True. From what I have seen in the data provided to me, playing at random had a large risk of getting those long playthroughs. I reduced the route to danger/safety to reduce the risk of getting into overlong playthroughs. I want players to enjoy the experience, not get exhausted and give up (nobody did yet as far as I know, but I can imagine seemingly getting nowhere when playing at random might get exhausting after a while).
My thoughts exactly. In fact while creating this game I was also reminded of that particular story fragment in Dune. I am gambling on the fact that playing at random is hard for players to do well… which gives the game an edge sometimes.