I get that it is your opinion. It just happens to be wrong.
It’s not unreasonable to rock 1100 hp, divine saves, 1200 mana, mild stat coverage, a number of disarm proof weapons, and some proggyness all without metal gear. Hell you can get virtually all of that with just a set of silver dragon eq plus Druid only gear, so it’s really not hard at all.
So yeah are there good metal things you can’t use? Sure. But there are plenty of dragon gear, Druid only gear, light armor stuff that covers everything you could possibly need to be very competitive.
So please stop trying to discourage players based on your poorly crafted opinion.
This is mostly in an Walkthrough in the wiki ffs.