Does the first reflection point actually matter??

Yes, reflections can 'enhance' the sound - though unchecked they will play havoc with precise imaging/scaling and the individuality of recordings.
Some can't get enough of reflections - Amar Bose built a company on speakers leveraging enveloping reflected sound. Not for everyone though. 

I've certainly enjoyed previous systems in rooms without any acoustic treatment, though wouldn't go back to that now.

There is so many variables. 
We have all different speakers with more or less amount of high frequency output.
Some sit with a "full range" tang band 8" and others has more/higher frequencies + added super tweeters. 
I guess the last example will probably more likely need more absorption coverage area of the walls.
(Then it is a good idea to take in and out the carpet if switching between those two different speakers in the room. A way of "Tuning" the room depending on what gear is used.)

OK, we can see it as the acoustics in the listening ROOM and the acoustics in the recording ROOM. 
The record "CHASING THE DRAGON - AUDIOPHILE RECORDINGS VOL 1" from Mike Valentine. Has two tracks:

2. Cello Interior: Bach's Cello Suite No. 1
Interior: In an English church, 3 M50's were set up to record cellist Justin Pearson performing Bach's Prelude. Between the mic, a Jecklin Disc was placed. This increased the separation of the spaced pair. The acoustics of the church are wonderful!
3. Cello Exterior: Bach's Cello Suite No. 1
The same microphones, performer, cello and the same piece of music... but this time recorded outside in the graveyard! How important are acoustics? What would it sound like to be able to remove the church from the last recording? Compare the tracks to hear for yourself the results of this interesting experiment! Which do you prefer?

It is very benefiting that our room do not has its own colorfull acoustics then you are not hearing what Mike Valentine intended us to hear in his recordings.
If we exaggerate and take and rig our stereo in the "big English church" as our listening room and listen to track "3. Cello Exterior".

Then we will hear almost the same as if we used well treated room/earphones and listening to track "2. Cello Interior"!

So if we are listening in a reverberant, colorful room. We will get used to that and at the end it will be our preferences. But everything we play will get that reverb and color. That were not intended to be there by the technician/artist. But you now prefer it but we can if we want always adjust our preferences. (See below) :)

As in those two tracks, examples above I actually in the beginning preferred track "2. Cello Interior" over the "3. Cello Exterior". 
Because that is the normal sound that we are USED to hear it in a reverberant space as a room is.

But after a while I noticed that I changed opinion and started to like "3. Cello Exterior" more and more. When I discovered that when the room were removed and all of its reverberation and color THEN I easily could hear how the cello itself sounded and how the whole resonant cello body sounded without any room smearing all over it. That were a great educational experience for me (not every day you hear a cello playing in free air outside (closest we get to a anacoic chamber))

If I ask someone with Floyd Toole level knowledge of loudspeaker-in-room acoustics (which I can with Billy Woodman at ATC),  he would tell me that consistent spectral content of direct vs reflections is the key to imaging.  If the reflections look very similar in spectral content to the direct sound it will image well.  That's why he builds wide dispersion loudspeakers. Narrow dispersion loudspeakers, having different spectral content off axis than on axis, sends spectral energy that does NOT sound like the direct sound on reflection "zones" (love this word Duke, well done).  Its all about the sum of these two complex sources of (direct vs reflected) energy at your ears, because when they combine with each other they partially cancel or completely cancel each other.   Longer path = longer time= phase shift.   This is the idea of nearfeild monitoring in studios, reduce the amount of reflected energy by sitting closer and moving the speakers further from the walls (smaller triangle).   Now you can hear more of your monitor and less of the room.  Engineers use this idea to help them get a more consistent sound in the different rooms they work in without changing speakers, using EQ or DSP (all of which adds another "veil" to the direct sound).  I remember seeing Kevin Shirley mixing about 2 feet from his speakers which were about 2 feet apart.   Not so much "room sound" in such a set up.

Brad    

Hi Brad,
Yep, that's one reason I often recommend audiophiles listen to their speakers from 2' away.  The difference in clarity and resolution and tonal balance between that and the normal listening position is mostly the room.  Once they understand that, they can better decide if treating the room would be wroth it.

Best,
Erik

If I ask someone with Floyd Toole level knowledge of loudspeaker-in-room acoustics (which I can with Billy Woodman at ATC), he would tell me that consistent spectral content of direct vs reflections is the key to imaging. If the reflections look very similar in spectral content to the direct sound it will image well. That’s why he builds wide dispersion loudspeakers. Narrow dispersion loudspeakers, having different spectral content off axis than on axis, sends spectral energy that does NOT sound like the direct sound on reflection "zones" (love this word Duke, well done). Its all about the sum of these two complex sources of (direct vs reflected) energy at your ears, because when they combine with each other they partially cancel or completely cancel each other. Longer path = longer time= phase shift. This is the idea of nearfeild monitoring in studios, reduce the amount of reflected energy by sitting closer and moving the speakers further from the walls (smaller triangle). Now you can hear more of your monitor and less of the room. Engineers use this idea to help them get a more consistent sound in the different rooms they work in without changing speakers, using EQ or DSP (all of which adds another "veil" to the direct sound). I remember seeing Kevin Shirley mixing about 2 feet from his speakers which were about 2 feet apart. Not so much "room sound" in such a set up.

Thanks very much for this informative very important post for me....

That help me to understand the way my controls devices work....And damn ! they work amazingly but i was not being able to understand why.... Your post is the first step for me to understand....The concept of the "spectral content" was lacking in my ignorant and rudimentary acoustical knowledge.... I created my acoustic controls by listenings experiments and intuition without being able to understand why my results at the end were so totally transformative, even if they are unorthodox to say the least....I will not go further here about that tough....

My best to you....