I am still making my way through the podcast, but I had an idea in relation to the 2-point skill.  What if you made the 2pt spend a "down payment" on an eventual 4pt skill?  Consider this scenario:

A player wants to gain an advantage in identifying numenera in a specific location.  This would typically be a 2 pt buy.  As you noted, this is expensive for something that will only be useful for a session or two.  However, as a "downpayment" this could be the first part of their research into the general nature of the numenera.  When they later spend two more points, they upgrade the skill buy to a full training or specialization.  This could be described in story ("Work the numenera we recovered in the last caverns made me realize something about the strange symbols carved into numenera (microcircuit channels)...").  This makes the 2pt buys worth more and can open up some compelling story opportunities to make skill development less abrupt.

Alternatively, one could make the 2pt buys a little more general.  Instead of buying specialization in numenera in this one cavern, maybe you can buy specialization in a specific type of numenera (nanotech controls, datasphere interfaces, etc.).  If the skill covers a little less than half of the numenera they encounter, it may seem worthwhile -- also providing a nice narrative hook because the player has something specific to differentiate their expertise.

Just kicking around some ideas. 

I have several ideas for topics of future Strange Encounters segments.  But, I wanted to see if others had specific topics they would like to hear me address.  Any requests?

Agent Niehl (@Agent_Niehl on Twitter)