Lost Lab of Kwalish

Sounds like this is a long rest then? Is anyone standing watch or casting tiny hut instead it using time to do non-long rest things?

Dorian will cast tiny hut once everyone's done with any forge work, so that it'll benefit everyone for the full long rest, and he'll leave his owl out to alert the group of any danger.

Echo will also stand guard.

Missed the detect magic still up after the locks, so you would sense evocation magic from Moradin's Gauntlet (I'm new to homebrew in DDB, so let me know if this shows up for all of you).

Also adding the discovery of a cloak of displacement to the treasure in the treasury.

You're long rest is uninterrupted, how do you proceed?

(Moradin's Gauntlet is showing up in my equipment list, yes.)

Dorian will attune to the cloak overnight, deattuning from the Ring of Mind Shielding. He'll also take 10 minutes to cast Comprehend Languages before they head out.

Ooc: I think I originally had it set as armor, the gauntlet is now a wondrous item. That should allow full usage as intended.

If there's no further exploring, I'll assume we will head back through area 10, where the mine carts were.

While you were sleeping... The warlock easily cut the ropes with a left over scimitar from one of his fallen comrades using mage hand, which he cast with his first spell slot, being a warlock that finished a short rest.  Several other patrols were out during the day and have since returned.  Of the dozen striders you saw chains for, the party has disposed of 4, 6 have returned and 2 are unaccounted for.  The warlock is beyond enraged, not only that you've decimated his tribe, but that you've desecrated their shrine when you took the old keys out if it.

Looking for a 10ft radius clearing for your tiny hut, I'd guess the northwest corner of the smelter.

The newts do not immediately return to the forge, but set up a perimeter and cordon the area as the remaining patrols return to bolster their numbers.  The dwarves have been threatening to reclaim the forge and now the new invaders have come in and disrupted the newt's sanctum.  If the dwarves find out about this, they will be emboldened and take the forge back.  The Warlock and his warriors cannot allow this to happen.  This is their last stand. 

The warlock travels on the surface of the mountain to meet patrols returning from Ataaz Yklwazi (The "Gorge of Blades").  The warlock and 4 warriors mounted on striders patrol the tunnels to the South and East. A special detail consisting of 3 newts and 2 striders was sent the the East cavern, where the party entered via the slag pit.

Whoever has the best perception knows something else is in the cavern and likely assumes it's the newts again.  I can only assume you'll alert the party.

Ooc: I'm really struggling narratively for a reason to give you guys the long rest, if you can't tell

Ooc2: The map from ToA is really not great for this, (it claims 12 striders can fit in area 10. They cannot. At all.) So if you engage the firenewts, expect a big flat square map with maybe some walls to replace what's there, unless the point of contact is in an especially decent place for it.  Not that combat has to occur, but you and the newts have really conflicting goals and worldviews and both parties more or less know the other is there.  They'll attack once the hut disappears.  They want you all dead, but once bitten, twice shy... They'd rather know who they're dealing with than face a hidden enemy.

Well, if they can't get in the hut we'll at least get our full rest inside the hut. But if you're saying that we'd have a chance to perceive them before the long rest is over, then I'd think we would if we've got two familiars keeping watch. Would they possibly even have seen the warlock escaping? (I really can't imagine that we tied him up and left him, but I guess no one specified?)

I asked a lot of questions because it seemed weird to me, like what kind of rope, you know he summons fire... And 'rope burns' was implied.  If I'm wrong, I'm wrong, but it's kind of moot: ToA actually had a second warlock in here, anyway.  If not for the long rest I'd have said the newts don't even come back before you're all gone.

Your watch guards do see them, (sorry if it want clear,) so if you don't want to wait for everyone to get their long rest before doing something about it, be my guest, tell me what they do.

Echo lets out a low growl to wake up whomever she can, and if that doesn't work, she barks.

What you didn't get to see... Fade in on Vernell, barefoot in the slag pit, being pushed about as he toils at painstaking manual labor, his hands: bleeding, his face: scarred, his body: broken.

Before the party arrived, Vernell was held as a slave by his slimy captors.  The creatures saw his winged boots and took those, (wouldn't you?) as an offering to Imix (thus the barefoot human footprints you saw).  Vernell hatched a plan, being a warlock himself. He asked his patron for one more favor, and he was offered a deal.  The details, it seems, are less important at the moment, since he, evidently, did not survive.  The request he made was granted by his infernal patron.  The very boots that were taken from him would be his means of vengeance: Vernell placed a curse upon them.

For every five minutes of use, the wearer's charisma score is permanently reduced by one.  Vernell, being a warlock recognizes the thing about the Firenewt warlock that empowers him above his peers in the forbidden arcane art, and sees this high powered extension of Hex, which beset him with 5 levels of exhaustion, as his last hope of survival.

For each 5 minutes of use, the wearer must roll a d100. If the roll is above 79, they resist the curse and there is no effect, otherwise their Charisma score (not modifier) is permanently reduced by 1 point for each failed attempt.  A greater restoration or wish spell would suffice to recover them, but other possible paths may reveal themselves.

Leann has used the winged boots for 20 minutes, calling for 4 d100 rolls, no advantage, no modifiers, no "help" action or magic items it's is solely for fate, a rare force more powerful than Vernell's dark master, to decide.

Quote from Shonisaurus >>

Echo lets out a low growl to wake up whomever she can, and if that doesn't work, she barks.

 This is after they get their hitpoints and spell slots back, right? It can nudge the encounter, so I want to be sure 

By the way, your last encounter with firenewts was worth 2100xp, which should put you all at 12085.  I may have said that you'd be level 6 (1400xp) after the next encounter, but this one here was not planned. I tried to avoid it, but it's like a few things together that made it hard to say no to.  It's up to you if you want to rid the place if these guys or just get out alive.

I would assume that this is after HP and Spell Slot recovery.

Cool. So the barking definitely attracts the firenewts, and with an ignan battle cry (something like "charge!") They descend upon the group.

2

A mounted firenewt on a strider enters the smelter from the East, right next to where your hut was. 

Another mounted warrior from the South and a third from the Southeast. (About 33.5ft away, so let's round down to 30ft)

As the defenders, you can all act before this the firenewts and the striders

(We're just going with the map that's up, the smelter is a pretty big area).

We're in area 10, correct?

Either way, Huarache will shoot whomever is closest. How close is the closest enemy?

It's getting a but hard to tell when exactly things are popping off.  I thought your waking up the party was a retcon to say you'd never picked up and headed down the corridor, which was an option, before the loud growling.   If you want to be in area 10, there's fine as the combat hadn't really begun.  I'm fine with either. Unless someone asks, I'm going with the smelter as described in the previous post. (1018)

Where is the smelter, though? I was going back through the posts, trying to figure out where we were by description because I can't figure out which room on the map a) looks like a smelter and b) has entrances for the newts to approach in the way you mentioned.

I may have flopped an east west somewhere. It's room 2 with the rectangular pit of molten metal, probably adamantine ore, most of it will become slag with a small percentage being processed into adamantine.

To be perfectly accurate, the one in the south doorway is blocking the entrance for a moment before the one coming from the East can enter the room..  and when I say it's pretty open, I mean for monsters that don't catch fire or melt.

I don't agree that this would be happening after we finish a long rest -- please pause while we discuss in the OOC thread? And also it's after midnight in my time zone so I don't know if we'll be able to get the logistics sorted before I have to go to bed.

Edit. Removed