire swamp.

They get a few more "cart" lengths forward, when the area suddenly SWARMS with nearly 600 Lizardmen & 20 large Dinosaur-like creatures lurking in a deeper-water channel near-by.
Again with the "One-Two Punch", only THIS time they debate on the fact that they've only got three total castings of the fire spell left (for the day), and there are MANY more Lizardmen to get rid of this time.
So they come to the conclusion that they'll *combine* the three castings into one, single, HUGE fire spell, deal a TON of damage, & get out while the few that survive are too busy licking their wounds to care...
They cast the spell, fire reigns down from the Heavens, and literally *incinerates* everything in a 40' radius.
Including almost everything they were wearing that wasn't flammible, the "cart", and everything IN it.
The NPC is taken to 1 HP from Death, the Druid *dies* (fails her Reflex save & takes 25 HP more than she had), & the Cleric is so bad off he has to cast a Cure Critical Wounds *on himself* BEFORE he can get to the others...

Of the Lizardmen that survive, he finds ONE in good-enough condition to be interrogated, & asks it why the Lizardmen were attacking.
[LM] "Because you were killing our home!"
[Cleric] We were just passing through.  We can't walk on water, so I was drying out the land, making a path, & not harming anyone.
[LM] Why were you walking?  You were pulling a BOAT.

The Cleric looks at the Druid, silence descends over the game, & my son starts pounding himself in the forehead with the Player's Hand Book.
*WHUMP* WE *WHUMP* HAD *WHUMP* A *WHUMP* BOAT! *WHUMP*

XD BAH HAHAHAHAHAHahahahahahahahahhahhaahhaaaaaaa...