You will have to pry my XL out of my cold dead hands. I farking love that thing. I had the same dilemma before I went with the XL. My buddy sells them and he had the L on the truck on the way to my house when I had an epiphany, so I called him and told him to load up the XL instead. Best move I could've made.
Now that's just me and maybe I am burning a tad more lump than I would with a L. I don't care, #1 I've never cooked on a large so I don't have any basis of comparison so maybe that's for the best and #2 to me it's worth it to be able to use it without all those racks and stuff, maybe because I'm lazy.
I only have a plate setter and on occasion I use two bricks and the grate from my 22' kettle when I need an extra rack. I like to be able to go out and throw 4 racks of BB's right on the grate, or if I cook something in a pan I can get 2 half pans or 1 full disposable pan right on the grate. I'll bet with my second ghetto grate and 2 rib racks I could probably do 10 racks or more. I wanted to have something that had enough room to entertain and I've yet to find myself looking for more room.
Now that I look at this pic, I've actually had 2 racks of spares and 3 racks of BB's on there at once. I'm certain you could get this amount of meat on a large with some finagling, and someone will probably post some pics of just that. Which I encourage. It's nice to have all your options lined up for you.
In the end you'll probably end up just like me after reading everyone's different opinions on the L vs. XL....even more confused. I guess you really can't go wrong with either one, you know unless you pick the wrong one.
When I bought my 50in. TV it only took me a week to wish I'd have spent the extra money and got the 55. Just sayin'.