Do caster out of combat options matter?

[Psyren]

Being able to travel the planes is more than just a 'you may participate in an adventure on the Plane of Fire' button. It's the ability to access those environments and their useful properties for any of a thousand purposes, at any time you choose, whether getting there is actually required or merely advantageous. It's the ability to simply make someone be elsewhere, and moreover, have that elsewhere have different laws of physics, powerful alien beings, and so on and so forth.

Exactly - just because the DM can make a portal available for an OnlyFighters party to participate in a planar adventure, doesn't mean the players' choice to have or not have a wizard becomes invalidated. Having a wizard that can plane shift the PCs gives more benefits than being a taxi to the plot.

I do mostly agree with Rynjin. Don't add a bridge just because the players suck at climbing and can't teleport/fly. They take the long way around the chasm.

I disagree that "adding a bridge" is automatically bad. The bridge can be every bit as challenging/onerous as "the long way around the chasm," just faster. I would do both.

Baldurs Gate 3 is illustrative here; every critical plot path and even a number of the non-critical ones have at least 3 avenues of approach. That "rule of 3" is a good practice for GMs in general.