Not really. V:TM core rulebook has a setting chapter(237-251(not including the massive amount of setting material in the front of the book. Which starts on pg 24 and ends on pg 55.) that is longer than the combat chapter (only 12 pages on combat) .The disciplines chapter. If you look at the story teller section(254-267) it tells you what kind of themes and stories that game tells the best. It does tell you about the power structure of vampire society, the theme of loss etc... the pathfinder core rulebook sets up a clear example of combat by CR. Suggestions on how to change the car based on other factors like terrain or numbers etc.... The combat chapter is the Longest chapter in the book. Pathfinder is clearly focused on tactical combat.
Not sure about the Pathfinder books, but remember that 3, and 3.5 had a book mostly based on world building and how to run things - the DMG - which has multiple chapters on how to set up your world, as well as generally having setting books which then detail more about the specific game world they're written for. I'd have to reread WoD, but I seem to remember there being far more than 12 pages on combat.
As for your roleplay cr explanation the bit about wealth by level is completely ignored with regard to rp encounters. So yeah if I play a scene where I am trying to complete a task for someone sure I could get wealth by level. However that goes right out the window of plausibility when I am say helping a poor innocent man stand trial and get a not guilty verdict. If I am his advocate I get paid by the poor pauper. If I am level 1 the party should get somewhere between 170-400 gold for this. Gold I know he doesn't have. Am I to assume he just happens to have an heirloom worth that much that he wouldn't sell to get himself an advocate instead of lucking up and finding me. The only reason wealth by level exists is because the characters are supposed to get more money to buy better adventuring gear so they can go get more wealth and so on. The only things that keep going up in price in the core rulebook are, all the magic items. Primarily magic weapons and armor. So wealth by level exists is to earn more items to get better at fighting. I would say this is a fair criticism of the game.
The money wouldn't necessarily have to come from the poor defendant directly. Perhaps the court awards you fees when you win. Perhaps he knows where there is a "lightly" guarded treasure that he's now willing to tell you about, or perhaps, as I suggested, the difference is simply made up by adding a little bit here and there to treasure you'd find anyway - at low level perhaps an orcish leader has a masterwork item rather than a normal one, or they've got a more valuable item than is expected? Or perhaps the defense is needed now, and given a month or two, he could contact his cousin in another city who has their grandfather's sword from when he was an adventurer?
Wealth by level is a guide though, and is primarily meant as a yardstick for the GM to compare against, not a rigid formula. Being a hundred or so gold down at level 2/3 isn't the end of the world, and it is easy to compensate for if the GM is paying attention - there's even a section of the rulebook that works around the problem of over or under equipping the party.
As for Vampire games devolving into combat/power fests. I don't really see the combat heavy WoD game often. As for the powers.(pg 237- 278) Yeah I can see them getting used often but in defense it is often to avoid combat. Also that chapter would be much smaller if it were disciplines that are seen in the Camerillia, or at least take out/ignore disciplines that PCs are unlikely to have or encounter like Necromancy, Serpentis etc...
We must have vastly different experiences of WoD then. Almost every game I've played of it has degenerated into Potence/Fortitude/Celerity/Protean brawls, or into Dominate/Presence "you can't act" scenes - which then turns into them steadily murdering anyone they've got paralysed for the scene.