Edit: I'm probably also biased because I put Glass Cannon on both of my mages, but neither of my warriors. I try to take that into account, but...
Oh yeah, that would definitely do it as well. A non-GC character simply cannot compete against a GC character, but you can actually make GC melee just fine. The screenshot above is clearly a GC Madora.
I don't view it as gear dependency so much as Blacksmithing/Crafting dependency. A large steel bar and a bar of Tenebrium barely cost anything at all, but you need to have someone who can make them. You can cheese this by relying on the Hall of Heroes, but I prefer not to; even then, with +Blacksmithing and +Crafting equipment, the investment is minimal. Admittedly, spellcasters are not nearly as reliant on Blacksmithing/Crafting for their damage, but it's a small cost to pay for a lot of extra power.
