I'm currently working on a TTRPG setting where there is an ocean of caustic clouds surrounding the continents instead of a regular ocean. Tech level is roughly Age of Sail with some deviations due to differences in resource availability. In this world, there is a type of rock that exhibits incredible buoyancy when coming into contact with said ocean and the people living there have been building ships with these rocks as the centrepiece that keeps them floating on top of it. For reference, a rock with a diameter of ~5 ft. would support a fully loaded caravel.
From researching a bit, I realised that it's the resistance/difference of movement between water and air that lets conventional ships move in any direction that is not the same as the wind. This begs the question of how this could be achieved in this setting? And what the possible implications for ship design would be?
Now, I'm not above handwaving this pretty heavily 'cause this is more about aesthetic to me than about how realistic something like this is but I think following the thought could still end up making the vessels look more unique and lead to other cool ideas.
I did look at some other questions about airships but all of them seemed to concern ships that can move in three dimensions so I hope this makes sense as its own question.
(If anyone needs/wants more information about the world, I'm happy to provide but I wanted to keep this short for now.)