Gotta love beta giveaways!

On the subject of keeping beta characters, Mortis is right...EQ2 will be no different in that your character in the final phase of beta will be wiped before the game goes gold. There's multiple reasons for this, but it mainly helps to keep the beta testers from having an unfair headstart over those who weren't in beta. The knowledge you gain in testing the game out before it is released is advantage enough, you can skip the phase of total newbdom.

Lineage II, from what I hear, was or rather is a horrible game and the lack of a beta character wipe was only icing on the cake. Not wiping beta chars is one of the most stupid decisions a dev team can make.