The knot now lets only a repo's owner or collaborators erase a ticket, even the author's own (knot2/crates/knot-cobs/src/social.rs:79, Tangled 21a6c7a47). When a pull's patch is refused, pr create tries to erase the ticket it just opened. For a contributor without collaborator rights that now fails, leaving an open pull with no patch.
pr create now names the atgc pr close command. The option here: on a 403 from the erase, close the ticket automatically, and say so. That's an extra write the user didn't ask for, so it needs a decision.