Airships are not rare curiosities in Apocalyptica Arcanum. They are working machines, built from timber, brass, iron, and shard-craft compromises, and they sit at the crossroads of commerce, war, and crime. If you can pay for hydrogas and keep the hull patched, you can go places no road can reach and you can do it fast.
This page covers two things:
Most airships stay aloft via Hydrogas balloons, Shardisite-based enchantments, or both. Hydrogas is a lighter-than-air combustible fuel held in one or more reinforced tanks and gas cells aboard the ship. Hydrogas is efficient and widely used, but it is also volatile. Every airship captain knows the same rule: fire is not a problem, it is the end of the conversation.
Hydrogas does two jobs:
Hydrogas is the airship’s lifeblood and its biggest weakness. When reserves run low, ships lose buoyancy and settle toward the surface. Most captains treat fuel planning like religion. Fire aboard a hydrogas ship is always treated as an emergency. Even small flames prompt panic, hard choices, and desperate damage control. This keeps airship encounters tense without bogging down into accounting.
Even a modest vessel represents serious capital as well as upward mobility in the world. Ownership or even stewardship usually means one of these is true:
A ship in the sky feels like power, and power always produces rumors.
Not all airships are equal. The following classifications represent the recognized vessel types operating across the known world. Class determines a ship's general role, tactical footprint, and market value. Within each class, individual vessels vary considerably based on age, outfitting, and modification history.
| Size | Approx. Map Footprint (10ft sq.) |
|---|---|
| Tiny | 3 × 1 |
| Small | 7 × 3 |
| Medium | 10 × 4 |
| Large | 15 × 5 |
| Huge | 20 × 7 |
| Gargantuan | 30+ × 10+ |
Airship combat uses 10-foot squares rather than the standard 5-foot grid. Vessel size determines approximate battlemap footprint.
Privately owned and operated. Crewed by civilians, merchants, privateers, and the wealthy. Private vessels are not built for sustained military engagement, though some are armed.
Built for cargo, extraction, and heavy labor. Industrial vessels sacrifice speed and armament for raw capacity. They are not warships and are not designed to be. Most carry no weapon hardpoints.
Built by nation-states and military contractors for combat operations. Military vessels carry reinforced hulls, dedicated weapon hardpoints, and crew complements trained for sustained engagement. Operating a military vessel without proper registry invites immediate scrutiny from any naval authority in range.
| Class | Type | Size | Base Cost (appr.) | Fly Speed (ft) | Cargo (lbs) | Rooms | Min. Crew | Weapon Hardpoints |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Yacht | Private | Tiny | 100,000 GP | 400 | 3,000 | 3 | 1 | 0 |
| Caravel | Private | Small | 300,000 GP | 300 | 5,000 | 5 | 4 | 2 |
| Schooner | Private | Medium | 600,000 GP | 250 | 10,000 | 10 | 12 | 4 |
| Brigantine | Private | Huge | 1,000,000 GP | 200 | 30,000 | 20 | 20 | 6 |
| Zeppelin | Private | Gargantuan | 8,000,000 GP | 100 | 50,000 | 50 | 40 | 6 |
| Tug | Industrial | Tiny | 75,000 GP | 200 | 2,000 | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| Barge | Industrial | Large | 750,000 GP | 200 | 40,000 | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| Dirigible | Industrial | Gargantuan | 7,500,000 GP | 100 | 60,000 | 10 | 20 | 0 |
| Sloop | Military | Small | 150,000 GP | 350 | 2,000 | 2 | 2 | 3 |
| Cutter | Military | Medium | 400,000 GP | 300 | 4,000 | 5 | 5 | 7 |
| Brig | Military | Large | 700,000 GP | 250 | 8,000 | 15 | 10 | 11 |
| Galleon | Military | Huge | 1,200,000 GP | 200 | 15,000 | 25 | 20 | 18 |
| Dreadnaught | Military | Gargantuan | 12,000,000 GP | 100 | 20,000 | 40 | 50 | 26 |
Rooms represent the number of below-decks spaces that can be designated for specific purposes — crew quarters, workshops, armories, brigs, medical bays, and so on. Rooms not assigned a specific function are treated as general storage or bunk space.
Weapon Hardpoints represent the maximum number of mounted weapons the hull can structurally support. Hardpoints must be outfitted with a weapon separately. An unoccupied hardpoint is simply an unused mount.
Cost reflects market value for a vessel in functional used condition. New builds, heavily modified vessels, or ships with significant history may vary considerably.
Speed is expressed in feet per round at standard cruising. Sprint speed, weather penalties, and cargo load all affect actual travel rate at the GM's discretion.
Airships are run like vehicles with their own turns, but they still rely on people. The core idea is simple: The ship is a monster stat block that needs crew actions to function. You do not roleplay every rope pull. You assign roles, declare actions, and resolve outcomes fast.
Airships operate in 3D space. In most fights, track:
Use of maps can be helpful, but this system is designed to be intuitive and simple so that you can run airship combat entirely in the theatre of the mind.
The airship rolls initiative and takes its own turn. Crew still take their own turns as normal.
The ship can only take actions if crew members have readied the relevant ship action on their turns. That means a typical round looks like this:
This prevents “free ship actions” and keeps the ship from outshining the party. It also makes sabotage and casualties matter.
If you expect the ship to fire weapons or maneuver during combat you must have a character in the appropriate location (helm, steering wheel, controls, mounted weapon, etc..). A single character can sometimes cover multiple roles, but it gets risky and almost impossible in a large vessel. The two primary roles aboard an airship are the Pilot and the Gunner. Other roles exist and are vessel-specific.
Non-player characters can perform all of the following tasks but it will be at GM discretion what actions are taken by those NPCs.
Pilot
Gunner
Other roles aboard an airship may include but are not limited to:
Engineer
Spotter
You do not need a formal rules sub-system for each role. Use these as table language so everyone knows what “help the ship” means.
Most airships can take multiple actions on their turn, up to the maximum listed in their stat block. However, they may only take as many actions as have been readied by the crew.
Common airship actions include:
If an action exists on the ship sheet, a crew member must ready it to enable it.
Mounted weapons are powerful, but they have constraints:
If the gunner is proficient with firearms, they add their proficiency bonus to the mounted weapon’s attack rolls. Class features and abilities that apply to firearm attacks may also apply to mounted weapons at the GM’s discretion.
Piloting uses the pilot’s movement to move the ship. This is intentionally abstract. It keeps ship movement tied to a character, not free-floating on the ship’s turn.
At the table:
If you use proficiency systems like airship proficiency, let it matter on:
If the airship is moving and the pilot leaves the helm or becomes incapacitated, the ship continues on its current speed and heading until acted upon by an outside force. The GM determines the outcome based on environmental conditions and the encounter.
Ramming is not a casual option. It is a desperate gambit with unforgiving consequences.
Use ramming when someone is desperate, reckless, or certain the target is softer than the hull.
Most ships have at least one anchor and that opens up some mechanical options:
When reduced to 0 hit points, an airship does not simply “die.” It crashes. The nature of that crash depends on altitude, speed, structural integrity, and fuel state. The GM determines whether it spirals, descends uncontrolled, breaks apart midair, or detonates in a hydrogas fireball.
Airships rarely operate at full efficiency while heavily damaged. As an airship loses hit points, the GM may impose narrative and mechanical consequences appropriate to the damage sustained. These may include reduced speed, loss of lift, disabled weapons, ruptured gas cells, jammed controls, uncontrolled drift, electrical failures, spreading fire, or exposed crew.
Airship combat is not a static exchange of attacks. It is an unfolding environmental hazard in motion. Decks tilt. Rigging snaps. Fires spread. Crew are thrown from their feet. Falling debris becomes shrapnel. A wounded vessel becomes increasingly unpredictable.
The goal is not granular simulation, but escalation. The lower the hull integrity, the more unstable the situation becomes. By the time an airship reaches 0 hit points, the fight should already have shifted from victory to surviving the crash.