[Draenin]

Yeah, technically water qualifies as flat terrain with a z-height of 0. All the terrain seen under the surface of the water is in the negatives.

Normally, players on terrain gmaps can move at the same speed regardless of where they are, but Kingdoms has its own movement system that decreases your speed as the slope of land in front of you goes up. However, it does not decrease as you go down or move along a flat surface. It's a system that simulates resistance, and there are a few things you can do to negate the burden of climbing steep hills.

One thing you might want to try is getting a scroll for mountaineering, which decreases the amount of resistance you'll be affected by when scaling hills, and try to store some of your possessions in bags. Bags do have weight, but if you store some of your items in them they will reduce the amount of weight carried in your inventory by a small percentage. This is because bags have their own weight capacities which are independent from the actual amount of weight used in your inventory. Some containers like bags of holding will even store copious amounts of items with very little weight taken up in your actual inventory.

The closer you get to your weight capacity, the slower you move. Regardless of what kind of terrain you're on. So it's good to make sure you always have fairly high strength and carry as little as possible. When you do get your house built, invest in some materials to make mine carts or chests, depending on what you need. Mine carts have a 800 kg weight limit, while chests have about 200 kg and can be locked up. I would suggest keeping your valuables in chests and stuff that takes up a lot of weight like platinum, iron, and so on in mine carts.