Roving Encounters

Roving Encounters are overworld enemies who will trigger encounters when you get too close. These overworld enemies will be similar to the ones in adventure scenes, except they can’t be engaged in actual combat. Instead, if you approach too close to the new overworld enemies and they see you, they’ll run at you. If they get next to you, you’ll be pulled into the encounter associated with them. For example, bandits will pull you into bandit encounters, while wolves pull you into a scene full of wolves. Once you see the enemy, you can walk around it to avoid the encounter or run toward it to force the encounter. If the enemy has already spotted you and you’re quick, you can try to run away before the enemy catches up and keep the encounter from ever triggering. Encounters are scattered about; wandering in the woods, meandering along a shoreline, or patrolling along a road.

These encounters also have wave battles within them. Defeating the lower level creatures within will cause higher level creatures to appear. If you can defeat all of these higher level creatures, you have a chance that a special NPC may appear. They do not always appear. The kind of NPC's that can appear are the Peasant Clothing Merchant, Sculptor Merchant, Ecology Researcher, Bounty Hunter and Altruist Pilgrim.

Trivia

 * Random encounters were first implemented in Release 12 — you’ll be walking across plains, hills, swamps, or forests in the Hidden Vale overworld map and, without warning, you’ll be teleported into a small encounter scene.
 * A desert encounter was added in Release 13
 * The Hidden Vale encounters were removed in Release 20, and encounters placed along the Perennial Trail instead. There were five new encounters available:
 * Highway Robbery: Human bandits ambush you!
 * Farm Animals: You stumble upon herds of domesticated animals grazing peacefully and protected by dogs.
 * Wild Herds: You disturb a herd of stags grazing along your way.
 * Rare Goods: You happen upon Shandy Chapman the wandering merchant who sells rare items to those he meets along the Perennial Trail.
 * Haunted Ruins: You are lured by tempting reagents into undead-infested ruins
 * Wolves: A pack of wolves that have been tracking you suddenly surround you!


 * In Release 22, a dragon ambush was added in the plains of Drachvald.
 * In Release 33, random encounters were added back to forest road, plains road, plains wilderness, and swamp road areas across Novia and the Hidden Vale, in addition to the ones unique to the Perennial Coast and Drachvald.
 * Release 35 removed all random encounters, and replaced them with roving encounters that appear on the overworld. Initially, only common encounters like wolves, bandits, and undead were included. Over time, dragon encounters will return and other rare situations like merchants will be added.