Shipbuilding
Your ship. Your creation. Your legend.
Ships are the heart of Ships and Shanties. Make a hull at the shipwright table, then build a ship on top of it that is entirely your own.
From hull to ship
Everything starts at the shipwright table
Make a hull, build upon it, and customise the ship until it is unmistakably yours.
Shipbuilding is not a side activity in Ships and Shanties. It is the way the game opens up: a better ship carries you into more dangerous waters. You do not build a hull from scratch. You make one at a shipwright table, then build your ship on top of it, and that is where the real freedom begins. Step through the stages below to see how that journey is described.
Start at the shipwright table
You do not lay a ship down plank by plank. A hull is made at the shipwright table, and it becomes the foundation everything else is built on.
- 1Hull from the shipwright table
A conceptual progression drawn from the game’s design intent. It is an illustration for this website, not a depiction of final in-game ship stages.
Customise your vessel
Heavy beams, patched rigging
Viking ships are built on thick, load-bearing construction. Pirate ships are built on adaptation: repairs, rope, hanging cloth and whatever was close to hand. Ships in this game draw on both.
Customisation is the heart of it. Every ship has sails and rigging, and beyond that you add, change and rearrange what you like, so that the ship feels hand-built, repairable and scarred by use, and unmistakably yours.
The shipwright table
Bigger tables, bigger hulls
The shipwright table comes in tiers. Each tier lets you make bigger and better hulls, and a bigger hull means more room to build on, and more dangerous waters within reach.
Tiers are a feature of the shipwright table, not a game-wide progression system. What goes on top of the hull is up to you.
Built for the voyage
Make ready for the sea
A hull with a deck and a mast is where preparation begins. Equip your ship for exploration, and for naval encounters, including different categories of mounted weapons. Then point it at the horizon.
A ship with a story
The ship you remember
Because you customise it, upgrade it and repair it, a ship becomes more than a means of travel. It carries your decisions and your shared history, and in cooperative play, your crew’s.
Wear tells stories: patched planks, salt-bleached sailcloth, a scratched shield. That is the look the game is built around.
Raise your first hull
Wishlist the game, or follow development, and watch the shipyard grow.