Okay, you step back through the hoop, and find yourselves back under the Pixie tree.  There is no druid panic this time.  Which hoop do you try next?

Del will give the short form version of the story to the druids. " we rescued some 30000 victims of the hags when we tracked the wood trade to Slate City, now we are trying to get some 300 home to the Feywild"

I guess the triple wood #4 next. #3 is Twisted Tree plus Pixie, probably to the Shadowfell. Unless someone can say anything about #1 and the Feywild thorny area

#4, the hoop from the late City warehouse takes you to...the Slate City Warehouse. Assuming you have no more business to attend to here (since you just left yesterday) you step through the hoop again....and find yourselves somewhere strange.

You are on a large, flat, empty mesa under a night sky, with a large, gibbous moon overhead shedding light. Underfoot, Raven notices that there are tracks of straight lines in the sand, as if large, oblong boxes were once stacked here...and occasional shards and chips of a crystalline substance. 

Your mesa is surrounded by hundreds of others, as far as you can see. Permanent bridges connect many of those with structurally solid flat tops.  You can see folding portable bridges lying on others. You can also see what look like camps and other, more permanent dwellings on some of the other mesas...some of them huge in size. The gorges between the mesa tops are deeper than you can see...the bottoms, if there are any, are lost in darkness and distance.

A few mesas to the north is a particularly large section of unbroken rock, and it is covered my a shining construction of crystal. 

The crystal structure is lit by torches and lanterns, and some of the populated mesas are also lit. You are in darkness, but have no cover here. It's just a matter of time before you are seen.  The sound of large wings can be heard overhead...

Back through unless someone really loves menacing mesas. I guess we know now how to get into real trouble. Triple wood - triple destination?

Raven would be inclined to go back through as well. She would wait for discussion untilt hat is done, as she is not sure if the others wish this fight just yet. She is wondering if this is the location of the maze though.

Quentin thinks for a moment as he says, "It seems like all our options aren't that great anyways, I saw we just pick one and go through, start exploring. If we just keep waiting for the 'right' option to appear we'll be waiting longer than even I can live." 

(( Mindartis is yet to weigh in, but I am not looking for perfection, just the Feywild. This whole plane hopping thing is to get M & A's people home. No reason to fight if it is not a way forward for that ))

Mindartis and Althaea both seem more inclined to try for a different destination. "I still think it would just be better to take them all back in groups," he says. "I know where our village is. I can take them there directly. The likelihood of a hoop destination being anywhere near the village seems to be wishful thinking."

So outa here, anyway, once more into the beech, as it were.

Once out of the hellscape, Del makes a double take Still think? My apologies, I do not recall your making that suggestion before

"I..." Mindartis stops, "I'm... not sure I said it out loud now that I think about it..."

The thing is Del continues only if we are not somewhere dangerous You can bring eight, right? So if none of us come, that is like 40 some trips across the planes, by yourself, with a small chance of mishap each time. Being stuck in the Abyss by yourself might be inconvenient. Or you bring a couple of us, and it's a hundred odd trips.

"I think trying some more of the hoops would be prudent." Raven speaks up. "If nothing else, it allows us to know where they go, and, maybe, we can find one that will better fit our needs for getting everyone home."

"Of course," Mindartis says, "I was just thinking outloud," Mindartis leads the group through to their next hoop distination.

Stepping through the last unidentified hoop, you find yourselves in the forest, on a hill overlooking a large clearing. Zanderfell and his tree seem to have moved elsewhere, but there is no mistaking the site of the battle, with its shattered stockade and bits and pieces of broken armor and weapons littering the cleared space.  A large charred area still marks the place where you burned the fallen gnolls, and still smells like woodsmoke and singed fur.

There seems to be nothing of note happening here. You re-enter the hoop (I assume) and find yourselves in another gnoll army camp.  Not quietly in a supply tent in a half-empty place, but in the center of a courtyard, with squads drilling and working nearby.

Roll a DC15 group stealth check! If at least 4 pass it, the group remains unnoticed long enough to decide what to do next.

((I thought we were going a third time through the triple-wood loop - either back to the known warehouse or a third place. But playing on...))

Less than an hour, still have the benefit of Pass without Trace: +10 for all my friends

Del Stealth 28

Flitterbug (is still invisible and on M's shoulder) Stealth 27

(Oops, my mistake. Well, we can try that next.)

While we pass through Z's old clearing FB (still invisible) says Oh, back here. Good to be away from that gray place She turns and scowls at Del (not that we can see it) Don't be a gloomy Galanodel. We will get where we want to if Mindartis says so

Raven stealth: 30 (Is Raven still invisible then, as we are less than an hour...)

Ethen stealth: 19

Well, that's four party members. You can take action before the gnolls notice you. What do you do?)