But it made it completely useless to be an early adopter, because by the time the zero reward blocks ended the difficulty was already extremely high so it was like jumping into an already established coin.
It depends on what's the dev's priority in the end, but there is indeed a perfect way to launch a coin smoothly.
I'm just saying, with this type of reward (which I find to be the best in the long run), you simply cannot start with 400 coins, and then a couple thousands... in litecoin days, yes. Now, it's on an exchange instantly and people are looking to turn a quick profit, it would destroy the coin at launch.
But I see what you mean, I just don't see it fitting.
It's quite a complicated issue, but the solutions are plenty.