@williamherschel
I agree with what @redsparrows and @PersonalC0ffee said.
The community wanted more content and the captaincy update would have introduce content only for those who would have been Pirate Legend. With THD, Cursed Sails and Forsaken Shores they want to introduce content for everyone.
In fact, in the first couple months I think most people were under the impression that THD, Cursed Sails, and Forsaken Shores would arrive in addition to captaincy.
Well they clearly said they were putting the pets and captaincy in the backburner many times, if people were still expecting something else it's not really Rare's fault. It's a game as a service and they are working with the feedbacks from the community, things can change quickly.
the game is now being filled with a bunch of meaningless commendation grinding instead of giving users tools that would expand the sandbox.
That's your opinion. I like the commendations, some are highlighting tools from the sandbox and showing ways to use them. You're able to do these Bilge Rat Adventures while doing the other voyages so to me it's really expanding the way I play the game. I'm almost using on each session the speaking trumpet, giving bananas to my crewmates or other nice addition they've introduced. To me they gave me new tools to play with.
There's literally a 2-page section in the Art of Sea of Thieves book that shows ship titles with placeholder "Fury of The Placeholder Text."
The Art of Sea of Thieves is an awesome book but it's just ideas they had, I don't think they ever said everything in it will be introduced in the game.