41 articlesYou start Windrose with what can generously be described as a boat. Dr. Galen hands you a small vessel after the tutorial that tops out at 10 knots and does not inspire much confidence on the open sea. It gets the job done for early island hopping but the moment you try to take on anything serious you will feel every limitation it has.
The real ship comes through the I Need a Bigger Boat quest, which Dr. Galen kicks off after you mine copper for the first time. It is not as simple as just sailing to a location and claiming it though. The ship needs repairing with specific materials and you need a crew of seven before you can even take the helm. This guide walks you through the whole thing step by step.
Getting Your First Large Ship
Once you progress far enough through the early story and unlock Dr. Galen back at your base, he will give you two quests to work on. The first one is called “I Need a Bigger Boat” and the second one is “Rescuing The Crew“. You need to complete both of these quests in order to unlock your first actual big ship. Here is how to complete both of them, one by one:
I Need a Bigger Boat
Once you get both of these quests from Dr. Galen, check your map and you will see four quest markers pop up. Three of these markers are shipwrecks that you need to investigate first. The fourth one is related to the crew, which we will come back to later.
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Gathering the Necessary Resources
You can gather Wood by chopping down trees with your axe. It is one of the easiest resources to get, so you should have no trouble stocking up. For Coarse Fabric and Ropes, you need to craft them at the Workbench. Both of them are made from Plant Fibers, which you can gather by interacting with bushes or tall grass as you explore.
As for Nails, those are crafted from Copper Ingots. To get Copper Ingots, you first need to mine Copper Ore from inside caves. You will also need to set up a Charcoal Kiln at your base. Putting one piece of Wood into the Kiln gives you one Charcoal and one Ash. Once you have Charcoal, take it along with four Copper Ores to the Smelting Furnace. That combination will produce one Copper Ingot, which you can then use to craft nails at the Workbench.
Repairing the Ship
Once you have gathered all the necessary resources, head back to the shipwreck. Interact with the broken down ship and you will see an option to “Repair the ship“. Select that, and the game will consume your materials to fix it up. That part of the quest is now complete. Next, the quest will update and ask you to gather seven crew members before you can actually take the ship out.
Rescuing The Crew
Check your map for the quest indicator tied to “Rescuing The Crew” and head over to that location. When you arrive, you will find a pirate camp with several enemies patrolling the area. You need to take them out first before you can do anything else.
Once the enemies are cleared, look around the camp and you will find a person trapped inside a cage. Interact with the caged sailor and go through the dialogue that pops up. After that conversation finishes, the quest will update and give you six more markers on your map. These markers will all be in the same general area, so you do not have to travel far. Go to each one of them one by one and rescue the captured sailor trapped inside each cage. Once you free the final captive, the quest will be completed.
Now that you have rescued all the captured sailors, head back to the shipwreck where you repaired the vessel. Interact with the ship again, and you will see a new option that says “Launch the ship with the crew aboard“. Select that, and the ship will become yours. From now on, you can recall it at any time by opening your ship recall menu and selecting “Ketch“.
Now to fully finish the questline, head back to Dr. Galen and let him know about the repaired ship. Go through the dialogue options that come up, and once that conversation wraps up, the questline will be officially completed.
That’s It
So that is how you get your first real ship in Windrose. Dr. Galen gives you the quests, you find the right wreck, patch it up, rescue a handful of crew members from some cages, and then launch the thing. Once you report back to him, the Ketch is all yours. It is a huge step up from the little boat you start with and will serve you well for a good while.
Now that you have a proper vessel, you are going to start running into factions and dealing with selling loot. The game does a pretty terrible job explaining how any of that works, so I suggest reading my guide on how factions ACTUALLY work in Windrose. It will save you a lot of confusion!
