For more on my CRPG QotD, please see my blog http://www.wastedbrilliance.com/2008... - Brooks Bishop

I think yesterday's question could use a little more love too http://friendfeed.com/e.... Please feel free to go back and respond to any question of the series if you come up with anything new to add. :D You can find links to all the questions in the blog post. - Brooks Bishop

They annoy me, but I recognize them as staples of the genre. I like the way it was done in FF12 where you can see the enemies and avoid them. - James (@willia4)

I think we need them, but sometimes they annoy me anyway. - Rachel R.

I like them. Never liked having the option to walk around all the creatures. Maybe having like an automatic flee feature would be a nice compromise. - Geoff Schultz

I like them, unless I'm just recovering from a huge battle and need to find a save point. I'd love an option to turn them off, or defer them for a time - perhaps the next few would be stronger when the feature was turned back on? Hmm. - Jennifer Dittrich

Don't like them. I liked how in the most recent Final Fantasy how you could see your enemies and run away from them if you so chose. Which makes a lot more sense. Plus it also makes it easier to grind, instead of just running around in circles hoping for random battles. - Alex Scoble

The really annoying thing about them (and this mostly comes from later FF games) is that you can't just start the battle, fight, and get back to the game. Oh no. There has to be a long swirling animation as the battle mechanics load. Then you have to wait for some new Active Battle meter to charge before anyone can do anything. Then, when the battle's finally over, the camera has to pan around your characters doing their victory poses. And all of this happens ten thousand times. - James (@willia4)

I probably wouldn't mind the random battles so much if they weren't so jarring and timewasting with all of the nonsense. - James (@willia4)

I'm looking at implementing a system that's pseudo-random. After a battle, or upon entry into a screen, the random battle chance will reset to 0. Every step will increase that chance slightly. This way you don't get battles too fast, but you do get one eventually. I like the suggested idea of letting people tweak the rate of increase, which simultaneously would affect things like monster power, item drops, and experience when the fight does occur. - Brooks Bishop

The old school in me lurvs me some nostalgia. But this day and age, completely random battles may not be a wonderful thing. Though what you're thinking up sounds pretty nifty. Shouldn't be too hard to implement (armchair dev, lawlz) a Chrono Trigger / FFXII type of encounter system though and that might be a better option to cut down coding. People can choose to fight or not. - Arlan Koizumi