Quote: Essentially what this means is that any piracy encounter automatically ends in the pvp death of the transoprt.
Untrue. It's up to the trader to come up with roleplaying the negotiations, pay up or to be destroyed. If the latter happens - in 99.9% of the cases it is fault of the stubborn trader.
If trader doesn't want to fulfill the reasonable demand (without any attempt to negotiate, mind me), it is not my obligation to be soft on him. Such a behaviour would be very OORP. I roleplay a damn pirate, not a candy seller.