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The description of the Ring of Alter Self says that if one wears it for a month, the effects become permanent.

I'm a 4 level hexlock and I have a Spined Devil who I want to use as a henchman. If I make him alter himself into a humanoid shape and make it permanent using one of these rings, can he use the old wings of his as a trait like Necrotic Shroud?

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    \$\begingroup\$ Are you asking about this homebrew item from dandwiki? \$\endgroup\$ Jun 16, 2021 at 12:04
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    – V2Blast
    Jun 16, 2021 at 19:54
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    \$\begingroup\$ Does my answer solve your problem well enough for a green check? \$\endgroup\$ Jun 18, 2021 at 12:16
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This probably won't work.

In addition to the answer by Thomas Markov (this item is homebrew and needs a DM ruling), there's a good chance it won't work.

The ring is based on the Alter Self spell's "Change Appearance" feature:

You transform your appearance. You decide what you look like, including your height, weight, facial features, sound of your voice, hair length, coloration, and distinguishing characteristics, if any. You can make yourself appear as a member of another race, though none of your statistics change. You also can't appear as a creature of a different size than you, and your basic shape stays the same; if you're bipedal, you can't use this spell to become quadrupedal, for instance. At any time for the duration of the spell, you can use your action to change your appearance in this way again.

The reason it's likely not going to work is the part I highlighted above: you can't change your basic shape. That means that your Spined Devil will not be able to mask their tail or wings, and will never look passably humanoid.

However, regarding the abilities, the Devil will retain all of them since the feature also says "none of your statistics change".

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Ambiguous homebrew features require the DM to make a ruling.

The Ring of Alter Self is a homebrew item from dandwiki, a site notorious for uncurated homebrew content. The page has in the header:

This page was created by a user of D&D Wiki, and is not official content. Talk to your Dungeon Master before you use it.

The actual feature description is poorly written and ambiguous:

Alter Self. An attuned wearer's body gradually changes to an altered version of their body. If the wearer removes the ring, their body returns to its original state. After 30 consecutive days of wearing the ring, an attuned wearer's body permanently becomes the altered version.

You're going to have to ask your DM before you use this at all, and your DM is going to have to decide how it works, since the feature description doesn't actually tell us how it would interact with your devil.

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As with everything at the end of the day it's whatever the DM allows but here's how I would approach it:

First figure out how the ring works. Does it change the "essence" of the creature or just change its body?

If it changes the "essence" of the creature I'd say that it loses all abilities of its previous form and gains all the abilities of its new form.

If it just changes the body then you'd have to figure out what powers the devil gets from its body and which it gets from some magical essence. For example the spines are a physical part of the devil so it would lose those and wouldn't be able to fly since it has no wings, but it would still have darkvision and magic resistance.

I'd argue that it should just change the body, since the alternative is much more complicated and potentially unbalanced (I turn myself into an ancient gold wyrm with all its abilities...) but you and your DM should figure that out together.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ So after one month, he can regrow his wings with ring, can he? \$\endgroup\$ Jun 17, 2021 at 3:48
  • \$\begingroup\$ @AfshinMangudai: Well no... if the change is permanent after one month his wings are gone since he now permanently has the physical features of a humanoid. \$\endgroup\$
    – Mattia
    Jun 17, 2021 at 15:03

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