Thanks for the considered reply!
I find that a lot of incrementals are about waiting for numbers to reach an arbitrary point and then being disoriented by a bunch of upgrades before being forced to "prestige" which is really a downgrade. So I switch it up with progress bars, "crafts", and other more concrete or lifelike situations, and fit them into the incremental model.
I like a lot of your concrete suggestions. I can always use interface suggestions. I'm seeing from comments that this could be a good long-form game, and adding features like dismantling would make it a lot easier on me, preventing the need to analyze skill unlocks to avoid soft-locking the game.
For the theme, I really wish I'd added the text "Capped at 1" on every item. People didn't associate "unique" with "1". The game was designed around the theme entirely, I didn't even have an idea for a game before the theme came out. I didn't want to play with some math to make the skills appear as if they were capped at 1 without it affecting the mechanics. I did it with the progress bars, and now you can't tell how long something will take. Every button caps at one to the detriment knowledge, but that isn't enough to count for the mechanics-based theme? As a long-form game, you better believe there would be 10k screws and 5k metal plates to craft a "chamber" or whatever. I just have to remember to spell out themes for people, my interpretations are too unusual.
Ok, sorry for that bit of rant. I do appreciate the feedback and I'll look for someone to look over the interface before I post my next game.