I said: Don't give Xp for random encounters, because those shouldn't be farmable. I honestly don't like the idea of linking XP to just killing, but that's a computer game thing (I link it to objectives in my campaign)
I also prefer milestone levelling to xp, but I don't think Larian will rebuild the game around it. Mostly because you can progress through the game in many ways at setting progress points at arbitrary story points wouldn't make sense to me.
That said, if an random encounter doesn't offer XP or tangible loot then I just spent 5-20 minutes doing nothing. I didn't progress the story, I didn't get XP. In fact I may have lost resources to deal with it. How is that rewarding?
Right now going back to camp is "free" there is absolutely hot a single downside to doing it, there's no threat to it, there's no cost to it, no nothing. This takes away a MAJOR core part of DnD: Resource management. Not to mention the fact that it breaks the balance between many classes. "I'm a Warlock, I get my spell slots back on a short rest, but I get fewer spell slots because of it" then along comes the Wizard "HA looser, I too get all my spell slots back on a short rest, because that's basically what a long rest is in Baldur's Gate 3!"
Not everything in a game has to be a direct reward, a game is about reward and challenge. Adding something to make at least going back to camp something that's not free adds a challenge: "Do I go back and get spell slots? Or do I push on?"
With no timer on anything in the game, you don't have that as an issue (They keep talking about resting being "dangerous because of the tadpole" but that's just flavor)
And the same about fast traveling, if you made it so you could only rest at certain spots? What's stopping you from just fast travel scumming it? And then complain that you have to do that to get spell slots back.
Risk VS Reward is what makes games interesting.
PS: I didn't say I like milestones, milestone leveling is the worst idea ever. I said I put xp on tasks not on defeating monsters. Fighting mosters could be a task though, but the players get the same amount of XP if they found another way to bypass or "defeat" the monsters.
That gives a sense of character progression. Just getting levels at DMs whim is super boring, and I'm happy Larian doesn't have that.
