Project Eternity director details stealth, crafting and strongholds

Obsidian Entertainment's role-playing game Project Eternity will feature an inventive new take on stealth mechanics and six-player strongholds with static leveling options, project director Josh Sawyer shared among other details in a Q&A with RPGCodex.

Sawyer revealed that a player's party can accommodate six standard characters maximum, but some quests and missions may add additional NPCs to the party or have them appear at quest destinations. Player strongholds will also feature "hirelings" that will protect the area but will not leave it. Companions who stay at the stronghold while players go on quests will still receive a small amount of experience towards leveling, and players can customize how high that amount should be

Stealth mechanics will be a little more involved, and rather than pointing the mouse and clicking to creep along a line, players will have a stealth radius around them that can be altered. This radius indicates at what range other beings will notice them, and it can be expanded using spells. "Bumping" another creature's edge of detection will send them into investigation mode and they will move towards you, while crossing completely into players' stealth radius will put them on alert.

Sawyer also revealed that crafting recipes will focus on consumables and upgrading or adding properties to existing items, rather than making new equipment. Attributes that are assigned to players will also be uniformly applied, which means they won't only be useable with specific attacks or items.

"We would like your character concepts to be viable regardless of how you distribute your attributes," Sawyer said. "Part of our solution for this is decoupling things like attribute-based accuracy and damage bonuses from specific types of gear or class abilities."

As for voice acting in Project Eternity, Sawyer noted that the development team has yet to finalize an "extensive plan" for it, but will focus on providing voices for player characters, companions, major NPCs and background chatter for crowds.

Check out the full Q&A with Sawyer here.