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I've been thinking a bit on the subject of randomized content in video games. A thought occurred to me: could a random encounter in Pathfinder be similarly randomized? We already do quite a bit with our dice in the way of random numbers, why not build a monster out of them?
Here's how I imagine it working.
1.Roll a d4 to determine the creature's size, from Small to Huge.
2.Roll its stats. 3d6 in order I would think.
2b.From there, you can figure out its AC, attack bonus, CMB and hit points. Assume a number of hit dice equal to the desired CR?
3.Roll d% on a list of monster abilities, feats, spell-like-abilities, or weapons to decide what this creature uses against the PC. Feel free to roll several times and mix and match abilities.
4.Roll to see how many of this creature there are in a given encounter. 2d4 sounds like a good amount.
After the statblock looks solid, decide the fluff. What kind of creature did you get? What does it look like?
The upside is that these encounters can be generated on the spot using the exact same algorithm, using the players' rolls if you like, and can in theory produce hundreds of different kinds of encounters. And since the GM provides the fluff after the fact, the players are never left to wonder why there's a minotaur and a zombie in the same room.
The downside is that rolling all those dice and deriving the AC and HP and everything, not to mention writing up a d% table, takes time that would slow the pace of play (or cut into the GM's prep time) and most GMs might rather just flip to a random page in their Bestiary. Any given page in the Bestiary is also a lot less likely to have a mishmash of non-synergistic abilities, and already has the fluff to explain why it has the abilities it has.
So what do you think? Is this worth attempting? From a player's perspective? From a GM's?