I think this preloading template would turn new users off more than AfD.
I've never had an article I created put up for AfD, even my first new
article ever, which I posted without any references, and which was one of my
earliest edits.
Making it clear to newcomers how the site works would be a good start.
There are many things that I'll probably never figure out, like how to get
to a WikiProject page, how to find the citations templates, how to find the
vandalism templates (the first time I posted one without having to look at
it up two editors jumped me for assuming the guy was a vandal, so I up up
patrolling vandalism), how to insert a date into a reference, the code for
references (today I tried {{references /}}, {{references/}, {{/
references}}, and {references /} before giving up), and which policies I
should, as a newcomer, follow, and which ones will get me bitten or
ridiculed. It's too convoluted looking things up on Wikipedia, and most of
it is designed (it being the resources you need to know about to follow
policies) for the computer savvy and heavy net user.
Making it easier for newcomers would be better than loading a new template
that only applies to newcomers.
Oh, and I still can't figure out how to start a new article, so newcomers
who do that are either starting new articles that return no search items
from Wikipedia, which have a high chance of AfD, or they're not so new, I
suspect.
KP