What it isn't, is some great big guy in a soup can with a fully heirloomed greatsword frothing at the mouth, pretending that muscle memory is a substitute for skill.
This game is losing players because it has become about effective builds using the most efficient gear and the best, most balanced, stats.
What....the....fuck? Muscle memory is exactly what skill is in this type of game. Is a professional football player skilled at what he does? I assume you would say yes to that, thats 80% muscle memory, 10% talent, 10% knowing what to do.
A skilled swordfighter, his skill consists pretty much completely out of muscle memory.
But of course that depends upon your definition of skill. For me it is doing something that noone else can do and doing it better than any could have imagined, as well as inventing your own moves and abilities.
Your definition of skill sucks balls. No one is skilled according to it.
You'd better stick to this definition: 'Proficiency, facility, or dexterity that is acquired or developed through training or experience.'
According to this definition, this is a skill game. Say you join this game as a complete noob. Someone tells you what the perfect 2h build is, gives you looms for the right armour and right twohander. Would you do good? No, cause you have no experience, you have no muscle memory as far as blocking and attacking goes, you have no knowledge of battle mechanics and maps, you have no idea how other classes work and have no idea of their strength and weaknesses.
Would you be able to get a kill? Probably, does that make this less of a skill game? No, it doesn't. It just shows that even the perfect player can still die and the worst player can still kill. Which is necesarry to keep this fun for all.
The lack of individiuality is also not as bad as you say. There are tons of armour combinations to choose from, tons of effective builds. There are tons of less effective builds, that players choose because they want to be original or because they see them as fun. You are an extreme form of one of these players. Your problem is not that the game mechanics lack individuality. Its your extreme desire for complete uniqueness that is your problem. No game offers that while still making you able to compete with the rest.
No game offers that, cRPG does a pretty good job.