I really recommend using the mod Frackin' Universe with Starbound. It's huge, adding a ton of well-integrated content that expands the game on every aspect.

The Trailer Park Boys in Space mod is close to excellent but some of the added items are broken (holding a ghetto blaster = crash.) I didn't have any luck with the TPB character spawners, either, nor did the regular colony deeds work when I had a TPB spawner on screen. I'm guessing this is something that got broken with the colonization update and hopefully will be repaired eventually. The pixel art is so great, though, and Ricky's car on the front lawn really makes a place feel like home. The kitty cat portraits that spawn cats also work, so you can fill up a place with cats real quick, which is important.

Zetta Team's Creative Mode pretty much does what it says on the tin, though I can't get the random equipment box to actually do anything. If you want to free buiid without all that pesky game in the way it's not a bad choice.

The Modified Manipulator mod may be just the right amount of cheating for the impatient but serious gamer. The weakness of the early manipulator ray is probably the most irritating thing about early game. For a chronic restarter like myself, it's simply intolerable to always build & demolish at minimum speed. A more powerful manipulator ray can translate to real gameplay advantage (instant escape routes for you/instant sinkholes for your foes), but mostly it just makes things less agonizingly slow. I can see not wanting to install it on your multiplayer server (oh, look, a noob effortlessly & instantly vacuumed up our entire home planet... again), but for private play settling for a weak manipulator for even a few hours just seems like masochism to me.

I've not yet bought Starbound but probably will soon. Would Frackin' Universe make most sense to install right from the beginning, or would it make more sense to play "vanilla" Starbound for awhile, before installing it?

I ask because, if installing FU meant that I really would miss out on what the regular vanilla planets are supposed to look like, I'd feel like that was something of a loss.

Oh, with this rather silly manipulator module system in place, it takes at least three upgrades to get the manipulator up to competent levels. Personally I think I much preferred doing the quests for the upgrades, rather than aimlessly milling about in hopes of finding them. (I'm also not enjoying the boss set pieces.)

As for the random equipment box not working, as far as I can tell, all random equipment has been removed from the game because ???.

I found the default manipulator tolerable. It would probably be a pain after restart, but that is about the same same as restarting in Terraria, exchanging endgame pickaxe for a copper one is awful feeling. I already finished ore progression with 3x3 manipulator and one upgrade to mining speed and it felt ok.

You have to reset the universe after changing mods. Also, Frackin' is a very complex mod. Play vanilla and if it's not complex enough, switch off to FU.