Pathfinder Pirate Slang

Source: Paizo, Pirates of the Inner Sea

• Adrift: Floating loose at sea. Can also mean someone who has run away or gone missing.
• Anchor: A person who wears heavy metal armor.
• Besmara’s Fingers: A-cat-o’-nine-tails.
• Binnacle: A glass-topped box fixed to a stand on the deck. The binnacle houses a compass.
• Bubbles: A person who can’t swim.
• Cannon: A spellcaster with flashy offensive spells.
• Captain’s Dance: When two ships meet in open water and wish to parlay, each ship sends out a boat. The two captains meet on one ship; the two first mates meet on the other.
• Chase: A ship that is being pursued by pirates.
• Coaming: A raised lip around a hatch to keep water from spilling belowdecks.
• Fancy Jacket: Someone who dresses and talks like a pirate but has no real sailing experience.
• Fast Colors: A country’s flag. Privateers sometimes fly pirate or merchant flags to lure pirate ships close, then raise their true flags when combat begins.
• Fishslicer: A small blade, like a dagger.
• Following Sea: Waves going in the same direction as a ship.
• Frenzy: A fight, particularly a tavern brawl.
• Gallows Jumper: Someone who has died and then come back to life, such as through a raise dead spell.
• Holystone: Bars of sandstone used to scrub the deck.
• Jack Tar: A pirate.
• Lights: Lungs. (The “lights” in famous exclamations like “I’ll have your liver and lights!” actually refers to lungs, rather than eyes, as landlubbers often imagine.)
• Lubber: A clumsy or stupid person, often a “landlubber.”
• Paying Cargo: Passengers.
• Running Lunch: A rat or large insect.
• Sailors sometimes joke that a new crewman must “catch himself a running lunch.”
• Scaly: A fish. Can also refer to a sea monster.
• Sea Legs: The ability to maintain balance on a rolling deck.
• The Sweet Trade: Piracy.
• Windbound: Unable to set sail because of wind conditions. Can mean any situation in which a person cannot act because of outside circumstances.
• Windspinner: A spellcaster, specifically one who possesses weather magic.
• X-er: A treasure hunter—someone always looking for “the X that marks the spot.” Can also mean a Pathfinder.