引用自 NickPalmer：

A mechanic I think a lot of games need to think more about is what it rewards the players for doing.

I just feel like we need to reward players for clever thinking. Nothing bothers me more than the clever way to get by an obstacle giving you less rewards than brute forcing it.

If I hack a panel to gas a room full of enemy soldiers, I should get as much if not more xp than if I fought them.

Every time we reward a player badly for thinking clever, it reinforces the idea that he should just brute force the game.

I agree with the idea that you should get exp in your example, but I would disagree with getting more for it. It's two different ways of playing the same thing, the same amount of 'bad guys' were defeated, so the same exp should be given.
A close example I'd use in a more recent game would be defeating an enemy in Fallout 4 (just using it's experience system). If you shoot it and it dies, it's x exp, if your companions kills it you get the same exp, if you set a trap you get the same exp.
Technically a character that "brute forces" the battle learns better to utilize that tactic, where a person that hacks the vents doesn't get the experience from physical combat, but gets the experience of using a building system to do the job. Either way, the same amount of enemies died.
TL;DR version - "rewarding for clever thinking" to me just seems to be a way of trying to get the person playing your game to play it in a specific manner, whereas generalizing the experience system a bit more could end up be more rewarding to more people instead of slanting it towards a specific play style. Though, in the end, it really matters what the type of game this system is going into. e.g. if you're playing a stealthly-spy RPG, you'd want to reward stealthy actions more.

I remember playing Castlevania 2: Simon's Quest (hey, it has non-linear pathing and equipment) when I first got a Nintendo. Zelda was amazing back then too.
However, I think the game that hooked turn-based RPGs for me was a bit later with Phantasy Star II. I never beat it. Hell, I don't think I even ever got too far in the game, but the ability to plan attacks and be strategic instead of reactionary just ended up doing it for me.