The only time I may deploy frigates late in the game is Remnant attacks that are too small to warrant a capital to deploy. Unlike other factions, Remnants are fearless and never run away. Frigates are also good for auto-resolving pursuit, but you can equip your frigates with junk weapons and they will do just as well.
Recovering your ships is easy. Put Reinforced Bulkheads if you really care about the hull. However, recovering good weapons is hard. The only way to get around that somewhat is to rely on ships that can use common weapons (open market and black market staples) effectively. (For example, Lasher with machine guns, mortars, and annihilators or single shot harpoons).
It makes using high-tech ships a bit of a pain. Weapons useful for them are in the black market, and the really common ones are limited to pulse lasers and low-grade (LR) PD lasers. Other energy weapons (like phase lance, AM blasters, and maybe ion cannons) are rarer.
If you really want to use the good stuff that is hard to find, be prepared to reload the game as soon as you lose it.
I do wish that better weapons are more common. I get a bit tired of using open market stuff all of the time.