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Game News Project Eternity Kickstarter Update #40: Orlans and Gods

Infinitron

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Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Tags: George Ziets; J.E. Sawyer; Obsidian Entertainment; Pillars of Eternity

We have another meaty Project Eternity Kickstarter update this week. This one is written by George Ziets, and discusses a topic that is close to his heart - pantheon design. Have a snippet:

Deities can be a good starting point when developing a world. They reflect the views and beliefs of the world’s inhabitants, and they can inspire ideas for characters, organizations, and conflicts.

You’ve already heard a few of our gods mentioned in passing: Magran, goddess of fire and war; Berath, god of cycles, doors, and death; Eothas, god of light and redemption. Josh invented these gods when he was first developing the world, and they play important roles in the region where the game will be set. But we’ll need a lot more gods to fill out the pantheon.

Here are a few of the elements we consider for each new deity:
  • What is the god's name, and what are his/her "aliases" (e.g., "The Twinned God" for Berath).
  • What is the god's portfolio? That is, what aspects of life or the world do they represent (e.g., mortality, greed, summer, commerce)?
  • What allies and foes do they have amongst the other gods?
  • What are their symbols?
  • How do they manifest in the mortal world?
We list this information for each deity, as well as providing a detailed description. Players won’t necessarily get to see all this stuff, but it’s useful background for the art and design teams, so that the world feels like a consistent, coherent whole.

One other thing to bear in mind: for the most part, our deities aren’t good or evil. They’re somewhere in between – closer to the multi-dimensional gods of the ancient world. Every deity has his or her own agenda, which isn’t bound by notions of alignment. Sometimes they can be helpful and benevolent. Other times – not so much.
As an example, George reveals another one of Project Eternity's gods - Woedica, "The Exiled Queen", who manifests in the world as a leathery-skinned old woman clad in tattered finery who murders those who break solemn oaths. Am I the only one thinking "Ravel Puzzlewell"?

The update also reveals a full-sized portrait of Project Eternity's halfling Orlan detective NPC, which was hidden in the tileset screenshot from last week's update:

orlan-tn.jpg

You can read the entire update here.
 

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Are these hair or ears? Either way it's awesome lame funny. I think. Not sure what to make of this.
 

Kirtai

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Detective eh? Seems my psychometry comment in the other thread might have been on target.
 

Bladderfish

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Love the tone of the Exiled Queen idea. George has some really good ideas, and I hope we see more of his input (and if his god design has some additional originality beyond the usual boring crap of the traditional pantheon that always seem to derive from the greek stuff).
 

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Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
Interesting choice of first post after over two years of inactivity.
 
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Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera
Represents how the gods are above the laws. Or how power is above the law. Laws are no restriction to those with the power to disregard them.

So not looking like it will be the grand celestial order type of pantheon.

Kind of my thinking as well. The ambiguity about whether she actually held dominion and was deposed or whether she just claims to have done so raises the question of whether the gods are above the law because they have never been subject to it or whether they have actively rejected it. In other words, is law irrelevant to the gods or are they anti-law.

Skulls for the Skull throne?
 
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Ziets said:
So what was her story? According to her followers, she had once claimed rulership over all the other gods. But if that was true, she was cast down in the far distant past. Among the other gods, she has no real allies, believing that all the gods owe her fealty. She claims the portfolios of law, rightful rulership, memory, and vengeance. And she manifests in the world as the Strangler, a leathery-skinned old woman, always clad in tattered finery, who appears on an empty road or abandoned alleyway to murder those who break a solemn oath.

Her Aedyran name is Woedica, which evokes the “Old English” feel of the Aedyran language. (Maintaining a distinct sense of national/ethnic language and culture is important to us – more about that in a later update.)

There’s a lot more to tell about the Exiled Queen and the other gods (some of which aren’t even “human”). But that should give you a taste of our creative process. We’ll have plenty more to say about world-building in future updates. As some of the keen-eyed among you noted from last week's update, there was an unfamiliar portrait in our work-in-progress tileset screenshot. We read the debates and viewed the Blade Runner-esque enhanced images that followed with interest. Good work, sleuths, the character pictured is, in fact, an orlan. This orlan is engaged in some important work in one of the Dyrwood's busiest cities. Here's the full-sized portrait for your continued speculation!

It's ironic that they allegedly put this much thought into it because the name "Woedica" is just plain fucking shit and also sounds like a shitty play on the word "woe" and the historical Queen Boedica who somewhat parallels this "Oh My Woes-dica" bitch.
 

Infinitron

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Codex Year of the Donut Serpent in the Staglands Dead State Divinity: Original Sin Project: Eternity Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 A Beautifully Desolate Campaign Pillars of Eternity 2: Deadfire Pathfinder: Kingmaker Pathfinder: Wrath I'm very into cock and ball torture I helped put crap in Monomyth
The amblem on the Orlan's vest, fist holding -a dart?-, looks like the logo of some game developer I can't recall. Anyone up to the task?

Sort of like the guy's hand in the Troika logo, rotated 90 degrees, perhaps?
 

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