Not that it is that similar to Elite, but I like World of Tanks. And I like the fact that even though equipment gives you a boost the maximum hovers around, what, 10% or so? And after having fought thousands and thousands of battles your crew has several skills. But even at that stage the combined effect with equipment and consumables is around +20% to total efficiency compared to vanilla. And at that stage with the skills and experience you have gathered over those battles gives you the majority of the edge over others. I think that is the way you do player vs player. (Yes, World of Tanks has the grind too, with tiers of tanks and soft currency required for new tanks. And yes, WoT has been suffering from power creep of premium vehicles. Yet, the effiency bonus level remains the same.)
Elite is a different beast, but I still do not like this equipment (and related grind) over experience angle. But I am old, started Elite on C64 back in the day, nor do I play many online games.
EDIT: At the moment there is no mechanic in place that would level the playing field between a pilot flying a vanilla ship and someone in a god-rolled one. I would have no chance against a pilot of similar skill level in a craft which is a lot faster, deals 70% more damage, and takes, what, half of what I pump out. The difference is insane. And as it would appear developers want more interaction between players, the current situation is not balanced. At least with NPC pilots I can gauge the threat level based on their rank as it appears to scale with their ship.
Not sure what would be a good cure as a tier system would not, most likely, work. Maybe Pilots Federation sanctions to players who engage PCs of lower level? Or cost increase in line with engineered modules. I do not know.