This is just my opinion/preference but I would prefer to just have monster sprites (that trigger battle events) that the player can choose to avoid or grind against rather than random encounters that the player usually doesn't have much control over. Sometimes, when I play RPG's, I find random battles tedious while there are other times when I want to grind or steal certain items from certain enemies or capture them and I find walking around hoping/waiting to encounter a certain enemy a nuisance. The most annoying thing for me about random battles is when I'm stuck with a puzzle and I end up wandering around a dungeon fighting the same monsters for hours and gain lots of money and exp but run low on healing items and magic and end up dying! I do not wish for someone playing my games in the future to have to go through something like that so you could say I'm sort of against random encounters. No offense to any games that have them. I still like many games that have them despite what I mentioned.
