Thanks for the input sparky. I'm not put off by the fact that it's a "kit lens", we're still talking about a piece of glass that retails for what, $1200 by itself?
I know that I will need to pick up at least one good medium length prime for the stuff that I like to shoot. But f4 shouldn't be a problem for most things I do.
If they bundled a trinity lens with a body would that make it a "kit lens"? Yes it would. Would it start to suck after that? I'm convinced that some reviewers on the internet would immediately proclaim its downfall for that reason alone.
The D750 is the top of the Consumer heap. They bundled the 24-85mm f3.5-4.5 with the D600 and it is a
very good zoom and well matched for that body. It has its minor flaws and weaknesses, but you'd expect that for a full frame zoom in that price range, and I still love mine. With the D750 they upped the ante in both sensor quality and price, so I expect they decided to up what's in the "kit" package as well. Think long and hard about this - the D750 "kit" price is like buying a D750
and a D7100 refurb body. That's not a cheap bump in price. A "kit" is not meant to short sell something, it's meant to allow someone moving into the FX format the opportunity to get suitable glass at a discount with the body, and the quality is matched accordingly. $700 is not throwaway money, and the 24-120mm is far from an also ran - but that never stopped people from running their mouths because they're looking to justify an idea. I've yet to see any poor review of any kit lens backed up with empirical evidence and detailed images and not just opinion - and you know what they say about opinions ... everybody has one.
Funny thing is, the 24-120mm F4 completes what is effectively the budget, or "unholy" trinity of Nikon zooms along with the 16-35mm F4 and the 70-200mm F4, and I don't hear many people complaining about the kit-worthiness of them. Those 3 lenses are all I really need unless I have a screaming need for depth of field. Light isn't a problem with modern sensors because the stop I get from a 2.8 lens is made up for with improved ISO noise suppression.
I'll let my work speak for the lenses, just follow my Flickr link below where you'll see 90-95% of my non-wildlife work shot with "kit lenses" almost exclusively - 18-105mm DX, 24-85mm F3.5-4.5, 24-120mm f4. They live on my cameras unless there's a specific need for something else.