Just to start this post - I'm new to the system. Haven't even finished reading the entire book, but I do have experience in game design and I want to throw in my two cents. I'm spelling out my assumptions so that people can poke holes in my ideas with appropriate precision.
The goal of minimum requirements for gear is to create a feeling of growth and specialization in equipment as well as ability. It also helps reign in players replacing their own competence with decent gear as this discourages having a few points here and there if some silver elven craft hedge clippers from the pack mule is objectively better than ranking up in a skill.
The problem is that with dice caps, a player who is skilled in a thing (and thus could benefit from high quality equipment) doesn't actually gain a bonus for having that equipment in practice. The only individuals who take advantage of the bonuses provided by high quality equipment are individuals who aren't skilled at the task in the first place. This, of course, feels wrong. Jim Farmhand shouldn't get more benefit from a Holy Avenger than Sir Derrick the High Paladin.
Removing dice caps isn't an option - it's a fairly core element of the system which exists for a good reason. That being that it forces players to build wider (gaining new skills instead of just increasing the ones they currently have) and makes for more well-rounded characters that are less tempted to min/max out of necessity.
With those assumptions in mind. I can see two options.
First - Reinstate skill requirements, but instead of giving die bonuses, allow them to provide a flat bonus to the roll they are used on. Make it clear gear is the only thing that does this. Instead of a +1d6, gear would provide a low, flat, bonus - even a +1. This allows it to be useful to the skilled user, and the unskilled one. This would create some power creep (increasing the average roll result of a skill by a few points essentially) but could be capped a little by making it so that the result can't exceed what could naturally be gained on the dice (thus increasing reliability of rolls). This does seem to break one of the sacred cows of the system. However, by making gear the only potential source of flat bonuses it may be worth it.
Second - Allow gear to remove penalties to rolls from circumstances and limit the amount removed by skill requirements. This makes gear substantially more situational, but avoids the issue of running into the skill cap. It may come at the cost of interplay between the character and the environment, or the character and his opponent. It could result in brute forcing potentially cinematic challenges, or blowing past enemies using tactics - especially at higher levels. It also runs into the issue with penalties to dice being interchangeable with increase to difficulty. In the game right now, they are interchangeable. With this change, that is no longer the case. I personally like the first idea more than the second.
I'm sure there are other solutions out there, but those are my ideas. The best I can think up at 4am on a phone, with a very half-assed understanding of the system. Best of luck!
