Avatar of Greed - Gold Smelting Encounter inspiration needed
The setup: Players have about 100k of cursed gold pieces, which they can't spend without spreading the curse, and remove curse only works on one gold piece at the time. So they've travelled to an elemental forge in the hopes of smelting the gold and recasting it in clean coins. This will unleash the trapped avatar of Greed, which will have to be destroyed to remove the curse completely.
Party: 4x lvl 10, Drunken Monk, Artillerist Artificer, Moon druid, Sword Bard, well equipped and fully rested.
Ideas so far:
Phase 1: carry and throw the gold into a crucible, heated by lava. Possibly incorporate carry weight, allow for magic shenanigans. Starting this should trigger some environmental danger and/or trigger mobs to drain resources.
Phase 2: Avatar, unspecified for now. Rises from the crucible. It's attacks should cost a part of the gold, so the goal is to destroy it before the gold is gone. Possible mechanic: tipping the crucible could save gold/drain hp.
I've got 2 weeks to work this out, and just typing this out has inspired me, but any ideas are welcome.