I have proposed that countless times:
- have all rats to drop “broken” meta/faction/DS/Officer modules.
- Broken modules are inoperable as is but can be repaired
- in order to repair any meta module you need a T1 equivalent
What this will achieve:
- higher mineral consumption
- a way for newer players to do some meaningful T1 industry besides mining and selling ore
- a logical explanation for lower salvage from dropped meta modules (they are “broken”)
- a better meta-modules will cease to be cheaper than plain T1 (market sanity)
and finally - that way ALL modules will be truly produced by players.