right now the wreckage other than the "chest" style bits is all very uniform: scattered randomly, but all at zero health, and all returning more or less the same resources. it feels a bit artificial, I guess?

my thoughts on a solution would be to give the wreckage a bit of health variation: between 0 and 30 or 50 percent randomly. so, clearly bent and broken, but not all so unnaturally seeming at the end of life. I'd expect that people mostly mine it away anyhow, which isn't a huge amount of time wasted on higher health.

on the item variation, a bunch of different items that had the same sprite, and some (pregenerated) randomness on how much stuff was returned would make sense.

to me, in the vanilla items, I feel like the things you might be able to salvage in small quantity would be:
iron/steel chests
regular surface pipes
lamps
red/green wires
the pistol and ammo normally found in the inventory -- or perhaps, like, one extra magazine
iron and copper plate, as with steel, in small quantities
copper cable, iron rod, and gear
maybe a couple green circuits
* maybe a low density structure or two

though most intermediates -- especially the high tech ones in two to five items -- would make sense. I'd probably choose to give more high tech ones and less basic ones, because they would be "useful salvage", but half a dozen low density structures don't change the early game at all, and don't really scratch the surface of the amount you need in the mid-game. same with maybe a blue or red circuit: ten, or even a hundred of them, won't really make anything but a tiny boost when I need them. they would be eaten in minutes and a half dozen items at their tier, but they "feel" like a nice high-tech reward to me. "whooo, I salvaged me some really good electronics!" when you have, y'know, two stones to bang together at the start of the game. :)

ultimately, though, the take-away is that I "feel" that the results are wonderful in terms of position, damage, behaviour, look, etc, but that there are a few places that feel too artificially identical right now.

The hit points of the wreckage are determined by how much is left by the fires. If the fire burns out on its own the wrecks takes about 40 damage. If the fire damage stacks they are destroyed entirely. I could make them fire resistant, but you still end up with them taking a very similar amount of damage.

My concept is that the starship is far higher technology than anything the player will ever create. It’s a starship, mich more advanced than a simple rocket. The least advanced items I could see adding would be blue circuits, which are so far from useful to the player until end game that it would be more for flavor than anything else.

I’m half inclined to remove the steel and copper cable that is currently salvageable from the wreckage and change it back to being simply debris that is only an obstacle to be cleared away. The “QuickStart” aspect of the mod is really aimed towards the machines, anyway.

I respect that decision.

Sorry, I meant to explain why things are the way they are, not to shoot down your suggestions. You raise a very good point that it feels very artificial to have everything exactly the same. I think I’ll give the wreckage some fire resistance, and also randomize HP when each piece is created. That should give a much more chaotic feel as the player wanders the wreckage.

For salvageable items I like the idea of getting copper cable that helps the player to build those first few critical green circuits, even if they don’t find actual green circuits (how primitive!) in the spaceship wreckage.

Steel is the most advanced bulk material in Factorio base that has any reasonable early game use. I know I’d love to be able to build Heavy armor or some red ammo without having to set up a whole steel line.

As funny as the image is, I can’t see finding much in the wreckage of an advanced spaceship that would be directly applicable to building a crude steam engine. (Iron pipes & plates.)

I think giving blue circuits would be nice. The player would have to store them for a long time, but it’s a really pleasant, big boost to getting some power armor equipment in the mid game.

From a feel perspective, it is monotonous to see every piece of wreckage list the same “expected resources.” I’m thinking I’ll move away from that entirely and give items to the player by script. Every piece of wreckage will be a surprise present!

No, no, uh, totally fine! I had communicated my view, you communicated your view why things are as they are.

I think you heard and understood what I had to say, and if your decision is that it should stay as-is, I respect that. Basically, I was trying to say "you have creative control, and I respect your right to that" (as opposed to "you have creative control, and I'm gonna whine on the forums until you give in" ;)

Thank you for hearing me. I'm pleased you also like the ideas, but ultimately, I'm also happy that you write your mod, not mine. ;) (I'll just ask politely that we share the crashy bits somehow if it ever comes to that, haha)