Airship sources

[Jurai]

Are there rules for airships in any of the first party books? I'm working on a campaign about Dragon Piracy for a group.

[Rukelnikov]

I'm on the phone so I can't check the books, but a certain site lists there being airships in the DMG for just 20k, seems very cheap imo.

EDIT: I doubt there's a lot of rules for them, maybe there's some in Spelljammer you can use? I haven't read it, but it doesn't have good rep, so I wouldn't be surprised if it doesn't have rules for ship combat

[Anymage]

Typing "airship" into DDB shows a few hits for the DMG and Storm King's Thunder, plus of course a bit in the Eberron book. Looking at the DMG (P. 119) it does mention some basics that might happen if the party happens to own a ship, but ship-to-ship combat isn't really talked about. It mentions crew and cargo capacities as well as what would happen if someone were to attack the ship, but nothing about ship-to-ship combat or boarding actions.

"Airship" has stats, being mostly similar to sailing ships. You can add more detail, but the game still fundamentally expects that ships are a stage for the characters to act on instead of tools for the characters to actively use themselves. And in that sense the only difference between a seagoing vessel and an airship is that in the one people who fall overboard are screwed if they can't swim, while the other screws characters who can't fly.

[Witty Username]

You could probably hack some of the stuff from Spelljammer, you may need to tinker with the speeds (and I would make the onboard weapons alot stronger) but it should come in handy.

[cZak]

There was a UA of ships
ShipsSea (https://media.wizards.com/2018/dnd/downloads/UA_ShipsSea.pdf)

Has stats n such

[Laserlight]

and I would make the onboard weapons a lot stronger

We took a trip on the one in Storm King, and it turns out those airships are extremely fragile and incapable of defending themselves.

[Catullus64]

I'm working on a campaign about Dragon Piracy for a group.

Are people pirating Dragons, like boarding and capturing them? Or are the dragons the ones doing the piracy?

[Jurai]

Dragon-riding pirates.

[Arkhios]

Apart from DMG and the aforementioned Unearthed Arcana: Of Ships and the Sea (https://media.wizards.com/2018/dnd/downloads/UA_ShipsSea.pdf) (which, to be honest, is quite extensive and good source for the purpose), I still find it to be rather disappointing that THE 5th edition setting book that talks about having airships among other magical transport (Eberron: Rising from the Last War) doesn't have any (additional) rules for them.

Spelljammer, on the other hand, is more about "spaceships" which is different, and might not work that well for the purposes of airships.

[JLandan]

I don't know any first party stuff, but there are lots of third party sources.

Bastian Press, Airships
Goodman Games, Aerial Adventures Guide, Sky Captain's Handbook

Just for two examples