Depends entirely on the game. I usually collect as much stuff as possible before heading into battle, whatever the game, but I don't have plans. In any game with exploration I will eventually know every detail about it through hours of simply walking and trying to get onto or into things I can see. I often try to act like a real sniper, waiting for the one shot and then moving to a new position, really enjoy seeing other people fail, but am close to the mainstream casual market enough to make me one of them.
So this whole rant was a bit pointless, but it all depends. I think it's probably quite a flawed system, since so many people seem to be caught between at least two, and if everyone's honest, they probably have facets of all these types.
