Yeah, I don't think that Vampire et al are fair examples of point build systems because of how badly they implement it. (Linear/progressive combo is the main one, but there's also big issues like not making it clear up front to new players how vital having the right abilities is to discipline use or the fact that the generation merit is far better than any other for the same cost).
As best I can tell, it was an atttempt to make certain things "simpler" at the price of having, as you say, inexperienced people making dumb assumptions because they assume the designers knew what they were doing.
That said, I like both random and point build depending on my mood and prefer games to commit to one or another rather than mixing and matching. If I'm designing a character I want full control over everything from stats to background. If I'm random rolling I'll have a good solid lifepath system please.
A lot of it depends on how broad or narrow skills within the system are, too. Its easier to make a random system that doesn't turn out weird results when many of the components are broad enough that linking them to a lifepath will produce a result that at least looks coherent.
(There are also non-random systems that aren't pure build-point approaches; NEW and its kind involve sort of a "walk through a lifepath style structure and pick certain things at each stage" approach.)