what if a team captured all 10 relics but weren't in first place, i know this is an unlikely scenario but it is possible....
who would win the era?

well this is not a usual things still if something like this happens , the alliance on rank 1 will win only they will get 3k blues not 3.5k as 500 blues will go to the relic holders

kk ty

you're wrong the victory conditions are either holding all ten relics or if noone does being rank 10 when the era resets. this happened in e3 when VULC alliance ranked 3 had all the relics passed to them when people didnt want to play anymore RK remained rank 1 and FFU rank 2 but VULC won the era.

you might be right about the blue thing but the admins will announce that it was the relic holders that won

Conditions of winning an era are to capture and hold all 10 relics for 100 ticks. If no team is able to do that and the world times out then it will be the rank 1 team that wins.