Just a quick question for all you DMs out there!

For those of you who are already running a Tomb of Annihilation campaign, what tactics or ideas are you guys using to get your players to "gravitate" to Omu? Do you let them just wander the jungle in hopes of finding it? Or do you gently lead them too it by giving them the hint that's where the curse is originating from?

Thanks!

Long Delayed BUMP

Spoilers:

Grandfather Zitembe (in Port Nayazaru's Temple of Savras) should hint at the hidden city during Chapter 1. Players might find other rumors there too. Later when the time is right, the players can get the exact location from the Naga Augur Saja N’baza (Oralunga), Asharra (Kir Sabal), Eku (Port Nayazaru), Tzindelor (Wymheart) or even Valindra (Heart of Ubtoa). Saja N’baza especially will be clear about Omu's link to the Death Curse.

Since my group was interested in Camp Vengeance, M'bala was easy first location.  This allowed me to describe a number of different locations on the path up to the ruined city (the Heart of Ubtao, the Wreck of the  Star Goddess, and the ruined temple of Orolunga).   That set the stage to have them travel to Orolunga and meet with Saja N'baza.   It was "easy" after that.

("easy" still implies 40+ days of slogging through a jungle, meeting Artus, nearly getting killed by Zhents looking for Artus, actually getting killed by all sorts of dinosaurs, plants, and undead or even undead plant dinosaurs!)

My team are hopeless. They know Savras is the god of divination because he featured prominently in a prior campaign. I mentioned, through NPC's, Grandfather Zitembe and the temple of Savras several times and yet no-one even thought to go there, at all. Thankfully, I rolled for a random Port Nyanzaru encounter that had the wandering priest of Savras spout a prophecy about the Oracle of Orulunga. They latched onto that, even though they didn't even escort the priest back to his temple... OF SAVRAS.

Sigh.

Grandfather Zitembe and Syndra have told my players of Omu, but not where it is.  One of my players is an aarakocra so they've been sent to Kir Sabal, there they will get the directions to Orolunga.  The naga sort of gives best direction of how to play out that area and push them to Omu, or you could do the killing the Yaun ti hideout and or/join sides with Ras Nsi getting the puzzle cube to get deeper into the temples plot that also sort of follows a book hook. 

My group decided to head to Firefinger and then Mezro. From there, they got a clue about Kir Sabal and Omu and it worked itself out. Too quickly, maybe: they entered the Tomb of the Nine Gods around level 7 or 8...

My character is a Undying Warlock and so our DM is apparently giving me clues via my patron through visions and voices.

I had them find a dead adventurers diary with several hints, including an account of the dead adventurers party meeting with Grandfather Zitembe. I also replaced the hook character (who hires them to go to Chult) with The Seer, the quest giver from the tier one SKT AL modules, because my party had worked for her.  The Seer has a pseudo dragon familiar who often performs message delivery.  I periodically use him to remind them of the overarching quest; if need be, I can use him for hints. Finally, my crew headed to Hrakhammar with Musharib as their guide. There are two prisoners there. My crew was frustrated with Musharibs weakness in combat (they started TOA at level 4 or 5). So I turned one of the prisoners into a level 4 forge cleric (crew was now levels 5/6, soon to be 6/7). Said cleric had been experiencing visions from Moradin about the threat in Omu, and was happy to leave the place of his imprisonment. 

There seem to be two basic "paths", both of which have been mentioned above. The first, which my players took, was to Camp Righteous/Camp Vengeance/M'bala. It's attractive because most of the trip can be by canoe. Then when they climb M'Bala, as Eryndel points out above, they can see both The Heart of Ubtao and Orolangu, both of which can provide information on Omu. There are two people in Port Nyarazu which lead to this path -- the paladin heading to Camp Vengeance and the acolyte wanting to explore the valley in search of the source of her visions of the Red Wizards (ultimately the Heart of Ubtao).

The alternative path seems to be the river that leads to Firefinger, as Technoskald points out. Firefinger leads to Kir Sabal, which leads to information on the garden city and Omu. I think this path might be a quicker/more direct route to Omu.

The players in my campaign went pretty directly -- they went to the two camps, then M'bala, then Orolangu, then skipped the Heart of Ubtao and went straight to the wreck of the sky goddess (I may be mis-remembering the name). Between those last two locations they got an accurate description of Omu's location. Then they got lost and ended up at the firenewt mines, but then they went directly to Omu. Even with that (almost) straight path, they didn't enter Omu until Day 50. They've now just finished Chapter 4 and are sitting on Day 62. 

They entered Omu at level 5, they're dividing experience 4 ways, and they ended chapter 4 still at level 7. They're probably going to be entering the Tomb of the 9 Gods below the recommended level, because they've pretty much farmed all the experience available in Omu, and they're worried if they dither about in the jungle their sponsor will die. They haven't been able to return to Port Nyrazu and buy any new equipment because they simply haven't had time (travelling back at this point would mean their sponsor would be dead before they got there). They're still playing with starting equipment and the scraps they picked up along the way. I'm interested to see what happens when they enter the tomb -- if this lack of available experience ends up being a design flaw or a feature.