Character creation is absolutely fundamental to a tabletop roleplaying game.
I agree wholeheartedly... AFAIK character creation has been there in every entry product of D&D history (box or PHB), or was there some exception?
Creating something is pretty much a core aspect of RPGing. Picking pregens is really just a "preview" of the real game, the real game always implies that you create
your own character.
It doesn't have to be a whole complete character creation with all the fiddly bits, but it's got to be something
personal, even if it's as little as rolling/buying the six ability scores, which is probably what it was in some very old edition: roll ability scores + pick a class. But that was already enough to make your PC
feel quite unique due to the large number of possible combinations of ability scores. Picking a pregen delivers a significantly different feel.
It feels weird that WotC sells a starting product that doesn't deliver the feeling that character creation is an essential part of RPGing.
I will ask you again - if chargen is a vital function, then how can convention games and gamestore games exist with pregens?
YMMV, and I'm sure it does... but IMHO convention games are a very different and in fact
limited RPGing experience. They are not the whole RPG thing. You are forced to start quickly and end the game in time. You can't have a too much open-ended adventure, you can't create much original stuff, you can't homebrew, you can't house rule, you can't always use additional material not to mention custom material... The vast majority of RPG games are played by people in their homes, the amount of games played at conventions or stores are a tiny fraction of the total. With all these limitations, pregens aren't a big deal.
Now I'm sure someone will jump up and say "but I never homebrew, never house rule, always use published adventures, etc.", which is fine, it's your choice. But if you never create characters, never design adventures or try world-building, you are in fact playing a
limited version of the game, not the "whole thing".
Once again, it is totally OK to do so! It is also totally ok not to play RPG at all
But I would expect WotC to want to make sure to tell beginners about the
whole game immediately. I'm sure the Starter Set mentions writing your own adventures and setting, and
you don't need rules for these, but unfortunately you do need at least some rules for creating characters. I just find it very odd that they prefer to save 3-5$ of a price that is already really low, rather than immediately teach the players that 99% (certainly more often than writing adventures) of the times when playing D&D they WILL create characters. So why not starting already in the SSet?
