@william-flint
While I'm fine with the PvPvE balance as it is, I can tell you why THIS PvE player tried out a game with online PvP.
Basically it was just cause I love pirate stuff. More specifically, the fantastical side of the pirate aesthetic. I loved the cartoony look and the idea of sailing around and digging up treasure while fighting skeletons.
Pirates are a strangely scarce setting for video games. After getting hooked by the Monkey Island games, offerings were few and far between and often too 'realistic' for my tastes. The last chance I got was Assassins Creed: Black Flag; and I bounced off that game hard.
Luckily for me, I got into the alpha and beta periods of SoT, so I got a chance to test it out before buying.
And I WILL say that I was iffy at first. Even back in beta, most players attacked on sight and I got frustrated with losing my loot.
However, the lack of penalty to dying and purely cosmetic rewards kept me around until I had my personal epiphany and made my peace with the PvP aspect of the game.
These days I even enjoy it a bit since, while I don't fight, it can lead to some pretty amusing encounters.
Still, I can understand why my PvE brethren would dream of a mode made just for them. I know that many find the idea of SoT without other players to be a boring prospect, but that isn't true for everyone.
I've grown to enjoy SoT's PvP, but if it had come out just as it is now, only as a single player game, I'd still be playing and loving it.
I'm guessing that's why many of them try it out. They like the look, the gameplay, the setting, or any or all of the above. I mean, SoT IS marked PvP, but 'vE' is still tacked onto the end. With hybrid games like this, it's hard to know how you'll feel about it until you try it.
That being said, I would urge those like me to try and meet the PvP halfway, even if it's just ignoring it as I do.