BG II was occasionally different. Resting was important in that game because it regenerated magicks (*essential* to pure spellcasters) and healed characters for the cost of.. What? 8-16 hours game time and possibly a small inn fee. That’s it. Where this turned against you is timed quests like the De’Arnise Hold; if you rested too often then Nalia would take the bull by the horns and go rescue the keep herself (not that she actually did, but it established where her priorities were). I suppose this put a damper in grind runs, though the quest would usually net equivalent XP anyway.

Made the game a lot of fun. Never really looked at the numbers, fought the battles with the characters I liked most (had two full adepts in the group most of the time). Felt really bad for Benezia and Liara, too, that whole “there’s no light, there was supposed to be a light” bit was creepy as hell.

If it’s a cliched rpg like Fable I’ll just pick whatever nets the most xp and doesn’t make me feel like a complete asshat. If it’s the sort of game with a really interesting world to explore like Bloodlines, I’ll pick whatever gives me the best chance of seeing the most of the game’s dialogue (took hacking only so I could read character’s emails >_>). For my favorite type of videogame though, the type that just pulls you in and never lets go, I’ll answer with what I would honestly say. Because with those games I don’t want to break the mood, I want to see the characters and the world change as I would change them, for better or worse. When your character does something you never would’ve done, you just…disconnect a little. Then the not-you goes and warps the plot around in a way that isn’t a result of your actions, and the whole thing is just a /game/ again. I’ve knowingly walked into ambushes despite prior metagame knowledge of ‘em because I wanted to be a part of that world, not apart from it.