If you're not actually having fun crafting, then don't. Quests and drops should give you plenty of gear. You can also do some levequests to find some. Don't worry about throwing away low level gear, either - that stuff is all super cheap and can mostly be bought from NPC vendors anyway.

However, if you intend to continue playing Gladiator, you should try to level Conjurer to level 15. It should take a couple of hours, tops. At level 30 as Gladiator, if you have level 15 conjurer, you can unlock Paladin. You'll retain your gladiator level as a paladin but get access to paladin abilities. You'll want to level Marauder to 26 (for Mercy Stroke) and Conjurer to 34 (for Stoneskin) eventually, but those can wait until your paladin is higher level.