I think the issue is the amount of SOLO play in todays MMOs. Back in Everquest for example, there were few classes that could successfully solo anything (Druids, Wizards, Mages, Necros come to mind). Everything else was group based. Everything. No solo story quests, no solo quests period (maybe newbie armor added later in the game), no duty finder, no teleports (except from druids and wizards), Gear wasn't a linear Tier-buffet, random stuff dropped from random things, exp parties, camping, AoE Groups, 30-50 man raids... OH MAN those were the day..
I was in Late middle school, High school when i started playing EQ. It was around Luclin release, and i loved every minute of the 4-5 years i put into that game. I miss that community so much. Every new MMO (even when EQ2 came out!) I hope to find the same amount of helpful, fun people that like to achieve stuff without a EVERYONE MUST HAVE GARUDA WEAPON attitude.

I would prefer them to have made leveling slow enough that most people weren't worrying about endgame yet. It IS a subscription game, you'd think they would want us to play a long time... :-\