Is UA considered official content?..

Do you want spells, or are magic items fine as well>

Based on your most recents edits, you want Spells only, right? No magic items of any rarity? And can magic items (including scrolls or spellcasters) be purchased easily in your world?

For what it's worth, asking wholly “how can this character stop a ship”, instead of asking merely what spells they can use, is very likely an entirely valid question, provided we understand their resources. Of course, spells will probably be involved somewhere in the process. Would I be correct in assuming they are acting solo? Are we trying to preserve the entire ship and everyone and everything on board, or are there some acceptable losses?

@doppelgreener This character is not acting solo but is most powerful among them.

Who’s controlling the ship? Is the captain friendly/hostile towards the NPC? With this info I could think of a social approach to “stopping the ship”, including spells for social interaction. Note: owning the ship does not nevesarrily equal controlling it.

Without more details about what character the spell is for, and other circumstances, this seems like a list question.

@doppelgreener I really hope there's such a thing as "acceptable losses"; if a stopped ship gets boarded, and it chooses to fight, it's highly likely that members of both crews will die.

@Lidza What's this NPC's goal for the end of this encounter? It sounds like you don't just want to stop the ship; you want to overtake it, board it, and capture it.

It is not clear, where is the NPC. On the same ship? On different ship? On land? How far from the ship? Who controls the ship? What is the gust of wind item?

@Artholl NPC is from other ship. Cloud of daggers would be a damaging for ship what would be hard to fix if not having them at the spot. PCs are controlling ship. Ok idea to hold person or command spell but it depends on failing save of person in control.

@Mazura Titles are not required to contain all details. However, comments are required to not contain answers. I have removed your answer. Feel free to repost it in an answer post.

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@GregFaust NPC is send to get pirates (PCs have taken over pirate ship) that is known for getting out of reach with wind magic. NPC is on other ship he commands. He wants pirates alive and ship in good state because of their cooperation with necromancer cult. It will play out on sea, between 2 ships

sorry i for late respond i was offline for some time