A quick post about the quirks of designing the meta progression in Dr. Professor Scientist's Weapons Testing Facility

Meta progression what is it?
Quick opener on the topic meta progression is the progression that happens outside of the regular gameplay loop. In many games, especially roguelikes it is about unlocking new weapons, classes and paths in your subsequent runs. 

The meta progression in DPSWTF
The meta progression in DPSWTF goes by the research, as you do in science. Every wave defeated you gain points equal to the waves number. So if you beat wave 7: you would gain 7 points towards the next unlock. The idea is to double down on dopamine hits for reaching far into the game where every subsequent wave reached soars your research points. 

Every time you started a research you'd get to choose between the three options, which were tied to your progression in the loose tech tree based on number of researches completed. Some unlocks gated behind unlocking a certain set of prior researches. 

On to the meat at hand: the researches were 99% of the time either modifiers or projectiles that you would unlock, widening your arsenal for the current and following runs. This had two effects, both it widened the available pool of projectiles and diluted the strength of your runs. Giving a small hidden effect increasing the difficulty. 
The dilution resulted in you having less chance of upgrading your components(projectiles or modifiers) by gaining three of the same one. 

Problems with the system
The system itself is a bit obtuse and the dilution had a side effect of "feeling bad". Most players have had the following feedback: "I felt so much more powerful when I could upgrade and find the items I wanted." 
We couldn't strike a good enough balance in the progression algorithm to ease you over the hump. A few follow up mechanics did ease the fact in future patches with favored and disfavored components(even more effective the higher tier component you trashed into those "altars"). And by the disciplines, locking some components into their respective runs, increasing the concentration and player agency in choosing their playstyle. 
Nonetheless the result wasn't enough, more should have been done. 

Afterwords
This has been quite the word-salad, but I hope you could gleam some insight into what went through our heads when designing this meta system. The one thing I can say is that next time we can be even better. 
If you are interested at all to understand more of this game, go purchase it. We are on sale for -50% off :)

Regards
Vlue
Cool Smithy Games