When do you like using the A rig? Do you think it would work well for fish suspended in open water close to points?
You just described one of the "text book" situations and locations to use the A-Rig. They are fantastic for suspended fish, no matter if they are relating to structure or not. Now points have been very good to me this year while using the rig but I've been able to catch them in 5-10 FOW while they were suspended over 30. Just as long as there are schools of baitfish present this rig will catch them. I've fished them over points, along grass lines, over sunken brush, and around boat docks & houses and it's caught fish off all of them. The only constant being the baitfish, no matter how good I caught them off point A yesterday if the baitfish have left I won't be getting many bites at all off it on the next.
I've had the most success on the rig at the two times of year when the bass are feeding the heaviest on baitfish, spring in preparation of the spawn and then again in late fall when they are feeding up for winter. I'm convinced that it will work as long as they are eating shad, naturally in the coldest part of winter when they aren't feeding much it's a very poor lure choice because IMO this bait is a "feeding response" bait not a reaction response as say when they are in a negative feeding mood but a jig is dropped right in front of their face in their living room, here they just eat out of reflex.
Also one more "tip" I can pass along about these rigs is you need to make the bait you have in the center of the rig different from the others in some way. Don't ask me why this makes such a big difference to them but it does, I started out using 5 swimbaits all the same color and size and wasn't getting bit very much. I read the tip to change the center bait in some way and it would improve your strike count but I didn't really believe it wholeheartedly. I changed my baits just to see if this was good info or just a "gimmick", turned out to be very solid advise so that's why I'm passing it along now. All I did was to downsize my four outside baits to 3-1/2" and put a 5" bait in the center, all the same color, and I started to get way more strikes. Also the middle bigger bait is the one the fish get 75-80% of the time.
I've seen all sorts of different ways people are "tweaking" their rigs to try and be as different as possible. I've seen some guys use casting spoons on the top two wires, a big swimbait in the center, and two smaller totally different color and design swimbaits on the lower two wires. I've even sen a guy that combined two 5 wire rigs to make a huge 9 wire one. He just attached the line tie of the second rig to the center wire of the rig he had tied to his line and therefore had nine swimbaits and hooks in the water on a single cast. That's going a little overboard IMO but to each his own. Point is there are countless ways to use these rigs and I'm sure there will be plenty of things to come from all the "experimenting" guys are doing right now. Get yourself one and enjoy.
