The Crew is the organizational backbone of the Alliance, a cultural building block that allows the notoriously individualistic Corsairs to work together towards a common purpose. Your Crew is your found family, a group of people who will put their lives on the line to aid in your ambitions and who will share your glory and your sorrows. The idea of a Crew is expanded to almost any organization in the Alliance, from labor unions (called “Portsmith Crews”) to city guards (”Bobby Crews”) to merchant syndicates (”Goldscale Crews”).
A Corsair joins a Crew once they leave their family’s care at the age of majority (or before; many Corsairs join their first Crew at much younger ages). Which Crew a Corsair joins depends entirely on what they’re offered and which Crew’s mission and culture resonates with them — few Corsairs are willing to tolerate being part of a Crew with an abusive or cheapskate Captain or one that undertakes hunts for things they aren’t interested in.
Crews can range in size from a five-man-band of Divers delving into an Amethran ruin to the thousands of Portsmiths working to keep Throneport clean and functional. Usually they’re somewhere between a dozen and one or two hundred people, enough to run a single ship in whatever schemes or adventures the Crew deems fit, but the only real maximum to the size of a Crew is how effectively it’s Captain can run it — past a certain point it often makes more sense to split a large and unwieldy Crew up into multiple smaller Crews and appoint a Commodore to run the combined Flotilla.
Crews are run according to their constitutions and codes, written documents that are crafted in large font for the whole Crew to reference and copied into smaller pocket-sized versions for each member of the Crew to keep on their person. These codes dictate how votes are conducted, how shares of any profits are divided, initiation rituals, punishments for misbehaviors, and so forth. Many are incredibly complex, but the more laissez-faire Crews often have a simple set of codes denoting a basic democratic system and loot shares, with a general “watch each others’ backs and don’t mess with your Crewmates” clause to round things out. While the Admiralty that rules the Alliance does have laws in place for governing inter-Crew disputes and behavior, most intra-Crew conflicts (up to and including murder or worse) are left to the Crew to deal with internally.
The Fairwinds Edict forbids piracy in most cases, upon pain of death and ruinous fines. Though the Corsairs still love their tales of piratical adventure and revere the pirates who founded the nation, they understand that they can’t engage in such “adventures” without angering the other nations of the Continent and losing the Alliance’s place as a major political power. While some do still undertake piracy within and outside the Archipelago, and are often quietly celebrated for keeping the tradition alive, they must keep such activities out of view of the Admiralty and other nations’ law-enforcement, or else face an Admiralty tribunal and the fatal consequences for being caught.
The Archipelago was once the heartland of dread Amethras, the dark empire of Amekhar, before it was shattered and sunk beneath the sea. It still bears a trace of the Old God’s hungry touch, in the form of a curse that afflicts those with too much wealth. Those who grow up within the Archipelago all hear tales of the Hoarding Sickness, how kings and Captains who accumulate enormous sums of wealth begin to go mad with it, constantly seeking out more and tearing themselves and their Crews apart in the process. Worse yet, the curse infects those who follow the afflicted person, inspiring them with equal amounts of greed and zeal in pursuit of their leader’s mad schemes to acquire more and more wealth.
The curse is no fairy tale, however — it is very real, and the Corsairs have long since adapted to dealing with it. For the most part this takes the form of investing their wealth or spending it on experiences, as Hoarding Sickness seems to trigger off of someone believing themselves to have large sums of liquid capital, such as coin, jewels, century-old brandy, or fine artwork. Owning a ship that is decked out to the gills with the best sails, hull, and armaments that money can buy doesn’t trigger the curse, nor does owning a sprawling mansion with grand gardens and a balcony overlooking Throneport’s harbor. Similarly, the curse is a significant driver behind the Corsairs’ tendency to spend their gold as fast as they earn it — it takes a few months of sitting on a hoard of gold for the curse to set in, and if a Corsair has already spent their excessive wealth on Grog, gambling, and a fancier ship by then, the curse can’t properly sink its teeth into them.
Hoarding Sickness is also the source of the myriad rumors of buried treasure that flow through the bars of the Archipelago. Kings, Queens, Emperors, Admirals, and pirate Captains have all needed to find ways of avoiding the curse at some point in the last three millennia, and one of the tried-and-true methods of avoiding the curse has been to literally bury any excess wealth one might have acquired. The principle seems to be “out of sight, out of mind”; so long as it takes a few days for someone to be able to lay their hands on their treasure, it doesn’t add to their metaphorical balance when it comes to the risk of acquiring Hoarding Sickness. Naturally, a lot of that loot has been lost over the centuries, as kings are murdered and Captains meet their fate in Davy Jones’ locker without telling anyone where they left their fortune, and so there are always Corsairs hunting after rumors or ancient maps that might point to where a buried treasure might be found.
Long ago, a great evil was released from a sunken Vault within the Archipelago. The Cerethalians, cephalopod-human hybrids crafted by the hand of Amekhar itself to be living weapons in its wars against the other Old Gods’ empires, ran rampant across the Archipelago during the Chainbreaker Churning. They used their powers of mental domination to control those mortals whom they could not bribe or intimidate into following them, and swiftly took over from the dozens of petty warlords who ruled the Archipelago at the time. The Cerethalian Empire ruled the Archipelago for three and a half centuries, slaying or enslaving all who tried to oppose them and extracting all the riches they could from the folk of the islands.
Then they disappeared. On the Night Of Silent Halls, all of the Cerethalians who ruled the Archipelago vanished, leaving the mortals they’d ruled over to fend for themselves. They remained a ghost story told by the people of the islands for centuries, with no sign of their presence found. Folk thought they had disappeared for good, until the start of the Faebane Churning when reports of the tentacled monstrosities once more began to surface. Every Churning since, the Cerethalians have reappeared, seeking pieces of eldritch lore in sunken Amethran Vaults; they target mortals and Old God cultists alike, infiltrating cities and building a cult-like following of their own to pursue their evil ends. It is thought that they are hunting for the original means of their creation, that they might breed an army of themselves to rule the seas once more. Now that another Churning has begun, the folk of the Archipelago are bracing themselves for the fiends’ reappearance, for it is only a matter of time until the Cerethalians rise once again from the shadows to sow chaos and misery amongst the Corsairs.
Dangerous animals live everywhere in the Archipelago, and the Corsairs have a long history of hunting and being hunted by them. Though the jungles and oceans are not as supernaturally hostile as, for example, the Grimmwold, all Corsairs are taught from a young age that if they want to go outside of a settlement they need to know how to defend themselves and be able to spot the natural dangers of the Archipelago. Threats include venomous snakes and carnivorous plants, hungry jaguars, man-eating apes, enormous crocodiles, baby sea serpents living in the shallows, opportunistic sharks, and of course the occasional nesting Kraken; the list goes on.
The Cazadores of the Archipelago make a good (if risky) living off of hunting these creatures, bringing back their kills to be processed by the Portsmith Crews and proving their courage and skill with every successful hunt. Captains and navigators for their part keep careful track of the migrations of the Krakens and sea serpents, avoiding the great beasts where possible or fending them off when one of the creatures takes exception to a ship’s presence. The truly brave (or mad, or both) venture south into the Southern Seas, hunting down the full-grown monsters of the oceans; Kraken, sea serpents, whales, enormous fish able to swallow a ship whole, and crocodiles longer than a dreadnaught can be found in those waters, and the greatest Cazador Crews seek to test their courage, skill, and luck hunting such leviathans and bringing their carcasses back to Renderport for gold and glory.
“Alright you lot, I’ve found us a new quarry to hunt…” Those words are guaranteed to grab the attention of any Corsair. They live for the hunt, for pursuing something, whether literally or metaphorically. They may not all be skilled at hunting animals, but the hunger to act and to chase runs through the soul of every Corsair, no matter the kind of prey they choose to pursue. Some hunt trade deals, others buried treasure; the Admiralty employs a number who make their living hunting criminals or tax evaders.
While the Hunt as an ideal calls to Corsairs and they love the thrill of the chase, in the day to day this often means that they’re just very goal-focused as they go through their lives, settling on things they wish to achieve and doggedly pursuing them no matter how mundane. If it’s possible to turn an activity into a hunt or have a trophy of some sort waiting at the end of it, the Corsairs will go at it with a vengeance. Portsmiths offer the oddest examples of this — they jokingly refer to restocking a tavern’s pantry as “hunting for the cellar,” and the sewer Crews will often collect the effluent they remove from the bowels of Throneport or Porto Tranquillo into a massive pile of filth to better appreciate their accomplishments for the day before carting it off to be disposed of.
Alcohol plays a critical role in the social side of Jadeite culture. Offerings of Grog are exchanged whenever someone arrives in another’s home; if accepted, they grant both guest and host the safety of guest-right, ensuring that no violence, theft, or treachery will be perpetrated by either during the guest’s stay. To refuse an offering of Grog is to declare at the very least that you’re open to the idea of harming the other person, and possibly may constitute an open declaration that you intend to act against them. (The actual type of alcohol doesn’t matter, and every good Corsair keeps some non-alcoholic drink to offer if their guest doesn’t partake; what’s critical is that it’s the same stuff that the Captain or homeowner drinks.)
Grog also plays a role in the authority of Captains and the functioning of Crews. A Captain is expected to be able to supply the rest of their Crew with Grog at least daily, or else face being voted out of their position. Captains are measured as much on the quality of their Grog as their exploits — a Captain who only gives their people the cheapest rotgut is not going to be getting very good or loyal folk to fill out their Crew.
Music is a part of life in the Alliance. No bar is a proper place to drink your Grog if there isn’t someone singing a sea shanty or playing an instrument, and no ship is home without music playing somewhere. “Traditional” shanties are working songs, designed to help sailors keep time so that they can better work in unison, but the word is used to describe any of the hundreds (probably thousands) of songs that the Corsairs have in their cultural repertoire. Shanties are how many of the legends and stories of the Archipelago are passed down through the generations, and half the time when the tale of a new adventure is told it’s turned into a shanty just to make it even catchier. Shantymen and -women, those Corsairs who are skilled singers and know enough songs to keep a Crew entertained and working together all day long, are prized members of their Crews. Mages who practice Spellsinging are known as Shantymages, and are even more highly valued than mundane Shantymen.
The Lifeline is a thin length of soft rope given to a child at the age of five, and is worn as a necklace or bracelet, kept in a pouch, or stored safe in the home. Every time a momentous event occurs in a Corsair's life, one of their family or Crew gives them a charm to place on their Lifeline to remember the occasion. The charms are never made out of valuable material and are rarely fine art, making them largely valueless except to their owner; there's a culture-wide understanding that you never steal someone's lifeline, unless you want to become known as an honorless villain and make an enemy for life. Merchants are willing to take someone's lifeline as collateral for a debt, but it's understood that they’ll never sell or dispose of someone's lifeline until they know for certain that the person is dead or not coming back.
Corsairs are not known for being particularly generous to those outside their Crew, but there is a custom they call Harborage that they use to ensure that those who are most down on their luck are able to survive until they can get back on their feet. Those who have hit upon misfortune — shipwrecked, kicked out by their Crew, caught out in a storm far from home, etc. — can knock on a door and ask for Harborage and be granted a shot of grog and a place to sleep for the night, and maybe some food if there is any to spare. Harborage is only expected to last for a single night, and guests who violate guestright are unceremoniously kicked out, but it still serves as a way to ensure that those who need help can get it, at least for a little while. Houses with spare beds often put a lantern out above their door, with green-tinted glass in front of the flame, to signal that any who need Harborage are welcome.
When a Corsair is contemplating retirement, or has an idea for an adventure that will be dangerous but highly lucrative if successful, they announce that they are heading out on their Last Voyage, and are in need of more hands for their Crew. Last Voyages are almost always highly dangerous, whether they’re pursuing some great beast, hunting a lost treasure, or racing the wind through rough seas to set a new record for how fast they can make a trading voyage. Undertaking and surviving such a voyage is considered a great feat, but even those who don’t survive are toasted for their courage and audacity.
The announcement of a Last Voyage often results in a reshuffling of the current Crew of a vessel, as those who aren’t in the mood for a suicidally dangerous adventure are expected to take a period of shore leave to make room for any new Crew members with a taste for danger.
One of the critical members of a Crew undertaking a Last Voyage is a Locker Priest, who stands as witness to the adventure and can use the One Immortal Moment ritual to immortalize the experience for others to learn about, even if none of the crew survive.
Each Crew has a Log, usually kept by the Captain but occasionally entrusted to the Crew’s scribe. The Log is filled with both the everyday logistics and activities of the Crew (supplies purchased, goods sold, repairs made, etc.) and the adventures and more exciting stories, which tend to be written in a much more narrative and bardic style. A Crew’s Log is a treasured object, valued above gold or riches or even Grog; losing it means losing the heart of the Crew’s pride, the written history that they can point to as proof of what they and their forebears in the Crew have accomplished. Crews that have been in operation for generations often have dozens of volumes in their Log, and copies stored at various harbors in zealously-guarded vaults.
Red is the color of death in the Archipelago, the color of blood and a glorious sunset as the light begins to fade. Red coral, rubies, and other red and orange jewelry, as well as brilliant crimson sashes, are the signs of mourning and celebration of the departed. The brightness and vibrancy of the red one wears while in mourning is taken as a sign of the regard one has for the deceased and their exploits.
It’s also quite normal for Corsairs to wear red as part of their everyday outfits, as a means of intimidation (the same way modern Americans wear black to seem edgy and grim) and as a sign that they’re ready to go out with a bang and are already wearing something they can be buried with, in a kind of enthusiastic fatalism.
Mourning usually lasts for a month or so, at least for those closest to the deceased. That can drop to as little as a single night after the memorial, though — Corsairs are well aware that death is always one step behind you, and many feel that mourning the lost for more than the time necessary to memorialize them takes away from plans for the future.
If a Corsair dies at sea, they are usually buried on the nearest island with an item of value from each member of the Crew they served with. Those who aren’t well-liked by their Crew, however, instead have their feet tied to a weight and are tossed overboard to “feed the Sea.”
Burial on land (whether on a nearby island as a ship is sailing, or if a Corsair dies on land) usually involves wrapping the body in cloth (sailcloth is traditional, but not always available) or palm leaves. Then the body is placed in one of three locations, depending on circumstances and the deceased’s wishes: burial under the sand or a stone cairn, to keep the body and any valuables buried with it from being disturbed by scavengers; burial in a shallow tidepool or reef, to let the crabs and fish dispose of the body; or burial in a tree, to allow the jungle’s creatures to dispose of the body. The most common option is burial in a cairn or under the sand, supposedly to “become one with the isles” but more pragmatically a desire to keep any valuables buried with the body from ending up in a jaguar’s or grouper’s belly. Many devout Druathans choose one of the latter two options, though.
Memorials are celebratory affairs overseen by one or more Lockerpriests, and sometimes a cleric of Druathos or Vallaros. They consist of the friends, family, and Crew of the deceased celebrating their adventures and accomplishments, usually with liberal amounts of food and alcohol involved. Towards the end of the evening, the stories being told about the deceased tend to get progressively more outlandish, and the Corsairs like it that way — the crazier the story, the better to remember the fallen.
A Spirit of drowned sailors, Jones is the ultimate bogeyman for Corsairs, haunting them with the idea that their deaths and lives are ultimately meaningless. He frequently shows up as a shadow in many stories that are completely unrelated to him as a portent of pointless and useless death. For the stories focused on him, Jones is a slow and relentless force that eventually catches up with the protagonist, usually after a prolonged and exhausting chase where the hero loses everything that matters to them. The classic sighting of Jones is in a small one-man sloop that is barely seen through mist or at dusk; the vessel’s tattered sails ignore whatever the wind is doing, and a solitary figure standing behind the wheel stares straight at the vessel he’s pursuing, inspiring a feeling of creeping dread in any who gaze back at him.
A seven-limbed humanoid panther, with a gold-flecked black coat, claws able to carve through the planks of a ship’s hull with a single swipe, and jaws capable of rending steel, the goldcat is a bogeyman feared by the Corsairs for its insatiable hunger for gold, silver, and gems. It doesn’t hoard the stuff, either, rather feasting on it and excreting fool’s gold out the other end. Children are threatened with it coming to eat them, their money, or their favorite toys if they don’t behave and listen to their parents, told that it can smell naughty children from many leagues away. Nobody from beyond the Archipelago has ever seen a goldcat, which casts doubt on the creature’s existence, but the Corsairs swear up and down that it’s real. There are rumors that the beast is a secret Herald of Videzalle, the Prince of Greed, sent to plague the people who live within Amekhar’s former realm.
A Spirit of good omen, who sailors say they spot standing above the water on the horizon, usually in the middle of a voyage. Sighting her often signifies that there is an unforeseen bounty coming, and following her can lead sailors to a nearby haven where they can resupply and rest. There’s a quiet belief amongst many Corsairs that she is a Herald of Selenir, though the druids insist that she is not.
The Hungry Mist is a mythic creature of dread in the Archipelago, said to carry ships dangerously far off course into a doldrum and then feast upon the crew’s despair as they fight amongst themselves and starve, unable to escape without the wind. There are subtle signs of its presence like a scent of foulness on the breeze, random and unforeseen breakage or decay of parts of the ship, and eventually the gradual withering and disappearance of the crew.
Rumors persists of a great temple-city built by the Imperio Dorado a millennia ago, filled with golden treasures and idols to the gods and hidden somewhere within the jungles of Puerta del Sur. The legendary city has so far evaded the searches of treasure hunters and diviners alike, but that hasn’t stopped generations Corsairs from trying to find it. Nobody knows exactly why the Reyes de Oro, or Golden Kings, sealed the city away, or why they placed so many of their treasures there; some believe that a great evil was sealed away within the city and that any who enter it or steal its treasures will be cursed, while others believe that it is home to a powerful artifact that was key to the Imperio Dorado’s five-century dominion over the southern half of the Archipelago. Whatever the case, one thing is for certain: the Crew that manages to find the lost city will be remembered in the songs and stories of the Archipelago for millennia.
Corsairs will hold a celebration at the proverbial drop of a hat, but they have a set of festivals that they always observe.
A day of tall tales and braggadocio, when the hunters and fishermen bring out their best trophies and the inns open up the best casks of booze. Grog and chum are poured into the sea, and meat is placed before wild beasts, as offerings for the wild things that the Corsairs depend on for their livelihoods. Mystics of Druathos are toasted, and garlands of flowering vines and seashells are draped over doorways to honor the Green and the Sea. Stories of cunning and audacity are traded, with the most extravagant that has even an ounce of truth in it winning the teller a round of Grog. The festival originally developed as a celebration of the Krakens that hunted down the Cerethalians who ruled over the Archipelago in the Second Millennium, and who still emerge from their hidey holes during Churnings to plague the mortal folk of the islands; in modern times it has transformed into a celebration of all the great beasts of the land, air, and sea.
Marking the day that the first Admiralty of the Alliance betrayed the last Imperial governor, stealing some of his ships and sinking the rest, declaring the Archipelago’s independence from the Empire. Usually celebrated with magical fireworks, hours of music, and many tales (exaggerated more with each successive recounting) telling of those swashbuckling days, as well as copious amounts of Grog.
A day in the depths of winter, when the Green is at its quietest, and the thoughts of Corsairs turn to those who are no longer with them. Tales are told of those who are remembered, both fondly and with venom, keeping the stories of the departed alive in the memories of the living for another year. Locker Priests are honored guests during this time, and often end up telling tales of those whose services they’ve performed for the entire day until they lose their voices.