Project Eternity Post-funding Update #40

Obsidian Entertainment has taken their Project Eternity updates over to the official forums, where update #40 introduces us to the Orlan race and features an inside look at how the team is creating the world’s deities, courtesy of the one and only George Ziets. Behold the creation of Woedica, “The Exiled Queen”:

A lot of my design ideas start with a visual image. That applies to characters, locations, even narrative. I’m not sure where most of them come from, but examining them more closely will usually lead me to develop stories to explain who they are and where they came from.

One of the first images that sprang to mind was an old woman a dethroned queen wandering along an empty road in tattered finery. Despite whatever horrors she had suffered, she maintained a certain stubborn dignity, and she carried a heavy book of law.

I felt like this goddess could cover a range of portfolios, and I liked the idea that the deity who was the “rightful ruler” of the gods (in her mind, at least), had lost her throne. That may have some interesting implications for the way in which mortals view the world.

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.