We’ve all wondered about it at some
time or another, perhaps while studying
the fetching portrait of the succubus in
the Monster Manual or that wonderful

sketch of Loviatar in the DEITIES &
DEMIGODS™ book (I know more guys
with characters that worship Loviatar
than any other evil deity). We also wonder about it every time we get a new
DRAGON™ magazine and turn immediately to the back to see if Phil & Dixie
are finally going to talk about “it” this
issue. We’re all normal people — right?
— and we all wonder what sorts of ideas
the AD&D™ critters have about sex.

Having concluded an exhaustive study
of the subject (that in itself is another
story), I would like to present some
interesting information on the private
lives of the Monster Manual inhabitants.
Let’s start with dryads. Someone from
Kansas City wrote to me the other day
and wanted to know about the sexual
lives of dryads. (I didn’t think Kansas
City had that many dryads, or even
trees.) Well, this person was really interested in knowing if there were male
dryads. Nope, there aren’t. All dryads
(and all nymphs, sylphs, and similar
woods-spirits) are female. So where do
little dryads come from: cloning? Nope.

This same person from Kansas City
also wanted to know if there were female
satyrs. Do women get satyriasis? Do
men get nymphomania? Do any female
satyrs ever appear in those Playboy cartoons? No, no, no, and no. Satyrs dance
around in the woods and fool around
with the dryads and nymphs and other
females, and the females get pregnant
eventually and have satyr children (if
male) or female wood-spirit kids like
Mommy. It’s a good thing that dryads
don’t get pregnant as easily as humans
do, or else oak trees would cover the
world and the sea bottoms as well. So,
there’s all you wanted to know about
dryads. (Well, maybe not all, but Mohan
will edit out anything else.)

Next, sphinxes. Surely one of the most
intriguing eternal triangles in all mythic
role-playing literature is that of the
and rosphinx, the gynosphinx, and the
criosphinx. (The hieracosphinx could
care less; he just wants to eat people.)
The androsphinx thinks of himself only;
daily he preens himself and admires the
way the wind tosses his hairy mane
about. Think of the androsphinx as the
King of Muscle Beach. The gynosphinx
(from which we get gynecology, the
science of studying gynosphinxes) lusts
after the androsphinx; she watches him
from afar, flashes those inch-long eyelashes, wiggles her hips, and pouts to
show off her ultra-gloss lipstick. Does
the king of Muscle Beach notice? Of
course not; he’s looking at his muscles.
So the gynosphinx’s heart is constantly
just on the verge of breaking. Think of
her as a beach bunny, one of the ones
who crowds around the lifeguard stand
or plays like she’s drowning to get rescued (but can’t do it convincingly).

Meanwhile, in the background behind
the gynosphinx, there’s the criosphinx.
This one is not the most attractive sphinx
there is, having a goat’s head and all. The
criosphinx lusts after the gynosphinx,
who is repulsed by him and tells him that
a regenerate spell couldn’t make him
better looking, and that she would rather
date an intellect devourer than see him.

The criosphinx is hurt; he looks in a
still pond and tries to do something
about his nose. It’s too long, but no one
in the woods does plastic surgery (or
will, for the next 35,000,000 years), so
he’s stuck with it. And his horns — why
doesn’t she like his horns? He used pine
rosin on them just this morning to make
them shiny. He tries again; maybe the
gynosphinx just didn’t notice them.

“I’ve got horns and androsphinxes
don’t,” he says casually, having crept up
behind a gynosphinx who is watching an
androsphinx flex on the beach.

“Androsphinxes have a minus 2 armor
class and more hit dice than you,” she
snaps."

“They only have two more than I do,”
he says defensively. “And I get three
attacks when they get just two.”

“Don’t make me laugh,” she says.

Getting nowhere fast, the criosphinx
slouches off but stops at the last moment
for one more try.

“I got money, ya know,” he calls. “I
prize wealth and will usually seek to
extort passersby, give them safe passage for a healthy bribe.”

“Blow off. I read the Monster Manual,
too. You couldn’t extort spit from a giant
slug, and you couldn’t get a date with
one, either, ‘cause you’re too ugly.”

The gynosphinx turns back and sighs
at the androsphinx, who lets out a huge,
lazy roar at this moment and scares off
the criosphinx without knowing it. The
criosphinx comes back later, but it’s all a
waste of time. Think of the criosphinx as
yourself, sitting on a beach lusting after
a beach bunny who’s lusting after a
muscle-bound lifeguard who ignores
everybody but himself. Don’t ask me if
sphinxes have sex or not; I almost don’t
think they do. Maybe they clone themselves or something.

And then there are succubi . . . oh, boy.
A body like a high-school cheerleader,
with cute little fangs and horns to boot.
At least, those fangs and horns look cute
when you first see them. Succubi make
you wonder where they get that superpale skin tone, like they spend all their
lives indoors. And they seem to have
such oral personalities, talking all the
time, smacking their lips, chewing on
pencils and fingernails (not their own,
though). Those lips are something, too:
red as new-drawn blood, inviting, tempting, begging to be kissed . . . and then
BAM! You go from Arch-Mage to Prestidigitator in twenty minutes, and you
wonder where the time went. Not even
cheerleaders kiss like that — at least not
where I went to school, they didn’t. The
problem with succubi is that kissing is
about as far as they go, though they
don’t seem to mind going directly into it
on the first date. And, unless you’re 30th
level to start with, your first date with a
succubus stands a good chance of being
your last one.

Who have I left out? Minotaurs. Heh,
heh. Guess you could say those guys are
always horny. . . . Okay, sorry.

Um, who else? Hydras. I bet you didn’t
know.. . no, Mohan won’t let me use that.

Giants .Those folks really know how to
make the earth move! . . .  All right, so I'm
not Henny Youngman, but ya gotta start
somewhere . . .

Ixitxachitl. Didja every wonder about
the sex life of an ixitxachitl? . . . Hey,
leggo of me! Stop it! Wait, wait! I know
what I’m doing! No, wait —


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(Editor’s note: Roger Moore will be
taking a brief vacation from writing from
DRAGON Magazine. Cards and flowers
will be accepted for him by the staff of
Dragon Publishing, for shipment to his
room at Happy Valley Hospital. Next
month we will bring you the next in his
series of insighful articles into AD&D
role-playing: The Cerebral Parasite’s
Point of View.)

 

Dragon

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Dragon 72