I used to love EQ2 until SOE killed it by making it too easy mode and the crap changes they did to Freeport.

It's F2P now though (even though they'd previously said they'd never make sub-based servers into F2P, do'h).
But yeah, I stopped playing Aion when they started making it F2P. Huge unfair advantages there. CoH/CoV is F2P now, and I loved the game when I first played it, but I haven't played it since it when F2P so I can't tell you if it's still good or not. AoC if F2P now too, and although the game had a serious lack of content and bad start, it's a bit more polished now. Funcom still can't do expansions though; that Asian place (I forget the name of it) was the definition of grind. You literally did the same few quests and areas over and over to gain favor with your chosen factions... when a game becomes more tedious work than fun entertainment, then it's tome for me to quit.
Like others, I'd have to recommend GW2. It's pretty awesome so far. It'll probably be like $50 for the initial game but no fees after that. Or you could always pony up (FOR PONY!) the $25 or so for Minecraft and play on some RPG server. ;p