Sure, if you want to wait weeks. There are definitely more ways now with the ascending system, no question. You can grind your way through 345 marks (minus either 75 or 120 depending on what you can get from Xur) and buy each gear and then play PoE 34 each week to ascend. All of that takes a lot of time haha. Just that when waiting on your final gear if you're level 33 and you can't get carried in a L34, your main chances are
1) Varik's RNG to have your gear type
2) Nightfall RNG for Etheric
3) Getting Carried through PoE 34 as a L33 for Etheric
4) Iron Banner to rank 3 (once a month, not that often for it to be viable most weeks) [+ 5k glimmer, can't forget that]
5) Trials 7 wins (hard for a lot)
Still RNG or carried or being awesome at PvP are the ways haha.