Waterdeep: Camel Heist (2020)

Dekhan, roll a Stealth check; with advantage because they cannot see you, and disadvantage because of your armour, so a straight check.

It sounds like there are four of them.

Stealth 20

Dekhan Vale: Stealth Paladin

Dekhan, if you choose to remain still, the gentle snoring of Varinth is not sufficient to retain the ghouls' attention in the face of the closed door, and they appear to wander off.

You resume your rest, and a few hours later you all awake, having gained the benefits of a long rest.

Dekhan remains motionless as the sounds of the ghouls trail away. When everyone awakes.. There’s more ghouls out there, lads, at least 4. We’d best keep our wits about us. Now, shall we go squash a spider? Or do we want to trap him under a cup and put him outside, that’s what my dear mom always did.

Smash him...if his mum has been a bit more ready to swat a young spider, maybe we wouldn't be dealing with him now.

Strix has a listen at the door, then if it seems clear will sneak out and see if he can see any sign of the Ghouls.

The plan is, if he spots them he'll try to get their attention, lead them back to the group and then they can 2nd-Line them - Dekhan opens the door a little, we drag 1 in, Shut and hold the door (probably need someone else on that, Vaz maybe?) while the rest of us wail on the guy we grabbed. Repeat.

If there's no obvious sign of them in the immediate surroundings, he'll retrace back to the Skulls cave to see if he's loose. Since we're approaching from the direction we originally arrived from it should be safe. Ish.

Stealth : 22

 Perception : 19

Strix, you listen closely to the door.  You hear nothing coming from the other side.  You tentatively open it, just a crack, and take a look out.  Your eyes see nothing moving, no threat, no undead that you are aware of.  You push the door open, and still nothing. The floor is scuffed, dust and dirt show that the ghouls have passed through, that they clustered here, but now, there is no sign of them.

You head back carefully to the entrance to the cave where the skull made its lair, and sure enough, it is there, floating above the ground, this time looking west.  With your keen eyes, you see that the latch to the furnace door has been blasted off by some unknown force, and the skull has resumed its endless (unendable?) vigil over this space.  It has not detected you... yet.

Just for your information, there are alternative routes to places you haven't explored yet.  One tunnel , far to the west of where you are now in the cave, leads north and you haven't explored that.  You also caught a glimpse of a fungus-infected cave to the south, which (given the general layout of the place) probably leads to the star-roofed cavern you briefly passed through already.

We also never made it too far past the water...or is that going past the skull?

Getting back to the cave which is the source of the wave echo?  Yes, that would mean going past the skull, or at least you haven't found a route to it that didn't go past the skull.  In addition to the passage to the west and the fungus cave to the south, you also have the option to head north from the large cavern, which would take you to the closed door that Zhudala just found.  I can't really post a clear map, I'm afraid, so all I can do is lay out the options:

- A passage to the south, leading east, that was briefly scouted and seems to lead to a cavern with some kind of fungal growth.

- A passage leading north from the largest cavern you entered, which leads to a closed door headed west.

- A passage far to the west, which would involve retracing your steps and then heading north.

Of course, you have the options to head back to the skull in the furnace area.  However, certain areas are blocked off from you by the skull, including the water cave, the starry-roofed cavern, and the last place that Zhudala scouted where she saw a crevasse in the ground.

 Strix whistles to the skull - "Skully! Want know, went back way came. Is good! No worry. Will look some'r else for dwarf. If Skully see bad elf 'n' need help, call, we come running! Strix run very fast! Sorry bout drownin! Still friends?"

Strix offers his boney chum a double thumbs up, and prepares to dodge incoming fire. If the skull is unresponsive or outwardly hostile, he'll return south to the big hall and await the gang.

To put myself in reference, what cardinal direction would you say the skull/wave echo cave are in?

Try this :

We're at X. The Skull is at S. W is the Wave. In is where we came in.

The cave East of S and south of W is the glittery one. South of that / east of the very bottom of the map is the fungus Steve mentioned I think.  You can see something funky on the tiny bit of visible wall.

Since the Wave is the top right, if the spider's in here I'm convinced he's top left - it's the least explored area and it's the direction the Skull was facing when we found him. Which means either the Spell forge is there too, or we just broke the spell forge by proxy using the Skull. Ooops!

That's incredibly helpful thank you...

I say we reenter the room with the benches and the ghouls northwest of our current door, then go up the western stairs and continue in that direction.

I’m with that, but I’d also like to see what’s in the area east of us and whether it leads up to the wave echo room. Those doors north east of us intrigue me. Surely not all of these rooms are filled with undead. I’m sure those ones are brimming with magic items.

Varinth will angrily vomit in a corner. He will then follow the others, looking pale and altogether miserable.

Hey Scupper, have you seen anything in that book we took of the necromancer about permanently exorcising floating skulls? This one’s becoming a pain in the ass.

I can't say anyting rings a feckin bell. (Does it?) We can try the Western path but hear me out...the skull...guardian o the forge, faces North and blocks our northerly path. Leaves me thinking we might head West and wander around until we're approaching Skully from the north. My best is still that the wave echo cave is our only real entrance te the forge. That said...we passed some doors after Skully that could connect te the fungus room...

If we goes east, someone needs te burn all that fungus. It'll not be a good path, otherwise...

Scupper, if you'd like to read through Remnants of Netheril looking for information about undead floating skulls, you can spend an hour or two doing that while others are preparing or clearing up after you rest.  The book doesn't mention floating skulls as such, but there are bits and pieces about traps and wards and undead guardians left behind by mages, things that an adventurer or scholar might come across in the ruins of Netheril.  You can make an Investigation check to try to piece these together.

Hearing "Burn the fungus" Vaz starts to shuffle off to the east (or what he thinks is east).

no need to shout he mumbles

Investigation for Book Reading (I'm a learned pirate). 2