Universal reference for ships by sky and by water: ship types, Himinkryst, travel times, costs, how countries use them, and the upgrades fitted to them. Ship travel, flight time and crew roles are in Rule - Ship Travel. Travel days come from Speed Calculations. Individual upgrades live in
2. World Lore/Items/Ship Items/.
Ship Types
Water Ships
Official stats from Ghosts of Saltmarsh (pp. 186–191), with prices from the Player’s Handbook.
| Ship | Size | Crew | Passengers | Cargo | Sails (normal / into the wind / with the wind) | Oars | Travel Pace | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rowboat | Large (10 by 5 ft.) | 2 | 2 | 0.25 ton | — | 15 ft. | 3 mph (24 miles per day, rowed) | 50 gp |
| Keelboat | Gargantuan (60 by 20 ft.) | 3 | 4 | 0.5 ton | 25 / 15 / 35 ft. | 20 ft. | 3 mph (72 miles per day) | 3,000 gp |
| Longship | Gargantuan (70 by 20 ft.) | 40 | 100 | 10 tons | 45 / 15 / 60 ft. | 20 ft. (needs 20 crew) | 5 mph (120 miles per day) | 10,000 gp |
| Sailing Ship | Gargantuan (100 by 20 ft.) | 30 | 20 | 100 tons | 45 / 15 / 60 ft. | — | 5 mph (120 miles per day) | 10,000 gp |
| Warship | Gargantuan (100 by 20 ft.) | 40 | 60 | 200 tons | 35 / 15 / 50 ft. | 20 ft. (needs 20 crew) | 4 mph (96 miles per day) | 25,000 gp |
| Galley | Gargantuan (130 by 20 ft.) | 80 | 40 | 150 tons | 35 / 15 / 50 ft. | 30 ft. (needs 40 crew) | 4 mph (96 miles per day) | 30,000 gp |
Sailing ships are fast designs built for travel. Warships are slower but more heavily armed, and carry more cargo.
Skyships
Any of these hulls can be built as a skyship. A skyship keeps its water version’s crew, passengers, cargo, hull and weapons; rowers become extra hands or soldiers. It changes as follows:
- Travel pace: 1.5 times the water version’s travel pace.
- Sails: travel pace × 10 in feet. Sailing into the wind is 15 ft. slower than that, and with the wind 15 ft. faster. A skyship can climb to find a better wind, so a headwind costs it less than it costs a water ship.
- Himinkryst replaces oars: 30 ft. on small crystals, 25 ft. on medium and 20 ft. on large.
- Himinkryst size follows the ship’s length: small up to 60 ft., medium from 60 to 120 ft., large over 120 ft.
| Skyship | Himinkryst | Sails (normal / into the wind / with the wind) | Himinkryst Speed | Travel Pace | Range Between Stops | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Keelboat (often called a caravel) | 2 small | 45 / 30 / 60 ft. | 30 ft. | 4.5 mph (108 miles per day) | 4 days | ~44,500 gp |
| Longship | 3 medium | 75 / 60 / 90 ft. | 25 ft. | 7.5 mph (180 miles per day) | 6 days | ~120,000 gp |
| Sailing Ship | 3 medium | 75 / 60 / 90 ft. | 25 ft. | 7.5 mph (180 miles per day) | 6 days | ~120,000 gp |
| Warship | 3 medium | 60 / 45 / 75 ft. | 25 ft. | 6 mph (144 miles per day) | 6 days | ~142,500 gp |
| Galley | 4 large | 60 / 45 / 75 ft. | 20 ft. | 6 mph (144 miles per day) | 8 days | ~325,000 gp |
Rowboats aren’t built as skyships; they serve as ships’ boats.
A skyship always beats its water counterpart. It must land to recharge, which costs about 2 hours for every day of flying on small crystals, 2⅔ hours on medium and 4 hours on large. That takes 8–14% off its 1.5 times pace, so over any distance a skyship arrives in about 70–75% of the time its water counterpart takes.
Speed upgrades push a skyship’s travel pace beyond the 1.5 times standard. An ordinary skyship shouldn’t reach 2 times its water version’s pace; getting near it or past it takes expensive upgrades, usually Very Rare and costing 15,000 gp or more (the price Ghosts of Saltmarsh sets for a ship upgrade).
Himinkryst Sizes
Every skyship floats on Himinkryst, and the size of its crystals decides how long it can stay aloft and how much it can be modified. Each size class of ship needs one more crystal to lift it: small ships carry 2, medium ships 3 and large ships 4, all of the same size.
Every crystal must be active while the ship is airborne. If one is switched off, destroyed or runs dry, the ship lists and starts losing altitude, and must put down as soon as it can. A skyship can’t hover on some crystals while the others recharge.
| Size | Typical Ships | Flight Time | Gliding | Passive Recharge | AC | Hit Points | Modification Slots |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Small | Keelboats, caravels, skiffs, cutters (up to 60 ft.) | 24 hours | 4 days | 3 hours per hour (full in 8 hours) | 14 | 100 (threshold 15) | 2 |
| Medium | Longships, sailing ships, warships, brigs, frigates (60–120 ft.) | 48 hours | 6 days | 3 hours per hour (full in 16 hours) | 15 | 150 (threshold 15) | 3 |
| Large | Galleys, galleons, flagships (over 120 ft.) | 96 hours | 8 days | 3 hours per hour (full in 32 hours) | 16 | 200 (threshold 20) | 4 |
- Flight time is per crystal, and every crystal spends it at once. Hovering or moving on crystal power alone spends 1 hour per hour. Gliding spends flight time more slowly: 6 hours per day for a small crystal, 8 for a medium and 12 for a large. Since all crystals drain together, a ship’s range between stops is its crystal’s gliding time: 4 days for a small ship, 6 for a medium and 8 for a large, no matter how many crystals it carries.
- Passive recharge only happens while the crystal is stationary and switched off, which means the ship has landed or is moored. All of a ship’s crystals recharge at the same time. Every size recharges at the same rate, 3 hours per hour, so a bigger crystal holds more flight time but takes longer to fill. A skyship sailing on water spends no flight time, but its crystals only recharge once it is at anchor.
- Spell recharge works the same for every size: as an action, a creature within 5 feet expends a spell slot to add flight time to one crystal equal to the slot level plus every level below it (1st = 1 hour, 2nd = 3 hours, 3rd = 6 hours, and so on). A ship with more crystals needs that many more slots to buy the same hour of flight.
- Speed comes from the ship’s stat block, not the crystal size. A bigger crystal lifts a bigger ship; it doesn’t make a small one faster.
- Replacing crystals with a larger size needs a shipwright and a ship big enough to take them. A small ship can’t mount medium crystals.
Travel Times
Days for common distances at normal sail speed, sailing around the clock. Skyship times include the stops to recharge. Use Speed Calculations for other speeds and distances.
| Ship | 500 Miles (Water / Sky) | 1,500 Miles (Water / Sky) | 5,000 Miles (Water / Sky) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rowboat | 20.8 days / — | — | — |
| Keelboat | 6.9 / 4.7 days (1 stop, 1 hour) | 20.8 / 14.7 days (3 stops, 20 hours in all) | 69.4 / 49.8 days (~11 stops) |
| Longship & Sailing Ship | 4.2 / 2.8 days | 12.5 / 8.6 days (1 stop, 6 hours) | 41.7 / 30.2 days (~4 stops) |
| Warship | 5.2 / 3.5 days | 15.6 / 10.9 days (1 stop, 12 hours) | 52.1 / 37.9 days (~5 stops) |
| Galley | 5.2 / 3.5 days | 15.6 / 10.8 days (1 stop, 10 hours) | 52.1 / 39.2 days (~4 stops) |
Working out a skyship’s stops:
- Flying days = distance ÷ miles per day.
- Flight time needed per crystal = flying days × the crystal’s gliding cost per day (6, 8 or 12 hours).
- Hours grounded = (flight time needed − the crystal’s full flight time) ÷ 3.
- Number of stops: no further apart than the ship’s range (4, 6 or 8 days), and no single stop can fill a crystal past its full flight time.
A skyship also flies a straight line, while a water ship follows coasts, currents and the prevailing winds, and only reaches places on the water. A water route is usually longer than the same trip by sky, so the real gap is often bigger than the table shows.
Cost and Cargo
Rough figures for a 1,500-mile trip. Crew cost averages about 1 gp per crew member per day, food included (officers are skilled hirelings at 2 gp, ordinary sailors cost less).
| Ship | Water: Trip / Crew Cost / Cost per Ton | Sky: Trip / Crew Cost / Cost per Ton | Ship Value per Ton of Cargo (Water / Sky) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Keelboat | 20.8 days / ~62 gp / ~125 gp | 14.7 days / ~44 gp / ~88 gp | ~6,000 / ~89,000 gp |
| Longship | 12.5 days / ~500 gp / ~50 gp | 8.6 days / ~344 gp / ~34 gp | ~1,000 / ~12,000 gp |
| Sailing Ship | 12.5 days / ~375 gp / ~3.8 gp | 8.6 days / ~258 gp / ~2.6 gp | ~100 / ~1,200 gp |
| Warship | 15.6 days / ~625 gp / ~3.1 gp | 10.9 days / ~436 gp / ~2.2 gp | ~125 / ~713 gp |
| Galley | 15.6 days / ~1,250 gp / ~8.3 gp | 10.8 days / ~864 gp / ~5.8 gp | ~200 / ~2,167 gp |
- Skyship prices are a hull built at about 1.5 times the cost of the water version (lighter timber, wings and the lever rig), plus its lift-grade Himinkryst: about 20,000 gp per small crystal, 35,000 gp per medium and 70,000 gp per large. Upgrades are extra.
- Skyships are cheaper to run per trip. They arrive sooner, so the crew is paid for fewer days.
- Skyships cost 6–15 times as much to buy. Losing one costs as much as losing a small fleet of water ships, and that, more than running costs, decides how they’re used.
- Bigger cargo holds are cheaper per ton. Cargo space grows much faster than the crew needed to sail it. Longships and galleys need large rowing crews, so they cost more per ton than sailing ships and warships of similar size.
Which Ship for Which Cargo
- Warship: the most cargo and the lowest cost per ton. Bulk goods such as grain, timber, stone and ore, or cargo that needs guarding.
- Sailing ship: fast trade and passengers. The workhorse of most trade.
- Galley: troops, siege weapons and large cargoes that need defending. A galley skyship needs a landing site big enough for it, and its stops are the longest.
- Longship: troops and raids. It carries little cargo but lands a hundred passengers quickly.
- Keelboat: urgent, valuable or light cargo, such as letters, relics, spices and passengers who pay for speed. A keelboat skyship can land almost anywhere, but it can’t cross a stretch of more than 4 days with nowhere to land.
How Countries Use Ships
Skyships are very good at almost everything, but they are extremely expensive. Most countries can afford only a handful and are careful with them.
- Water ships carry the world’s trade. Bulk cargo and overseas routes go by water almost everywhere.
- Skyships belong to the powerful. Governments, temples, chartered companies and the very rich own nearly all of them. Owners often split a ship into shares among several investors, as real merchant ships were split into shares, so one loss doesn’t ruin anyone.
- Keelboat skyships carry couriers, diplomats, scouts and the most valuable cargo.
- Sailing ship and warship skyships lift goods and troops to places water can’t reach, such as mountain holds, inland cities and jungle outposts with poor roads.
- Galley skyships serve as flagships, siege platforms and symbols of a nation’s power, and are rarely risked on trade.
- Most countries keep skyships off open-water trade. A skyship lost at sea is gone for good, crystals and all. An open sea also offers nowhere to land every 4–8 days, and deep water is too deep to anchor in, so the crystals can’t recharge. Skyships keep to routes over land and short hops along the coast.
Moltara: The Exception
Moltara is the one country where skyships are an ordinary part of trade. Himinkryst is mined there, and trade circulates evenly between its cities, so a skyship carries cargo on every leg instead of flying home empty. Its routes run over land between cities with places to put down, so the open-water risk that keeps other countries’ skyships at home doesn’t apply.
That sky trade is Valkyrian. The Amazonian territories trade on the ground, by road and river, and their official routes never touch the Valkyries. Free merchants can trade with both, but very few can afford a skyship of their own.
Modification Slots
Upgrades that are fitted to a Himinkryst take up that crystal’s modification slots. Each crystal tracks its own slots, so a ship with two small crystals has 2 slots on each, and a ship with four large crystals has 4 slots on each.
| Modification | Slots | Effect |
|---|---|---|
| Resonant Aethercore | 1 per core | +4 hours of flight time |
| Refined Aetherglass Plate | 1 per plate | +10 hit points to the crystal |
| Kryst Resonator | 1 | The crystal never falls out of balance |
| Kryst Overdrive Coil | 1 | Cheaper Kryst-Boost, and a once-a-day triple boost |
| Sun-Catcher Array | 1 | Recharges in sunlight while in use |
| Kryst Cannon | 1 | Draws its power from this crystal |
Removing a modification takes as long as installing it, and frees the slot. A modification on a destroyed crystal is lost with it.
Other Upgrades
Upgrades that aren’t fitted to a crystal don’t use slots. Instead, they’re limited by where they go on the ship:
- Sails: one suit of sails at a time, such as Ever-Billowing Sails or Windwoven Sails.
- Hull: one sheathing, such as Ironwood Hull Sheathing, plus one Runeward Lattice per damage type.
- Weapons: a ship’s weapon mounts are set by its size. A new weapon, such as a Grapple Harpoon or Stormcaller Ballista, replaces an existing one.
- Fittings: one of each fitting, such as a Sky Anchor, Fog Bellows, Lightning Rod Mast, Lodestar Binnacle, Cloudpiercer Lens or Muster Bell.
- Reserve crystals: a Reserve Lift Kryst is a crystal of its own and uses no slots.
