Gear. Does the gear make the musician or does the musician make the gear?

There's nothing more akin to whipping it out and producing measuring tape in the music world than talking about your gear. It almost seems like an instant way to gain cred as a guitarist when you start talking about your soundboard setup and what kind of amp you're running through and yada yada yada blah blah blah.
Granted, I love talking tech about guitar.
My point is, there are some shitty ass guitar players out there running on the best equipment, using the best patch cords, the better to clearly and crisply amplify their sucktitude. Gear doesn't make a bad guitarist good...but does it make a good guitarist better?
I've been playing for long enough that I'd like to classify myself as a good guitarist; I don't think I could blow anyone's mind with my riffs, but they're catchy and I can play them consistently. However, my "gear" consists of the following:
1. My guitar.
2. My Boss DS-1 distortion pedal (A gift from Dom. Thanks bro!)
3. My various patch chords.
4. My amp.
...
5. My MAGIC FINGAS!
I'm a decent guitarist, but could I be classified as better if I threw in a noise suppressor, equalizer, wah, flanger etc etc.?
That's a problem I have with really effects-y gear. Take...Slash, for example. GREAT GUITARIST, no one will argue. But listen to one of his guitar solos and mentally extract the wah from them. I'll wait for you to get back. (Personally, I chose "Slither" by Velvet Revolver but I'm sure there are much better examples)
*whistles*
See? He's so used to leaning on the wah that alot of his solos are wah filler; now imagine a Slash guitar solo made up of all the non-wah filler parts.
It's ok, I had a guitargasm too.
Now, take an absolute dick but amazing guitarist, Yngwie Malmsteen. My favorite video clip of him playing is on the G3 Live in Denver DVD, in between Steve Vai(wanker)'s set and his. He's just sitting on a couch, using an old Marshall tube amp, his guitar plugged right into it, no pedals, just straight amp distortion, tearin' up some arpeggios like the flabby, past-his-prime guitar god he is. And it's AWESOME.
However, measuring myself to Yngwie is like trying to measure my yearly income against Bill Gates, or my personal level of social ostracism to that of Pauly Shore. And the rough, crackly sound of unassisted distortion suits Yngwie's style; I don't know that it suits mine.
Basically, thanks to a very gear-driven conversation I had earlier, I want to acquire a noise suppresion pedal. I'd like to hear the deep chugging of Zweihander on my Peavey Valveking without the annoying buzz. But pedals are expensive, and I'm not rolling in dough at the moment.
PITY PARTY AND EVERYONE IS INVITED.

Conclusion for Brian: I don't wanna get effects pedals so much as pedals which will take some of the suck out of my sound.

\m/,
Brian