Hello Everybody,
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Thoughts
Jason Bulmahn
Lead Designer
Paizo Publishing
This sounds promising. As long as there is an option for low- to no-magic item gameplay in Pathfinder, I will be happy.
However, I would like to see an option that would allow the static bonuses many have been discussing, and in fact all static item bonuses, to be commuted into inherent bonuses that characters gain as they level up. That means changing item-dependent +X to level-dependent +X, across the board, optionally. (Yes, you Christmas-tree-loving gear-heads can still have your fun. (I mean the epithet affectionately, by the way.)) This would leave room for the more interesting items that everyone's been gushing about, but it would also mean that if a character lost access to a magic item, any magic item, or even ALL of their magic items, they wouldn't be completely SOL, which is the case in 3.5. I think games are made much more fun by having what your character can do be more important and more interesting than what your character has. I want to keep track of what my character is thinking, or feeling, or doing, not how many potions of cure light wounds he's carrying.
On a related but side note, anyone who says that magic items and the "Big Six" can't be completely and elegantly eliminated from 3e has never laid eyes on Iron Heroes by Mike Mearls, who I suspect was conscripted to work on 4e largely because of his work on the aforesaid.