The vast majority of the questions in Lineage II, have the same answer, "Depends"! In order to reply to that question, I would have to say, "depends on what you want to do". Are you a man with a plan or you are trying thins out until you like something and start playing that?
In general, you really need a "shifting goal" in order to stay motivated into playing the game, let me explain. This game requires a lot of time and patience, this is not a fast-paced game, you make take weeks or even months to get a level in most cases there are ways to get levels faster depending on your class and/or level, of course ongoing events is also something to consider when leveling but lets start small.
In most games you select a class that you like to play, however in Lineage II you have to select a class that you can sustain and play that, until you are able to play the class that you like and use the Red Libra event [] to switch classes.
With the total revamping of the support classes that is estimated to be completed by 2025, all players will be able to farm their own adena, something that was not possible for tanks/healers and enchanters, most if not all had to rely on their dualclass or a second account they used as a way to earn adena in places like Tower of Insolence or Pantheon.
Lets start with another generality, you cannot play the game absolutely free, once you hit 105 while still with the quest gear, each mob will seem like a raid boss. You will soon come to realize that some form of investment will have to go in the character so here is my list, starting with toons that need the least amount of gear.
As far as damage dealers go, Eviscerator, Dagger, Summoner, Death Knight, Tyrr, Shinemaker, Feoh, Archer. Now for support Enchanter, Healer and Tank you cannot really solo PvE just yet but they are not nearly as cheap as the single target classes. Each class group the common skills and then the class specific skills that separate one class from another.
Each class has its pros and cons:
Eviscerator: Single target melee damage dealer with high evasion, this is the only class that relies entirely in melee attacks and requires normal critical damage.
Daggers: There are 4 different classes, Fortune Seeker, Ghost Hunter, Wind Rider and Adventurer with the first one being the best PvE class due to the 30% pve damage passive skill and the Ghost Hunter being the best one for PvP. The rest are not "bad" but it really comes down to the class specific skills since the Wind Rider has cooldown and Adventurer has a boost in hp/cp. The best part about daggers is that they benefit from both normal critical damage and skill critical damage, so if an item has both the stats, the dagger will hit harder.
Summoners: Newly revamped class, master and pets are affected by matk and require mage items. The combination of ranged attacks/debuffs between the master and the pets along with the transfer pain and balance heal make this class a killing machine.
Death Knight: The DK is the current FOTM class being able to do extremely well in PvE with the right build, it really has everything, from skill critical rate in 3 different self buffs to 2 ranged skills as well as 3 different AOEs, this class can do wonders with the right amount of reuse. Just remember there is a limit on items with reuse so it becomes pricy after a certain point.
Tyrr Warrior: With a selection of 6 different classes the Tyrr Warriors are a class that every MMO has, Class specific skills are what makes the big different between them. They are in my opinion the most versatile class and can pretty much survive quite a bit due to their self buffs and the build that you select to do. All Tyrrs play with skill crit damage build to be more precise, they only use skills to either PvE or PvP, unlike the good old pole parties we did back in the day with a Titan killing everything and the rest sipping cocktails!
Shinemaker: New Mage class that uses both a bow and a slasher, the only class as of 2024 that can alter between weapons and also have a different set of skills for each one, Ranged single target for the bow, close combat aoe with the slasher. Able to take a hit or 2 before dying and also having the flexibility & jumps of a wizard.
Feoh: Classic wizards, aoe class but not that strong to do high level/ endgame areas, requires a lot of gear to build one properly and is not that popular among the damage dealers. Eech feoh has 2 or more different elemental stances, which determine what skills he is going to use.
Archer: The most gear hungry class in the game, requires a substantial amount of gear to be able to do anything but once the gear is there, noone can outdamage this class, There are 4 different classes with opinions varying on which one is the best class since each one of them have for the most part the same skills, only the self buffs are different and the newly added lv110 skill. Pure damage, the Ghost Sentinel is the strongest, then Saggitarius and Trickster are roughly the same with Moonlight Sentinel, being last, however the Moonlight Sentinel has 10% more reuse than the rest and a 3rd aoe, giving the class huge potential with the right gear.
Tanks, Enchanters and Healers:
A revamp for some of the classes has taken place and the rest are in progress.