Proposal: The Dice Sphinx

 

I had a random thought earlier this morning. As I've talked about my dice collection with others, and what I'm interested in, I'm not convinced that I fit into either of the two common definitions of collectors: the Dice Goblin/Kobold or the Dice Dragon.

Dice Goblin/Kobold

The Vibe: Chaotic, excited, and easily distracted by shiny things.

The Collection: Many plastic, acrylic, or random mystery-scoop sets often dumped into a pouch, or a Crown Royal bag.

The Mentality: "Clickety-clack, happy brain math rocks". They just want more shiny pieces to feed the urge to roll. Or, "I've generated a new character, I need a new set of dice for them." A goblin/kobold counts their sets. "I own 600 sets of dice!"

Dice Dragon

The Vibe: Imposing, majestic, and intimidatingly organized.

The Collection: Many unique sets, heavy metal pieces, semi-precious gemstone dice, or custom handcrafted artisan runs.

The Mentality: Curator of a grand treasure hoard. Possesses enough mass and weight to literally sleep on their pile or wield their dice bag as a weapon. "My dice collection is worth $8,000!"

Proposal: A New Dice Monster

I feel that I fit into a third category. I don't collect to increase the number of dice I own, and I'm not collecting primarily for value. Rather, I am collecting specifically due to nostalgia. (My wife might say due to a mid-life crisis.)

So I spent just a little time looking for just the right D&D monster to represent my kind of treasure hoarding. While there doesn't seem to be any being that hoards primarily for nostalgia, the closest I could find was a sphinx. And this is a general description, not specific to the D&D sub-types of sphinxes. (WARNING, Tangent! The Andro-, Crio-, Hieraco-, or Gyno- sub-types just feel like a poor design based on bad 1970's gender stereotypes, and they only continue to exist due to momentum. Seriously, someone at WotC needs to throw them all out.)

Here's what I found, in relation to how a Sphinx treats their treasure: 

They are the ultimate curator and magical guardian. They do not care for wealth or gold coins. They are highly intelligent, divinely appointed beings that guard specific, incredibly powerful artifacts, ancient secrets, or historical relics. A sphinx's lair is not a messy cave; it is an intricately designed, trap-laden temple or ancient ruin. They will carefully test anyone who approaches with riddles, trials, or combat to ensure only those deemed truly worthy can ever touch their treasures.

So with this in mind, here's my proposal for defining a Dice Sphinx:

The Dice Sphinx

The Vibe: Sees themselves as a curator and guardian of special artifacts.

The Collection: Unique sets that have special meaning, either to themselves, or to the gaming community at large.

The Mentality: Obtaining dice in order to preserve, willing to share historical or other unique information about sets with others, if they signal interest. These dice are not to be used in gameplay. 

That's the definition I'm going with, and it results in me building displays like this.

From top to bottom:

• TSR Holmes-era dice, including a pink d20/d10 from TSR's Topic Secret box set
• Moldvay prototype phase 1 "Beeswax" dice
• Moldvay production dice, the d8, d12, and d20 are my originals that I played D&D Moldvay Basic with as a teen
• Unknown gemstone set, perhaps Mayfair or Armory. All but the d6 are my originals that I played with as a teen, once we discovered that the Moldvays were deteriorating