ok been in beta 1 week exactly
in that time i've got a lvl 23 crusader and 4 other characters to lvl 5-10. Once you go through newbie isle once getting your characters up is a snap.

Pvp: have only done a one largeish encounter where a group of lvl 40+ guys (shadowclan i believe) were killing people. Immediatly 20+ people came and formed groups and we went on the offensive (sure we got slaughtered but it was fun we might even have taken a couple of em with us)

I've taken retribution on some people who were jerks on newbie isle who didn't think people would remember them (ie training mobs on my group and then laughing and looting our corpses)i made it to 20 before they did
1on 1 combat is pretty entertaining.

Lag was a serious problem last week but it's getting better daily.

Well im off to play some more.