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VoxRationis
2020-10-13, 02:09 AM
I'm writing a campaign right now and I'm trying to include elements that provide foreshadowing without being too direct about the plot of the game. If the players take the right steps, they could potentially find the following prophecy*, which is meant to be a piece of evidence that spurs a central NPC to set the PCs in motion (hopefully to avert the prophecy).


The Courage of Irant, the iron arm that iron will possessed
The Wings of a Star, a lucent piece of heav’n cast down like crystal tears
The Heart of the Moon, a light to darkness lost, in darkness laid to rest
So sought Lænomar thereby to stay the Shatt’ring of the Spheres
For there remained a vestige still, a glowing ember in the gloom
Irant’s king would his kindred kill, and bring Irant’s descendants’ doom

(It's written in iambic octameter (with some cheating for "of a"); Irant carries stress on the second syllable.)

Ultimately, the plot is about the return of the Sun to the world; the Sun, formerly the king of the gods but a paranoid megalomaniac, was overthrown long ago, with the stars dividing his power amongst themselves. The stars are set in three concentric crystal spheres, hence the "shattering of the spheres" by the resurgent Sun (Irant's king) as the main prophesied event. This event would devastate the world, particularly the descendants of Irant, who live mostly in the polar regions, which have become temperate and fertile with the light of the Sun now spread evenly over the world. Though the items listed appear to be "Scarborough Fair" sorts of impossible tasks, they allude to very real items that can be used to permanently destroy the Sun and which the PCs will end up questing for. The Courage of Irant is a magical bow once used by said figure, the Wings of a Star is a broken piece of the heavens, and the Heart of the Moon is a pearl the Moon tore out of herself when grieving for the fallen Sun.

With this context, does the poem seem too obvious about the plot of the game? My hope is that if the players find this poem through some clever stratagem, they will gain additional insight into what might be happening without understanding the entire plot at once, but I'm worried about it being a little too direct. Now, the poem obviously doesn't mention where these things are or what sorts of complications might arise from trying to find them, but it does fairly explicitly allude to the main antagonist and the natures of the three items. That said, that's coming from the perspective of the person who's devised the whole scenario, so I wanted to get an outside assessment from those not in the campaign.

*Technically, it's an excerpt from an old epic that's indirectly reproducing the prophecy by recounting the tale of someone who responded to it, but that's as close as the players will likely get to the original prediction.

OldTrees1
2020-10-13, 12:02 PM
Seems fine. Using just the PC knowledge I got some idea of the overall meaning. Your players will have more details to sift through, but would need to sift through those details (you only told me the relevant information).

On this first reading I know the upcoming event, but the prophecy has plenty of lines I did not decipher.

I suggest counting this as 1 of 3 clues if you follow the rule of 3.