Sphinx, Greater
From Defy the Gods, the game that I'm Kickstarting in March:
Sphinx, Greater
The greater sphinx has the body of a gigantic lion and an equally enormous, human-like face. The wings of flighted sphinxes can span forty feet or more. Sphinxes love knowledge; they absorb the intelligence of everything they eat. Their size allows them to prey on many wise creatures and learned humans. They can tell truth from a lie and have no patience for the latter.
Female Sphinxes have wings; they fly great distances in search of a nest. They prefer inhabited or once-inhabited places: an Atlantean ruin, a village, or an entire city. Once they find a suitable place, they fatten their wits by eating the nest’s inhabitants. They ask riddles. The purpose seems to be twofold: when hunting, to gauge their prey’s intelligence, and when mating, to engage in playful banter while assessing the prospective mate’s fitness.
Male sphinxes have no wings. They store up knowledge in preparation for mating season, but they will not speak unless asked a question they find compelling. A male sphinx is an itinerant hunter, collecting secrets from his prey, until he finds another sphinx’s nest. Then he will offer his secrets in a mating display. Occasionally, the male sphinx finds a nesting site so perfect that he seizes it first, in anticipation of an inevitable mate. But this is a rare gamble.
Other sphinxes, neither male nor female, grow wings anew every rainy season, then shed them like antlers as winter approaches. They are as likely to ask riddles as to wait for others to speak. Humans prize the discarded bones and feathers of an androgynous sphinx as talismans, sorcerous ingredients, wards against attack, or decoration.
Both female and androgynous sphinxes guard their nests fiercely. Its citizens serve as a food source, a potential offering to a mate, and a captive hunting ground for their juveniles. Once a female sphinx finds a suitable nest, she keeps it for life. An androgynous sphinx, on the other hand, flies in search of a new nest—their own or that of a female—every year. A male sphinx joins his mate’s nest; after the mate dies, he guards the nest for the rest of his life and does not mate again.
Sphinxes find knowledge compelling. When one encounters a winged sphinx, the sphinx may ask a riddle. A wingless sphinx, on the other hand, will simply block the adventurers’ way and wait for them to speak. Adventurers may forestall an attack by engaging the sphinx’s curiosity—answering the riddles, asking thought-provoking questions, or even telling a joke.
Juvenile sphinxes reach maturity in a year. Before then, they terrorize the prey in their nest. Then they leave to amass their own store of knowledge. Sphinxes seem to have no natural life span; they will live as long as food is available.
Some locations’ residents arrive at an arrangement with a sphinx, granting it rulership (actual or ceremonial) of their city in exchange for periodic sacrifices of wise and clever people. The sphinx defends the city from external threats and considers themself “mated to” the citizens.
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While there are many “sphinx riddles” online, choose ones the players can learn the answers to. Relate them to what the sphinx is guarding, so the adventurers can learn the answer by Exploring the region; or relate them to the sphinx’s personality, so they can Figure Out the sphinx. You may feed the players the right answers or questions to ask, as if the adventurers puzzled it out.
Players may Entice a sphinx by engaging in witty banter. Wit is so powerful and gratifying a drive that it need not always relate to literal mating.
Give the sphinx 3 Epithets: “who devours knowledge,” “who guards their nest fiercely,” and “whose claws rend falsehoods.”