I know next to nothing about ships, having owned a class 3 boat as a mortal at
best, and having dealt with the movement code. So educate me. What do YOU
think needs to be done?

The situation with ship trainers/specials is as follows: The system was
designed to be able to provide a "permanent" way for you to be able to raise
your crew level and their effectiveness beyond the maximum with a considerable
amount of effort. Those who are willing to put the time and energy (4-5
minutes/day, gasp!) to check each of these trainers are obviously the ones who
are going to profit and be able to get from max to max+(1-3).

Now, the reason why it is so 'difficult' per se to get them is because each
'level' that you add on to your crew adds SIGNIFICANT power to your ship.
Let's take speed for example:

If you have 20 speed crewmembers that are all level 4, you are looking at a
raw crew level power of 80. With the addition of just one trainer, raising the
maximum crew level to 5, you are extending that power to 100 once they have
all finished training. Now if you take a second there, you're adding 25% of
the previous maximum power to your ship...that is quite a lot even after the
ship size penalties are put into effect. Add the second and third trainers
there and you're adding another 20% then 16.7% power, respectively, and at
this point you have taken the previous max and are now working at 175% of it,
which is a hell of a deal.

That being said, just because something is difficult doesn't mean that it is
unobtainable and the reason for keeping it as so is to keep you from getting
bored. If it were made much easier, and correct me if I'm wrong, it'd mean a
whole lot less if we just handed them out like pamphlets on a NYC sidewalk.
The idea is to give you something to work for and perhaps allow those who are
a bit more hard-working to gain advantage for once over those who might have
deep pockets. Also, it is worth noting again, and this HAS been disclosed in
the past, the chance for you to get a special increases as your level of
reputation rises (Arr 0, Arr 1, Arr 2, Arr 3).

In my opinion, the system is balanced as such in your best interest as it is,
and really isn't all that entirely difficult. In the last 2 years or so of my
mortal days I never got beyond Arr 5 or so and I managed to fully outfit my
first ship with full trainers in about 9 months and my second some 5-6 months
later. And while there is an apparent bias when it comes to the ease-of-gain
of reputation for navy and pirates, I DO indeed have some plans (hopefully
coming to life before the new year) to allow members of the merchant navy
alignment to gain additional reputation beyond those 10 maximum points per
day.

In the meantime, yes there are those nice npc pirate ships roaming about the
seas to aid you in your quest for maxing out your ship as soon as possible,
but my suggestion is to hang in there guys and keep trying. The idea is that
the biggest, bestest, fastest, highest-flying ships aren't to be available to
all, only those who work hard for it...the same goes to eq from Tiamat,
Burgle, etc. We won't make it easier simply because everyone wants it...that's
what makes everyone want it.

-- Lord Tarken Aurelius, the Sage

And you can still buy someone else's maxxed-out ship...