I'd love to have a rolling release distro, similar to Arch. However, I have not been able to install that correctly. Has anyone made a variant of Arch or something similar with a decent installer?

Did you follow the Arch Beginners Guide?

Not to be rude but if you can't figure out the Arch installer, what makes you think you're up to the everyday challenge of using an unstable rolling release distro? The install process teaches you how the system is built, so you can troubleshoot it when it inevitably breaks.

In my experience, most people who think they need a rolling release distro really just want a stable distro with the latest Firefox, OpenOffice, etc. which is easily achieved.

All that being said if you want Arch with a graphic installer, check out Chakra. Sidux is another good rolling release distro, based on the Unstable branch of Debian.

Good luck!

I just don't see the reason why I should have to upgrade my kernel just to get the latest version of GIMP or Open Office, which is how most distros work.

Imagine if Microsoft forced everyone to upgrade to the latest OS just to get everyday applications.

They would if they could, and are probably working on that one right now.

GIMP: http://www.gimp.org/
OpenOffice: http://www.openoffice.org/

Problem solved.

ps What makes you think Arch won't update your kernel too? You will have more updates if you switch to Arch from Ubuntu or whatever you're currently using, not less.