Rift Progression Curve Notes

My Rift Cleric hit level 24 over the weekend, but I've side-tracked a bit working on some alts (a level 12 Mage with Outfitter and a brand new level 7 Rogue).  A few observations:
  • After seeing how Blizzard did Cataclysm, I'm really glad to have the exp curve set in a way that allows me to do stuff like Rifts without outleveling the zone I'm in.  I might skip the last hub or two of Gloamwood when I get that far, but that's more because the zone somehow hasn't caught my attention - it's pretty, but I've seen dark and gloomy many times before. 
  • As I noted in my first launch impressions, getting all the souls for a class in the extremely low levels feels like an odd progression choice.  By the mid 20's, my pure soul builds are already nearing the top "branches" of their soul trees.  There are still a few more abilities to be gained from the "roots" (and many abilities scale with the total points spent in that soul, up to 51 if you go back and take everything including the stuff you didn't want the first time). 

    The good news is that I can now look at a 10-12 point base in another tree without doing too much damage to my intended main focus, so this opens up options, but it is starting to feel like progress is slowing down.
  • Of all the Cleric builds I've tried, the 20+ Shaman/10 Justicar build seems to be the most effective.  I don't have much for ranged, which can be a problem in Rifts with bouncing aggro, but I do good damage and I can solo a single elite mob (or multiple non-elites) through self-healing.  On the downside, it's starting to bore me because it's getting a bit easy (which is part of why I'm trying the other classes suddenly).  
Overall, things are still fun, and it still looks like I have a decent amount of game ahead of me.