my best friend daily'd a pathfinder, a 2000 I think as well so it was a pretty cool suv. I can personally attest to the reliability of these shits apart from regular maintenance from having as much fun as we did, and it was a fucking ski hill rocket.
My dad has, so I have a 2005 f250 that's rebuilt with a bit of turbo work and I will say that it's probably the most safe thing to be driving apart from semis and shit. You do loose traction a fair amount which has been mentioned before, espesically if you're driving on legitimate mountain roads. If 4x4 works they go anywhere though.
and I have a miata as well, which I wouldn't reccomend because when I do start running it up and down the hill my friends are going to be carrying my things with their things in the passenger seat.