What to do about a damaged stipple ceiling?
What I ended up doing was putting up batons on the ceiling and plasterboard over the top. We did this with the other wall which was questionable too.

Benefits here are that the finish is much better once finished, and it's decidedly less plastering than doing the entire wall.

The cost was likely higher than if we had plastered, but the end result was much better.

If we had decided to plaster over, the stipple paper would have come up relatively easily with a scraper and some elbow grease.