Isn't it only pay-to-win if people can purchase things from the game's store which they cannot acquire through grinding in-game? if the developer was to only "seed" the game initially with mods and ships but then turn over the economy to the players through an uncapped tier based crafting system then everything in the game has to be created by the players. As in MK1, MK2, MK3 shields for your ship (for example).

Perhaps dig into CSC. The concept of that MMO was great but unfortunately the company decided to let the game go.  

 making it sats implies there’s ways to get them in and out or transfer them between players. Once it’s on bitcoin then you can bring money from the real world to buy more resources in game. 

 I understand what you're saying. But those resources were mined by someone (not duped) and by buying them you'll have to pay them for their labour. If the economy is balanced well then resources would be scarce enough to have value on the market and if you want to "pay-to-win" me $1,000 for some ores so that you can fast track to a plasma shield MK3, your call 😉