The Spirit Realm

I retired from EQ just before dod was released. I have a 70 pally and a 70 shaman I am looking to duo with. they have around 1000 aa's each. They were maxed on all tradeskills...for the time. So I have a few questions.

There used to be a stickied thread that gave the best groupable gear available, is there anything like that still? between the two toons I have around 800k plat, and I can get more, just need to reactivate some other accounts, but was waiting until I got an e-mail for a free 14 days or whatever they do once a year.

Hotzones the quickest way to level? there a great spot to stop and level aa's? (a bunch of new defensive and offensive aa's I need)

Should I bother with spells or just level and if it is buyable buy it?

anyone still playing this game or is it at the point where if you do not have friends allready you are out of luck?

For lower level, defiant gears completely upturned what ever are available. You can pretty much level to 75 to 80 using them. Once you got to 80, just jump straight into T1 HoT stuff which can be purchased in Bazaar. Culture also is a viable solution, but not a cheap one.

70 is a great level to stop and gain AA in Hole, next is 80 to 85 in RoI, Hotzones often are worse than standard ones so pick and choose.