I don't understand why PoP got more votes than Kunark? PoP ruined the aspect of world travel, giving you easy access to ANYWHERE in the bloody solar system. Remember back when you actually had to JOURNEY and EXPLORE? Gone, all gone. Thank you, PoP!
Luclin? Luclin was a boiling pot of good and bad ideas. Adding a new class was a bold move by Verant, but worked out very well. There was unlimited quests for players of all levels and the rewards were great. Now onto the bad.....512MB of RAM?? Omg, this was uber when Luclin released =( When Luclin came out I was using an old Hewlett Packard (before I discovered the art of building your own PC) that wielded a PII 533mghz processor, with a 4mb on board graphics chipset and 256 ram (upgraded from 64.) The lag was horrendous, and this machine was about your average PC at the time. (remember looking at the new 1000+mghz processors in awe) PLUS the fact that there was absolutely NO unique looking armors on the new players models practically killed them for me. 3rd place, Bazaar and Beastlords, what more can I say?
Velious? Terrific, terrific expansion. Would be absolutely perfect if it had some low level content (casual players had a hard time reaching 35+ back before Sony cranked EQ into easy mode.) All the content, the beautiful graphics and variety in factions made this expansion truly unique. Great experience, and great loot for the bold and daring. And OMG, stop murdering the snow bunnies! 2nd, VERY VERY VERY close to 1st but Kunark wins out by sheer amount of content it added to the game.
Kunark? Took the cake, in my mind. This expansion had EVERYTHING. Great unbeatable content for EVERY level and EVERY type of player, casual and hardcore alike. Epics? Omg, l33t. A new race which was *supposed* to have it's own type of armor, and opened up the monk class to players who hated humans. Back in the day, when people roleplayed their classes in this mmoROLEPLAYINGg, it was equally fun to roleplay an iksar and add extra s's to your text as it was to dumb everything up in ogre talk. Before PoP, the newbie areas were so great and untouched by the sssoftskinss, you could go 1-60 without ever leaving your wonderful little continent. And people wasted weeks camping the undead jester for it's so extremely rare club; everytime I saw one I just drooled, not because it was an uber item but because it was so frakking rare it was like seeing a newbie paladin that didn't beg for gold coins. 1st place, in my mind's eye.
LDoN? Great idea, terrific exp which took you away from the normal hotspots which were always overcamped. The loot was unheard of, actually looting equipment which was good for that level? Unbelievable. Allows you to customize your dungean spelunking to do what your group wants to do. Want to kill a boss mob for the pride of knowing you can do it, plus the phat lewtz? Go ahead. Want to kill kill kill and loot everything along the way, hoping to stock up on useless dusts or fangs? Shoot. Want slaughter a certain amount of enemies for the prize of a handful of adventure points? Who am I do stop you? Want to rescue a helpless maiden from the grips of a...oh, wait a minute....SORRY, it's BUGGED. Restart and hope for a collection or slaughter adv. Only thing I didn't like about LDoN was the fact that you can't go in without a certain amount of friends. If I want to solo, I want to solo damn it! Takes 4th place.
LoY? Wait a minute, this was an expansion? I thought it was a PATCH. It's a great expansion, decent content (wtf is with this charm slot? even after several years there are very few good items to put here that most casual players can get their grubby little paws on) and a new race is always nice. Maps/DYES (omg, no more tinted fine plate for me!)/and mid-level spell quests (although all to few) are all tasty fluff, but in the end, it's just that. Fluff.
And PoP....the expansion that makes me cry because it ruined the game yet I CAN'T STOP USING IT. Planar progression is not my idea of fun, and is suited only for those who are hardcore guild raiders or luck of the draw pick up raids. PoP wouldn't have been so bad if it wasn't for PoK, the most controversial part of the expansion, and arguably the game. These days it's almost impossible to play EQ without going to PoK for a C3 or conv. Want to plunder into the depts of Lower Guk or Befallen <cough> but you're on the other side of the world? Don't worry, poor n00blette, you don't have to actually have fun adventuring out into the world and finding your way off of Odus, or across the great plains of karana. Simply look at that stone statue book and poof, you're in another plane of existance where every race that is currently warring with each other is magically at peace, sipping tea and discussing the weather. Now, simply journey across this haven of love and MGB's, and you can land anywhere in the world in the blink of an eye without having to learn anything or actually experience the game.
All the other expansions? Eh, who cares. Nothing new, just more zones, more mobs/raid bosses, more uber loot to buy and sell in the bazaar, and general fluff all around. Kunark and Velious are by far, the best expansions in the game, and which one is actually better can be debated for the rest of my miserable life ;)
And with one more expansion guaranteed for EQ, I can't see how they could mess it up any more than PoP did. Hopefully, they'll add some decent mid-level content, or something revolutionary like LDoN, but in all likelyhood, it'll be another faceless expansion like GoD or OOW. <crosses fingers> This next expansion will probably make or break the game, if it bombs the game will die faster than it should. Hopefully, it'll add some extra kick to a game that in all fareness, should have been buried years ago but our loyal fanbase kept alive.