The lack of community hits the nail onn the head!
One thing I have noticed with EQ2 is that all the things they tweaked to reduce KSing also reduced some of the social aspects of the game e.g The number of times I went into newbie zone in EQ1 and randomly buffed ppl with my druid or handed out items I no longer used to strangers gave that warm glow inside and started quite a few friendships.
I think they need to work on the social aspect of the game now as really all the EQ's boil down to are interactive chatrooms.
I used to ask myself would I play EQ if it was just an RPG and think the answer is no. It is the people that bring me back time and again, whether in the game or in the forums.
Maybe the pokemon style Arena Champions will help kickstart it.
I suppose everyone will think this is all just soppy but I know for all their bad points I have SOE to thank for the opportunity to meet some of best and most caring people in the world that I would never have met otherwise.
Seggo