AFCSoff.
Have to agree that after a usable body glass is the right investment.
The 18-200VR is good lens in terms of size and capabilty, all depends what you want to do with it. If the rotor shots are typical of your sort of shooting, well. I would sell it off and buy a 70-200 f/2.8. Of course this is a personal and biased opinion. Try to take one out for a test and make up your own mind.
The 70-200 f/2.8 is obviously fast, the AF is swift, impressed my Canon friends, the lens is well balanced for the size/weight and very easy to use. Most impressive though is the crispness of image.
I bought a D200 for two reasons. a) improved AF speed, the 70-200 is now pretty rapid and b) better control over focus points. A mixed blessing.
The motor drive, oops I mean continous mode, has two states. CH is 5 fs and CL is definable between 1 and 4fps, useful.
One thing I have not yet used is the on-board intervalometer, in built time lapse capability !
D300, well there have been many rumours. Most turned out to be wrt the D3.
My kit is D200,
Nikkor 18-70mm f/3.5-4.5G IF-ED
Nikkor 80-200mm f/2.8D ED
Micro-Nikkor 60mm f/2.8D
Nikkor TC-20E II 2.0x AF-S Tele converter, so I lose two stops, only ever used with an f2.8 so we still win.
SB-800
Sigma EM 140 DG Ring Flash
Manfrotto 434B and 055 WNB with various heads.
Good luck and take care, The Mad Monk.
