I play without buying a single thing. Everything I use, I quest, hunt or tradeskill myself. Leveling up, the only area that seemed difficult for me was to find some good melee weapons in the 30-50 range. You can pretty much find decent stuff for every slot. I was never uber, but never outclassed by the content.
(I played the same way on Live, and let me tell you, when the content is geared towards players that wear stuff that drops from mobs 30 levels above theirs, you notice it quite quickly.)