PE rigging

Not Age of Sail stuff but I've noticed pontos aftermarket sets keep sneaking more and more pe rigging into them, which is great in my opinion. 

I really wish the plastic market would give us more "tall ships" and that aftermarket companies would put out superdetail sets for the ones we've got.

That is a good idea, though I wonder if black may not be self defeating.  On something very small, near eye resolution, contrast has a big bearing on size estimation, and high contrast makes things look bigger than they really are. I wonder if reversing the colors might work too.  I always avoid strictly black or white in rigging lines if I can find a tan or dark gray.

My only experience with that was the rear mast ratlines on the aftermarket set for the Revell Emden.

A thought- one thing I sort of disliked was the fact that the horizontals and verticals were the same size, big, and it looked kind of like a grating.

The last 1/350 I did with PE, for the lifelines around the main deck, which generally get paintied like bar railing even though they usually aren't; I painted the things a light gray sort of wire/ weathered rope color, and then painted the vertical stanchions ship blue. It was pretty easy because a) the stanchions were really short, and b) I did it by dipping the edge of a single edged razor blade in a little puddle of blue and "stamping" the stanchion.

Maybe you can try that. Paint the ratline/ shroud part the lighter ratline color, and then paint the shrouds only black with the edge of a razor.