You mean like when I added that Titanium-Gold Alloy? Yeah Progression is difficult in those situations.
All in all I would say it just depends on the Tech itself, maybe I would not even add that new Tech to the Earlygame and add something you need from Lategame in order to make such a thing. In Minecraft its hard to solve, but for my own Game it would be quite simple actually, since there I would have an Intelligence Stat that I could base Information related Stuff on.
Like for example you have two Gold Ingots with you, both of a different size and both of them having their weight written on them:
- With an insanely low INT Stat you couldn’t even read that Text because you dont know what “Karat” are (reading itself would be a separate stat on a per language basis), and you would not even be able to tell those two Ingots apart (as in they stack together in the UI, even though in the internal Data they are different)
- With an average INT Stat you know “yeah those two Ingots are different”, so you can take the Stack of 2 slightly different Ingots apart and make two separate Stacks without ending up on RNG for which Ingot you have grabbed out of the Stack.
- With a high INT Stat you would end up even knowing how much each Ingot is worth in addition to that.
- And with a very high INT Stat you would notice that someone screwed you over and that the Text on the Ingots saying how much Karat they are was actually a Lie, and that they are worth much less! (and you dont even need a Scale to notice that)
Ofcourse with such Stats you can do a Research System based on that and unlock Recipes that way. And then those way new Inventions that nobody thought of but are insanely Low Tech do make sense not being available to you.
People with a low INT Stat would also not just ruin the Game for themselves, there is ways other than doing it yourself to unlock Stuff, such as NPCs who you can tell to do the Research for you in some way shape or form. Or just go to the Library to get a Book with the Recipes you need, unless you cant read ofcourse.
Also if you do Research yourself you should have a Book and something to write with on you, that way you can automatically write down your findings in whatever ingame Language you selected for Recipe Books. or with a high INT Stat you could even encrypt those Books some way so others cant read them even if they DO know the Language.
Lots of Stuff. 