Originally Posted by prathmann

Agreed.

I have both free-standing and non-free-standing tents and both types work fine. For most of my bike touring trips I prioritize the weight over convenience and since the non-free-standing ones are lighter those get taken on these trips more frequently. And I've had no problem setting them up in all circumstances that I've found - including on snow, sand, solid platforms, rock slabs, etc. But it did sometimes take a bit more ingenuity than it would have with a free-standing design.