Like I said Ragnarok, you disagree. No need to be rude about it and accuse me of being illogical. Just because YOU don't see the logic in things, doesn't mean there's no logic there. Hey. If others agreed with you and told me I'm being totally illogical and there's nothing good at all in what I said, I'd be inclined to wonder if maybe I'm totally off base. However, if you notice, most of what I pointed out as benefits of random encounters, other people have said also.
But you fail to recognize your own contradictions. On the one hand, you're very opposed to people using exploits. Then, on the other hand, you're totally against people potentially using random encounters as an exploit. You have no problems with long rest spamming exploits, and height wins every time exploits and shoving exploits and drinking potions as bonus action exploits and stealth exploits and broken exploits like freezing an enemy in dialogue so you can easily sneak around behind him with every other character and steal everything from that person in real time while that person is frozen forever in turn based mode, and so on and so forth.
But, for some reason, you are so upset about the possibility that someone could use random encounters to increase their loot and experience points? If you receive a random encounter once maybe every thirty minutes to an hour of gameplay, how is that a major exploit in the game? On the contrary, you can literally use stealth in every situation to win, or you can literally freeze an enemy in dialogue, switch to characters not in dialogue or combat, move around in real time and position yourself so you can attack the enemy over and over again from the best possible position, and win every time. Or, spider lair, you can just wait until she's on a web, multiple times, and shoot her down so she loses like 20 HP a drop until she's almost dead.
But most of all, you WANT them to make it so you can long rest all the time so that when the game gets to spellcasters hurling fireballs you can literally use them in every battle, long rest, and use them again in every battle spamming them and making every other class completely obsolete. Makes absolutely no sense.
Random Encounters during travel, if done right, would only add a small element of risk for the purpose of making players be on guard at all times. If you never know when you might suddenly drop into combat, you aren't going to use your high powered spells constantly in case you get suddenly jumped by a troll or a couple of gnolls or ogres or whatever. (I'm not talking just with our little level cap of 4 but thinking of future potential random encounters.) If I know that while I'm prowling the goblin base, I might get suddenly jumped by a couple of ochre jellies, BESIDES all the other dangers there, even though I just cleared out an area of goblins, I might be a bit more careful.
Here's what I mean. I just got done fighting Ragzlin. I have 1 HP for one character, 9 HP for another, 5 HP for another and 4 HP for another. Game has no random encounters, and I know I've just cleared a huge portion of the game map. Inside the goblin base, there are no enemies at all. Now, if there are no random encounters, I don't need to worry about healing at all. Why bother? There are no enemies left. So why should I waste potions? Why should I waste a short rest? I'm good. Area cleared.
But, if there's the potential that while I'm trying to work my way out I might random encounter 2 ochre jellies, or 2 hobgoblins, or 3 more roaming goblins, or 2 giant spiders, or whatever, a sense of danger is created in the game. I COULD risk trying to get out without healing, and I would probably succeed because the chance of a random encounter in the goblin base is maybe 10% chance on a dice roll every 300 feet of movement or something like that. Well, am I willing to risk it, or should I heal just in case I am unlucky and encounter something I won't be able to handle? This creates potential dangers that can occur at any moment, since you won't know when it was that the game rolled the last time to determine if you encounter a random encounter. It makes you strategize and think, and it adds a "living" element to the world. It isn't just some stagnant map where nothing ever changes unless it's scripted, and once you've played the game through once, you know exactly what to expect. You never know when something will jump out at you, so you best not be stupid and continue roaming a hostile camp with very little health, etc.
And, now to Draigo's point, random encounters is meant to prevent rest spam. If you know you could be attacked by a troll if you long rest in goblin camp, but there's no chance of it if you rest in the Druid's Grove, you'll make sure you rest at Druid's Grove and not try to long rest while exploring the goblin base. You make it sound like a troll would be easy to take out, so spam long rest more frequently so you can trigger the troll early. That would be foolish. Why? Because after you've wasted all your spells on the troll, you try to long rest again and might, maybe run into a couple of hobgoblins as well. Now you've wasted HP and spells and items on the troll, AND you might have to fight more enemies, AND you still have the planned encounters to fight. So, spamming long rest in a dangerous location is foolish because you risk constantly dwindling down your resources fighting non-scripted enemies. Makes you strategize and ask yourself, "Should I long rest now or try to keep going? Do I risk it?"
AND, if they prevent you from simply teleporting from anywhere back to Druid's Grove, then it works. OR, if you try to fast travel, they implement a random encounters interruption potential every time you fast travel, symbolizing that you traveled on foot to the nearest portal and there was a chance that you might encounter something on the way. Either way, limiting long rest spamming, as Draigo said, is essential to later levels of spellcasting. (Plus everything else he said.)
And Draigo, one thing we're fighting for IS a more true D&D 5e ruleset BECAUSE classes are already obsolete. Rogues don't have Expertise and are completely nerfed. Clerics are not essential for healing because anyone can use any scroll, potions are all over the place in such numbers it's ridiculous, etc. Everything is so blurred that it really doesn't matter what class you pick, everyone can lock pick just about as easily as everyone else, and so on and so forth. To your point, this will ONLY become worse at higher levels.
