Every game begins the same way. You wake up on a beach. All you have with you is 'A Drowned Book,' hence the name of this project. Resources: https://book-of-hours.fandom.com/wiki/The_Beginning The base gameplay loop of Book of Hours involves verbs that can be fed various nouns. To power a verb, you often times have to spend the equivalent of a special type of energy point, known as an Element of the Soul, or EotS for short. These Elements of the Soul will not get permanently expended -- just temporarily exhausted -- and will be restored automatically each in-game morning. During 'character creation,' your choice of EotS is not random, and there is no RNG involved. The creation process is straight forward. In this game, very few things are RNG in a way that doesn't make sense. The RNG elements are things like the day's weather, as well as, for instance, what random item you might find on the seashore. Every start involves getting a free [[Health]] card and A Drowned Book. You will get to select between [[Chor]], [[Fet]], and [[Shapt]]. Then, you select between [[Ereb]], [[Mettle]], [[Phost]], and [[Wist]]. The choice you make at this stage determine one of the nine possible starts. **I call these starts Origins because if I just call them 'Librarians,' things are going to get pretty confusing pretty quickly.** That said, it's by no means a standard term. If you're brand new to the game, I highly suggest playing as [[The Revolutionary]]. You get very helpful Elements of the Soul from the start, as well as 3 lessons in one of the strongest skills in the game out the gate. To select The Revolutionary pick Fet, then Mettle. The tutorial is relatively straightforward from here. Your goals are to make contact with your friend who lives in town and get into the library. You have a book with you. You should try to open that book. It contains a free EotS and some free stuff that'll help you learn two skills in the early game. Guides about the game will often time fail to account for three more EotS you start with -- the aforementioned [[Health]] everyone starts with, a card you get from reading A Drowned Book (varies by Origin, but for The Revolutionary, it is always [[Mettle]]), and a [[Trist]] card you get the first time you open the Tree of Wisdom -- the skill tree. ### FAQ about Origins ###### "But wait, Eldra, 3 options x 4 options = 12 outcomes!" | Choices | [[Chor]] | [[Fet]] | [[Shapt]] | | ---------- | ------------------- | --------------------- | --------------------- | | [[Ereb]] | [[The Artist]] | [[The Artist]] | [[The Artist]] | | [[Mettle]] | [[The Executioner]] | [[The Revolutionary]] | [[The Archaeologist]] | | [[Phost]] | [[The Prodigal]] | [[The Cartographer]] | [[The Twice-Born]] | | [[Wist]] | [[The Symurgist]] | [[The Magnate]] | [[The Archaeologist]] | Of note: - Choosing [[Ereb]] at all means you'll get [[The Artist]] but there's no difference (other than starting element) between the three variations of The Artist - The two different versions of [[The Archaeologist]] do have differences. If you select [[Shapt]], then [[Mettle]], your starting lessons will be 3 Ragged Crossroads and 1 Wolf Stories. If you select Shapt, then Wist, your starting lessons will be 3 Inks of Containment and 1 Wolf Stories. - You can find more information about the possible starts, all their starting lessons, and their possible EotS here. https://www.eldraecho.com/blogofhours/librarianeots ###### Q: Why does the chart look different than the one on the Book of Hours wiki? Because mine is in alphabetical order. ###### Q: Are they formally called Origins? No. I just need a way to refer to these starts. ###### Q: Will I be locked out of content if I pick one Origin and not another? Each Origin can do the exact same things as the others. So, for instance, The Symurgist is associated with Birdsong (a Wisdom -- like a school of magic) but any Origin can pursue Birdsong -- and someone playing The Symurgist could ignore Birdsong entirely. The Symurgist doesn't get access to anything special that other characters could not also get later. ###### Q: What impact does Origin have on the game? There are unique endings for each Origin. ###### Q: If the Origins all have the same abilities, and the only difference is in the possible endings, what's the point of the different origins? Different origins have different starting Elements of the Soul, as well as different starting lessons, and some may have an easier time than others doing certain things due to that headstart. For instance, I recommend people play [[The Revolutionary]] as their first character because that character can get 3 Mettle cards pretty quickly and that's very useful for the early game, because Mettle cannot get maladied (sick.) #### RNG Guide The following are **not** RNG - Character creation stuff like the combos of EotS that make each Origin, or the rewards from cataloguing and from mastering A Drowned Book - Flavor text, principles - The presence of Travelling at Night, vol. 1 and vol. 2 in The Keeper's Lodge. They're the only(?) two guaranteed book spawns. - The items that are in each room when unlocked, e.g. there is always a loaf of Pillas-Oat Bread in The Keeper's Lodge - What memories and lessons a book grants or its mastery level and Principles and language - What EotS a skill awards if it's attuned to a Wisdom - The Tree of Wisdom map and jumps - Seasonal help available at the pub The following **are** RNG: - Whether a book is contaminated - Whether you get additional help/chances/types of chances to master a book when you fail to do so initially - Whether an EotS soul is maladied upon doing certain dangerous things - Who visits you - What Affair visitors care about - Special assistants, it's drawn from a deck but it's not weighted or seasonal The following are **pseudo-RNG**: - **Books found in the game (nearly fully RNG):** Books are organized by era. Each game will have a certain number of uncatalogued books from each era and those uncatalogued books will always be found in the same place. For instance, if there are 3 uncatalogued Curia period books in one room in your first game, you will find 3 uncatalogued Curia period books in that same game in your second game -- but they may be different books. They're only guaranteed to be from the same period. Given there are hundreds(?) of books, this is pretty RNG - **Items found gathering:** There's specific decks that are drawn from to - **Weather:** Weather is drawn from a deck of cards. This deck is based on the season. You aren't going to draw the Snow card in the Summer, but you cannot guarantee you'll get Sunny weather on a given day either. - **Numa:** If you know what it is, great, if not, this is not where I'm spoiling it for you. It seems random, but, it's not. It's in a deck of certain cards that is depleted until Numa is drawn, from what I recall.