This is one of the very good aspects of Skyrim: The random encounters.

I just have to mention two that basically interacted togther just now...

*Possible Spoilers on random Encounters*


I was on my way to Whiterun after competing a dungeon job with Lydia. I met 3 travelling Khajitts which was fortunate because I was able to sell most of my equipment to them saving me the trouble of carting all this stuff around. It was funny at first cos I had to take all the stuff Lydia was carrying as well and while talking to her the Khajitts had walked on (love the world continuing to move while talking). I had to walk really slowly but after about 5 minutes I just caught the Khajitt back up.

I sold all my stuff to him and a pleasurable transaction it was. We said our good byes and ran on down the road, leaving the Khajitts behind.

Saw a woman in armour ahead of me and decided to ask her what she was doing...

"I shouldn`t tell you but i`m off to do an important job," she says.

I wanted to know what, but I didn`t have good speech skills and I didn`t want to intimidate her, so I tried to bribe her. She didn`t like that at all and she attacked me! Lydia and I had to kill her. I shoved her body by the side of the road in a bush. I took all her kit and ran up to the Khajitts still walking down the road and sold everything to them, then I ran on my journey.

Then I heard the Khajitts talking behind me, "How did this happen?" "What happened here?"

I looked behind me and just up the road saw that the Khajitts had spotted the dead naked body and were clustered about it in dismay.

I actually felt a bit guilty, but turned around and ran on. I just thought that innocent incident was a nice example of how the random encounters (totally UNSCRIPTED) can work really well and it in many ways is what makes a sandbox-type game for me!

Nice work on that one, Devs!

you cruel cruel person, sithis approves

If you like those types of random encounters, then you'll just love being approached by a fugitve ingame who gives you a random item and says "take this, and don't tell anyone I'm here, or I'll...I'll kill you!", only then to be approached by a hunter who is looking for the fugitive.

In my opinion the random encounters are the best thing they added.

I love the random encounters! Though I hate it when my enemies work together.

Spoiler

Nothing worse then running into a Thalmor hit squad with a Dark Brotherhood assassin backing them.

It's a mix of the random encounters and the landscape that keep me from fast traveling.

I don’t know if this is a mod or it is in Skyrim but I saw a headless horseman blue ghost apparition ride past me near the Honeybrew meadery. That was epic.

Easter egg. I remember seeing it near Dragon Bridge. It. Was. Awesome.

I love the random encounters as well, i'm so glad Beth put them in, it makes the land seem less empty.

You know he actually leads you to somewere interesting, right? Just follow him next time you see him.

Random encounters are one of the best things that they have added, makes traveling on foot more interesting, and I am more inclined to do so than in any other TES game

This is an area where the game also actually acknowledge your previous actions. Hired thugs come after you for stealing or murdering, necromancers appear to avenge the destruction of powerful spirits, couriers carry messages about events in the civil war and so on...all of that being recognized and having an effect on the world is there - in the random events, but not in the scripted events.

well, scripted events are scripted...

Random events are scripted too...they only occur if you have done certain actions, so they are tied to your development as a character and your story. The static NPC′s and quests could have been scripted this way too...but for some reason they aren't very often.

I think because it's pretty much impossible (programming-wise) to make a big game where you can start everywhere that can acknowledge different things you've done during questlines that needs to be the same for every player. pretty much like it's impossible to program a really intelligent AI (example: cleverbot)

A guard died during a dragon attack in Morthal, and nearly everyone who walked past the corpse bent down beside it and said 'I'm going to find whoever did this ...' I love it when the characters interact with the wold like that!

I loved when I met with a bunch of bandits dressed in Imperial Armor asking for a "passing fee", and then I found the naked bodies around the corner. Not only me looting bodies now and then .

That reminds me of the random skirmishes between small groups imperials and stormcloaks. I just sit back and watch as they slaughter each other.