Hai hai Garret! I'm Soso (pronounced Sozo) and I've been playing 5e ever since the early 2010s I want to say. Friend of mine invited me to a game that was needing a player. Had never seen D&D before but it sounded fun and I agreed. Fast forward a couple years and I've been playing 5e ever since hehe. That being said, never tried 5.5e, or truthfully even knew it existed until I saw this post. I'm very curious to try out the new system and learn as I go. As far as character goes I have a funny homebrew idea I've been itching to play, and reading along with Xandrii and Frenchie's characters I actually think she would be a good match. Layila Nayilo was a dire wolf, she still is at heart. She wandered the wild by herself which was strange for dire wolves. Her home was a swampy grove, effectively an archipelago separated by large rivers as opposed to ocean. Each individual "island" was too small to fully support a pack, so in her local habitat the wolves spread out. Each dominating their respective territory, only congregating during mating season. One day, a group of poachers ambushed this congregation. The battle was long and bloody, but in the end Layila stood alone amidst the corpses of poachers and wolves alike. She was too wounded to leave and so fed on the poachers while she recuperated. By sheer coincidence, one of the poachers had been carrying a cursed ring, wearing it as a necklace (no I swear this is not a LoTR reference lmao). A few days later, as Layila ate, the ring became lodged on one of her canines, which technically counted as wearing it. In a swift blinding flash, Layila had transformed to a human. The only remaining trace of her canid origin were her fangs, which remained elongated to host the cursed ring. She stumbled and struggled, confused. The world a sudden cacophony of colours she'd never seen. Her once sharp nose and ears felt dull. And she struggled to stand and move as she once did. The blinding flash had caught the attention of a search party, whom had been looking for the missing poachers. They came to the bloody scene and assumed Layila to be the sole survivor among the poachers. She growled and snapped at the search party, but was quickly subdued with magic. The party assuming she'd gone mad from the tragedy. She was brought to a nearby village's healer and given her name "Layila Nayilo", which was a name plate found at the site from one of the poachers, the only feminine name. They assumed it belonged to her, and left her the poacher's belongings. Sorry for the long paragraph. ADHD kinda kept me writing more than I needed to. But yes TLDR. Layila is a dire wolf who got transformed into a human by a cursed ring and now has to adapt to her new life as a human. I've been wanting to play this for a bit. Starting out dumb, fearful, illiterate. Motivated purely by survival and food to begin with. Then slowly learning over time to speak, communicate, understand more complex social structures. Bonding with the party as time goes on. Considering them a pack at first, a more familiar concept, then again as she learns holding them in equal regards. Then along the line having her make a decision based on character growth on whether she'd want to turn back into a wolf, or if after everything she experiences after learning, she wishes to remain a human.
