For me as a newbye was very difficult to get ordinary knife, because traders had lots of weapons that doesnt stack, lack of money and offten deaths. I consider knife as a tool like hatchet and sledgehammer, I need knife to gather fibres, but i need 60 skillpoints in melee weapons to make it - its like a spear!
I suggest to change requirements to 45% in melee (10mm pistol required 45% in small guns) and 40 in science. Maybe change the number of knifes from 10 to 5.
srry for my english