I love random battles . With a nice battle theme, I'm good to go.

People would avoid most of them then cry "why is this so hard, why didn't i grind more!"

If you really need to grind a lot to beat a boss in an RPG, that screams more "horrible game design", not people's fault

I like random battles if they are not overly frequent. I especially like it if the game give you items and spells to make random encounters either more or less frequent.

Sometimes I hate them though, especially if I'm revisiting a place with low level enemies or if I'm trying to figure out a puzzle.

Nope, my favorite JRPG of all time has random encounters. Final Fantasy VIII.

I personally like them, I do prefer that the game has them.

Highly depends on the game. In the past when most games had random encounters, I didn't mind them. In some games I would spend hour upon hour running around in circles so I could get an encounter and level up, especially FF games where I'm usually the most obsessed at getting level 99 on all characters.

Nowadays random encounters are used alot less, I don't mind this either. Especially now with stuff like combo-counters and mob-counters.

They could be implemented in areas where it makes sense, ambushes in thick jungle, dark caves etc. Makes no sense at all to be surprised on a huge plain without so much as a shrub to hide behind or in the middle of a busy city street (monsters, that is).
Of course, I'm a long time pen & paper RPG fan so I'm a little particular about my feelings in this, encounters should always make sense imo and in many JRPG's (and WRPG's) they just don't.

It's sad when you can accurately predict when you'll enter a battle.

I'd have to agree with others. I hate random battles when I'm already trying to do something (like solve a puzzle or just pick up something on the ground), but I don't mind them as much if I'm trying to level up or something of that sort.

"Or crap, was that something I could pick up? I better go back and ch- *RANDOM BATTLE*"

ditto.

I would've preferred random encounters in Tales of Symphonia though...

lol, that is annoying indeed. On the plus side you get some more loot and experience in addition to your newfound treasure! If it actually is something you can pick up...