[Suicide Junkie]

Also, the Basic lifesupport component claims "not built to withstand battle damage" and has only 1 hitpoint.

That will almost ensure that the lifesupport is the LAST component destroyed. If it had an armor ability, it would be the first to go, though.

The 20% defense penalty forever seems a pretty harsh effect for just going cheap on the lifesupport.

I'd reccommend having something like +50% defense on lifesupport (with -50% on all hulls to cancel it out).
The ship would operate normally until it gets hit, and loses its ability to dodge when the crew all die from lack of the support systems.