I love how a lot of people are blaming this on "vertical progression"...
This type of problem exists in games with "horizontal progression" too, y'know. Except in that case it's worse: You need specific gear with specific stats, and since you have no hope of actually outgearing it, you need to get all the other gear from other places first, during which people will give you the same attitude because you don't have the set of gear you're trying to get the gear to get.