Keep allowing Burning Blade sells under pressure

When I made my initial post on this, I was a little worried it would be shot down. But I'm pleasantly surprised to see most people seem to agree that the issue isn't the turn-in, it's the balance of the event itself.

I've seen multiple scenarios similar to the one you had, and I agree that it's extremely exciting. Rotten Rocko's suggestion of having to do one Ritual is a solid change that I would be in favour of them making. In general, it's great to see people come up with great ideas to balance the event better that don't involve the ship-block.

Part of the problem with the balancing of the event seems to be that it was balanced around the entire server attacking the player-crewed BB. When those scenarios happen, it's super fun. In reality, you only get one ship attacking it the overwhelming majority of the time. Worse yet, it's not even a fun battle if the crew has more than 6 brain cells combined. It's just you doing everything in your power to even remotely slow down the BB in route to the Hideout. That's why the run-n-lower strat seems so OP...because everything leading up to it is so comically OP, bordering on futile, in the majority of cases.

Yep have said all along with multiple ships potentially attacking the bb this is an unreasonable requirement

Hot take: I think that if you can't secure the ship you don't deserve the reward, especially for how much gold you can earn from it.

That being said I'm totally in favor of the obsidian skeletons getting an aiming buff to make them better at fighting multiple ships.
Or, Perhaps buff them by letting players use the wheel of text chat to tell the skeletons what to do.

Your post is a perfect example why I think changing the commendation from “turning in an 8 streak” to just “hitting an 8 streak” would also be beneficial to the gameplay. You fought back until you hit 8 and then started running, because the commendation is the true value in this scenario.

I also agree with others that the event itself needs more balance, but I think removing the turn in condition would help a lot and is a much easier change to implement for the devs. They could continue to work on balancing, but they could easily change it from a turn in to a streak condition as they have that code in place already with the HG commendations.

I don't like the upcoming change either. I'm a firm believer in the philosophy that "it's not yours until you sell it," as it reconciles the PVE and PVP sides of loot struggles. If you PVE you gotta sell before it gets taken, and if you PVP you gotta take before it gets sold. It's a simple and easy win condition that works in every other aspect of the game, from Reaper Chests to Emissary Flags to Chest of Fortune to Skull of Siren Song. So why is it a problem specifically for the Burning Blade? How can Rare say that selling under pressure is not intended?

Yes, it is hard to stop the Burning Blade if they run. But that crew secured the ship themselves, so the ship's advantages are their privilege. Telling the crew that put in the effort to take it and level it that they're obligated to defend it betrays the above philosophy and it's going to tilt the scales of PVE/PVP engagement. Why would anybody bother with rituals and leveling up with the new system? The added insult is the BB crew gain nothing from defending their ship, which is a longtime complaint about PVP that is normally placated by not having to engage at all.

Let me give a live example from this morning. I took the BB uncontested and started running rituals. Nobody bothered me, the few sloops I seen all gave me a wide berth. Then I got to the 8th ritual site at Barnacle Cay and there was a freshly spawned Galleon at Ancient Spire. After finishing the 8th ritual and setting sail for Reaper's, I see the Galleon had set sail and was in hot pursuit. Mind you I wasn't "running," I hit 8 for the commendation and was going to sell anyways. By the time I reached Reaper's the Galleon had effectively caught up, cannoning over to try to stop me but I was able to sell it with seconds to spare. With the new change I'd be screwed here, putting in 90 minutes of work for 8 rituals just for a fresh faced Galleon to get a lucky spawn and stake a claim in my work. This isn't even factoring in the other ships on the server that could just park at Reaper's with the new change and stake a claim too, they can server hop until they see a juicy stack and straight deny a turn-in.

I certainly feel like there's better alternatives than locking out the ability to sell. Making the Blade easier to stop is the most apparent, "balancing" it better to make sinking it more practical so that running isn't as easy, but I know a lot of people love how powerful it is (including me!). I think another possibility is to spawn more treasure on the BB; the current treasure is so weak besides the COF it's not even worth selling by the BB crew. Putting more valuables on the ship gives the BB crew incentive to park and sell leaving them vulnerable, and/or gives attacking players a consolation prize if the BB crew sells the ship and the treasure gets left behind. Another option is to server merge the BB crew once sold and leave the ship there for a bit so another crew can claim it, which also addresses the common complaint about only being able to claim AI ships.

Multiple shrouded ghost titles doesnt mean they all have a lot of time, they could have all gotten that title together in less than a week of play. That aside, 1 good fight does not change the intent or hundreds of people running without even giving a single chance to test the waters of a fight with what is functionally the only player pvp boss ship.

Just because you would have had no hope to sell if you couldnt run doesnt mean that makes running ok. That means the other crew was pretty good and should have logically won it had it been implemented correctly, which is not a bad thing, you cant always win every time and no one should be able to win so easily. It is good to accept loss when it comes your way, and learn from it, you can always get another bb, and try again with more experience.