“Who Are You, Hollow Man?” A Travelling At Night Character Creation Guide

Aug 13

Steam: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3782179349

In "Travelling At Night," you play as Spencer Hobson, a man with many pasts and a future that's up to you to decide. This guide is intended to explain various mechanics and help you create your first character. I’m putting it on my site in case Steam removes the guide for some reason. Note this guide was written during the demo release so it may not be accurate on launch.

Please note that this guide uses whatever English spellings are used in-game when relevant, which tends to be British English. Also note this game does not include any in-app purchases or microtransactions, so any references to purchases = references to buying things in-game with in-game currency obtainable as part of gameplay.

Careers

Instead of character archetypes or classes (e.g. Healer, Mage, Ranger) you choose which of Spencer Hobson's four pasts you wish to focus on.

Careers dictate:
- Your starting options for Passions
- The starting Skills in which you can allocate points
- Your starting outfit, which comes with Skill bonuses as well as aspects
- Your starting items, which also come with bonuses
- Some special dialogue/story options

What Careers do not dictate:
- Future Passions options
- Future Skills you can unlock and use
- Available Signs (a bonus you get based on the final Skill you allocate a Skill point into during character creation)

Regardless of what Career background you pick, given that all four Careers represent four canonical spheres of Spencer's life, you will still hear about the paths you didn't pick through the game. You can unlock 2 more Passions during the game and unlock all skills, buy missing outfits, and buy/find/craft? the starting items.

Career: An Exorcist

Starting Passions: Anger (Edge, Forge) Honour (Heart, Lantern) Sorrow (Moth, Winter)
Starting Skills: Dignity, Eloquence, Horomachistry, Hushery, Illumination, Skolekosophy
Starting Outfit: Trench Coat Brigade Warm, Dignity +1, Skolekosophy +1
Starting Items: Vigilant Eye (Observation +2, Illumination +4, Horomachistry +2) Sun-Cross Pectoral (Dignity +2, Illumination +2)

Career: A Writer

Starting Passions: Ambition (Forge, Grail) Cynicism (Knock, Winter) Whimsy (Moth, Rose)
Starting Skills: Birdsong, Eloquence, Hushery, Observation, Sophistication, Spivvery
Starting Outfit: Man of Mystery: Modern, Hushery +1, Spivvery +1
Starting Items: Wayfarer's Sign (Eloquence +2, Nyctodromy +4, Preservation +2) Unobtrusive Notepad (Eloquence +2, Observation +2)
The notepad is easily purchasable in the game and findable, for free, around the end of day 1.

Career: A Conjurer

Starting Passions: Appetite (Edge, Grail) Curiosity (Knock, Lantern) Cynicism (Knock, Winter)
Starting Skills: Charm, Ithastry, Stagecraft, Nyctodromy, Observation, Spivvery
Starting Outfit: Summer Frivolity: Light, Raffish, Charm +1, Ithastry +1
Starting Items: Tanglebrag (+2 Nyctodromy, +2 Stagecraft, +4 Bosk) Deck of Playing Cards (Spivvery+2, Stagecraft +2)
The deck of playing cards is a relatively inexpensive purchasable item in-game.

Career: A Physician

Starting Passions: Ambition (Forge, Grail) Compassion (Heart, Rose) Curiosity (Knock, Lantern)
Starting Skills: Bosk, Dignity, Ithastry, Nyctodromy, Preservation, Skolekosophy
Starting Outfit: Father's Day: Respectable, Dignity +1, Preservation +1
Starting Items: Cradle-Weft (Charm +2, Preservation +4, Hushery +2) Unconventional Suture Kit (Preservation +2, Bosk +2)

Aspect Pool

The Aspect Pool is the clearly marked box in the upper right hand corner with pips (dots) listed for the nine Principles (think elements in other games like Lighting or Water) in the game.

The Aspect Pool is basically where you store a renewable resource that is used to force skillchecks that you've failed. If you fail a Skill check, you can try to force it using available pips in the Aspect Pool. Every Skill is associated with three different types of Principles (again, like elements) that you store in the Aspect Pool

Pips are added to the Aspect Pool based on your selected Passion and the Sign you get for your character, covered later in the guide. Your Skill selection affects what Sign you get, but it does not increase pips available in the Aspect Pool in any other way.

Passions

Passions add pips to your Aspect Pool. Each Passion has 2 associated Principles and will add 3 pips of each of those Principles to the Aspect Pool. Acting in a way that aligns with one of your Passions restores pips to your Aspect Pool.

Experiences = the different types of Experience points you get in the game. They're tied to the 9 Principles of the Aspect Pool: Edge, Forge, Grail, Heart, Knock, Lantern, Moth, Rose, Winter.

Note that at least in the demo, Corona and Glimmer, which are mentioned as Principles in Travelling At Night, are not Principles that you can gain Experience in nor do they appear in the Aspect Pool, at least in the demo.

Note that Secret Histories (from Cultist Simulator) and Moon, Scale, Nectar, and Sky (from Book Of Hours) do not appear as Principles in Travelling At Night, at least in the demo.

*"It's useful to have a Passion whose Aspects matches a Sign - then acting with the Passion will refresh the Sign pips [pips added to your Aspect Pool by the Sign] as well"*

The full Passions list:

  
Passion
Principles
Evolutions
Matching Signs
 
        Ambition
        Forge, Grail
Cynicism, Honour
Cassandro's Woe, Diamantina's Dismay, Fracasse's Frailty, Mezzetin's Mystery, Polchinelle's Misfortune
    
        Anger
        Edge, Forge
Honour, Ambition
Cassandro's Woe, Diamantina's Dismay, Fracasse's Frailty, Mezzetin's Mystery, Polchinelle's Misfortune
    
        Appetite
        Grail, Edge
Ambition, Curiosity
Cassandro's Woe, Polchinelle's Misfortune
    
        Compassion
        Heart, Rose
Anger, Sorrow
Fracasse's Frailty, Mezzetin's Mystery
    
        Curiosity
        Lantern, Knock
Appetite, Whimsy
Arlequin's Affliction, Metaphraste's Malady, Pierrot's Pang, Scapin's Sickness 
    
        Cynicism
        Winter, Knock
Sorrow, Whimsy
Arlequin's Affliction, Metaphraste's Malady, Pierrot's Pang, Scapin's Sickness
    
        Honour
        Lantern, Heart
Anger, Compassion
Fracasse's Frailty, Metaphraste's Malady
    
        Sorrow
        Winter, Moth
Curiosity, Appetite
Arlequin's Affliction, Pierrot's Pang
    
        Whimsy
        Moth, Rose
Curiosity, Appetite
Arlequin's Affliction, Mezzetin's Mystery

Skills

Skills can broadly be categorized as Worldly Skills and un-Worldly Skills. Worldly Skills are essentially mundane skills that do not have to do with the game's Crafting mechanic (at least in the Demo.)

The 9 Un-Worldly Skills can be used for Crafting Recipes at special in-game locations. Your Recipes can be viewed from the start of the game and can be viewed any time, but Recipes can only be used for Crafting at a Crafting location. The type of location required to use a Skill for Crafting is listed as "Crafting Location Aspects" in the chart below.

The 9 Un-Worldly skills can be broken up into the Arts Unregarded (Birdsong, The Bosk, Preservation,) Bright Arts (Horomachistry, Ithastry, Illumination), and Night Arts (Hushery, Nyctodromy, Skolekosopy).
- All Bright Arts result in a Fascination penalty if a skill check is failed.
- All Night Arts result in a Dread penalty if a skill check is failed.
- All Arts Unregarded except The Bosk result in a Weariness penalty if a check is failed. The Bosk's failure penalty is Dread.

New Recipes are unlocked at Skill levels 1, 5, 7, 10, 15, and 20.

Some Recipes are shared across Skills. For instance, "Surprise Memory" is a recipe that can be made with Birdsong 1 or Nyctodromy 1.

- All Level 1 Recipes can be made with any of 2 skills, except "Knock Memory" which requires Nyctodromy 1
- All level 5 recipes can be made with any of 2-3 skills, except "Assert Authority," which requires Horomachistry 5
- All level 10 recipes can be made with any of 3 skills
- All level 7, level 15, and level 20 recipes are unique, 1:1 with Unworldly skills (e.g. "Twilit Votum," made with Hushery 20, cannot be made with any other Skill)

Only one of the aspects has to match for a Skill to be usable at a Crafting location. For example, Birdsong can be used as Crafting locations with the aspects of Threshold or Verdant, and a Crafting location only needs one of those aspects to be usable, e.g. a place that is a Threshold but not Verdant can still be used for Birdsong crafting.

Skills are used for Skill checks and failing a Skill check gives you a penalty depending on the Skill used, hence, the "Failure Penalty" column in the chart below.

During Character Creation, you get 1 Skill point by default in each of the available starting Skills for the Career. You have 20 more points to assign and can add up to 6 points in a Skill's slot to get it up to level 7. The in-game Skill level cap is not 7. That's just the Skill level cap for character creation.

  
    

    
        Skill
        Type
Principles
Crafting Location Aspects
Failure Penalty
    

        Birdsong
        Arts Unconsidered
Heart, Moth, Rose
Thresholds, Verdant
Weariness
    

       Bosk
        Arts Unconsidered
Grail, Heart, Moth
Verdant, Shadowed
Dread
    

       Charm
        Worldly
Grail, Heart, Moth
None
Trace
    

       Dignity
        Worldly
Edge, Heart, Lantern
None
Trace
    

       Eloquence
        Worldly
Knock, Moth, Winter
None
Trace
    

       Horomachistry
        Bright Arts
Edge, Forge, Rose
Thresholds, Holy
Fascination
    

       Hushery
        Night Art
Edge, Lantern, Winter
Quiet, Shadowed
Dread
    

       Illumination
        Bright Art
Edge, Forge, Lantern
Holy, Quiet
Fascination
    

       Ithastry
        Bright Art
Forge, Knock, Winter
Hearths, Holy
Fascination
    

       Stagecraft
        Worldly
Edge, Forge, Moth
None
Weariness
    

       Nyctodromy
        Night Arts
Knock, Lantern, Moth
Thresholds, Wounds
Dread
    

       Observation
        Worldly
Lantern, Rose, Winter
None
Weariness
    

       Preservation
        Arts Unconsidered
Grail, Heart, Rose
Hearth, Verdant
Weariness
    

       Skolekosophy
        Night Arts
Grail, Knock, Winter
Wounds, Shadowed
Dread
    

       Sophistication
        Worldly
Forge, Lantern, Winter
None
Weariness
    

       Spivvery
        Worldly
Forge, Grail, Knock
None
Trace
    





  
  

Signs

Your Sign, in theory, is determined by your final choice of Skills, namely, the last Skill you put a skill point into during character creation. Sometimes it works for me, sometimes it doesn't, YMMV. I recommend messing around with your skills until you end up rolling the Sign you want.

Each of these Signs adds 2 points to your Aspect Pool. Fun fact: these are references to Commedia dell'arte, an Italian form of theater involving archetypes represented by masks and costumes. For instance, Arlequin = Harlequin, Pierrot is a direct reference to Pierrot, Polchinelle is likely a reference to Pulcinella, etc.

  
Sign
Principles
Skills
 
        Arlequin's Affliction
        Knock, Moth
Bosk, Stagecraft
    
        Cassandro's Woe
        Forge, Grail
Ithastry, Spivvery
    
        Diamantina's Dismay
        Forge, Forge
Charm, Preservation
    
        Fracasse's Frailty
        Heart, Forge
Illumination
    
        Metaphraste's Malady
        Lantern, Knock
Dignity, Observation
    
        Mezzetin's Misery
        Rose, Forge
Birdsong, Sophistication
    
        Pierrot's Pang
        Knock, Winter
Hushery, Skolekosophy
    
        Polchinelle's Misfortune
        Edge, Forge
Horomachistry
    
        Scapin's Sickness
        Knock, Knock
Eloquence, Nyctodromy

Eldra Echo