Why can't your readers know which characters are opening act one? Why is that a such a mystery? I have never seen the withholding of names as being essential to anyone's plot so far.

Point #1: When I see "he" and "she," or "him" and "her," opening a story. . . . Well, my first feeling is eye-rolling frustration, and I don't even want to look at it anymore. I don't like an author trying to play games with me. When I do decide to trudge on, here's what happens:

I'm forced to see black silhouettes (either with or without boobs) performing the actions. I'm following strangers for all I know. I'm having to save up the story in my mind so I can, hopefully soon, apply names to actions. When it is finally revealed that I was following, say, Eric and Presto, I often have to go back and reread, replacing the hes and hims with their names so I can make sense of what's happened so far. Let me be clear here, I do not enjoy doing that!

Point #2: I have seen this so many times. Depending on my mood, I either giggle or feel offended.

How often have you, dear reader, had to deal with this (and I'm relating my examples to D&D, though it happens everywhere)?:

You're reading a new fic, and you know all the characters (duh, fans read fan-fiction), yet the author is using descriptions in place of names � at least for the "introductory" mentions.

Hank could be "the blond with the bow."
Eric might be "the raven/black-haired youth."
Diana, perhaps, "the dark-skinned girl."
Sheila is "the red-head."
Presto is often "the bespectacled youth." (cringes)
Bobby could be "the boy/child with the club."

And I still find one every now and then where you'll see the canon characters' titles connected to their names on their first mentions: NAME the TITLE (for example, "Hank the Ranger").