First char i created was a Aasimar cleric.. turned out ok, my friend mr. Panthalones created a wizard githzerai i think it was... well we reached about lvl 20 in hmm just over a week? something like that... well we play pretty much

Anyway, when xp starts going down having a ecl char actually makes it easier to lvl since you get more minimum xp, my cleric is now 24 and i'm getting over 20 xp for killing one rat...and same for killing one town guard...i guess this problem will be solved with the high lvl areas but somehow i have the feeling that in the end it will be something similar unless there will be some really really high lvl areas for lvl 35+ only or something..just my 2 cents
btw i think Herons suggestion would be quite a good idea, interesting to try anyway, would give the ecl chars a bit better chance in the start giving ppl a reason to play them other then to have the mightiest character possible at lvl 40

NS3-central-> Head of the Goodmanner family.
NS4-> Trixy Goodmanner,
Trixy Meatshield