Last updated on December 14, 2023

Consecrated Sphinx (Secret Lair) - Illustration by Victor Adame Minguez

Consecrated Sphinx (Secret Lair) | Illustration by Victor Adame Minguez

Riddle me this: which MTG creature has wings, a human face, and a non-human body? If you said Skin Shedder, that’s both incorrect and mildly concerning. No, the answer is that lion-bodied human-faced sphinx from Greek mythology.

Magic has adopted the sphinx as a recurring creature type, with more than 70 different sphinges in print to this day. That’s right, did you know that the plural of “sphinx” can be either “sphinxes” or “sphinges?” (Editor's note: I feel a pun coming on.)

But what are the best ones in all of Magic? Let's dive in and find out!

What Are Sphinxes in MTG?

Defiler of Dreams (Dominaria United) - Illustration by Ryan Pancoast

Defiler of Dreams (Dominaria United) | Illustration by Ryan Pancoast

The sphinx creature type is what Magic R&D refers to as an “iconic” creature type, so it’s a creature that's associated with a certain color. In the same way that elves and hydras are iconic green creatures, sphinxes are iconic blue creatures.

Sphinxes tend to be high mana value blue creatures with flying. There are a few French vanilla sphinxes, but most of them have abilities meant to invoke the flavor of telling a riddle or peeking into the future. Some, like Conundrum Sphinx and Sphinx Ambassador, play guessing games, an homage to the Greek mythos of the riddle-telling sphinx.

#35. Inspired Sphinx

Inspired Sphinx

Sphinxes often dip into the world of artifact synergies, as evidenced by Inspired Sphinx. It should net you two or three cards on ETB and then acts as a Whirlermaker from that point on.

It’s inefficient but perfectly playable.

#34. Petra Sphinx

Petra Sphinx

Petra Sphinx is the only mono-white sphinx in Magic, but it’s also the very first sphinx to see print all the way back in Legends. It isn’t what you’d expect from this creature type, but it captures the mystique of the type as well as any of its blue brethren.

#33. Sandstone Oracle

Sandstone Oracle

The only colorless sphinx out there, Sandstone Oracle is fine but unexciting. It can refill your hand, or it can whiff if you’re already holding the most cards. I used to play this card more often but have since left it on the back burner.

#32. Sphinx of Enlightenment

Sphinx of Enlightenment

Sphinx of Enlightenment fits more of a “group hug” mold than anything. There are plenty of sphinxes that enter the battlefield and draw cards, but this one just happens to spread the love around a bit.

#31. Curator of Mysteries

Curator of Mysteries

Cycling-based decks can make good use of Curator of Mysteries. It helps you scry toward your payoffs and finishers while putting up a decent flying defense. Cycling itself for just a blue mana means it’s never a dead card.

#30. Ormos, Archive Keeper

Ormos, Archive Keeper

Ormos, Archive Keeper won’t win you the game like Laboratory Maniac, but it’s a cute way to prevent losing via mill. Ormos can start one-shotting opponents left and right if you find yourself with an empty library, and it provides decent card advantage along the way.

#29. Dazzling Sphinx

Dazzling Sphinx

Dazzling Sphinx doesn’t quite dazzle me, but it’s got a fairly strong saboteur ability. Dealing combat damage nets you a free spell from that opponent’s library, almost like a free spin from a Chaos Wand.

#28. Sphinx of Clear Skies

Sphinx of Clear Skies

The Fact or Fiction reference frequently comes up on sphinxes to evoke the idea of giving your opponent a riddle or dilemma to sort through.

Sphinx of Clear Skies does this with some fancy domain text that basically boils down to drawing extra cards when it connects in combat. Ward 2 is just annoying enough to help push it through for a solid hit.

#27. Atemsis, All-Seeing

Atemsis, All-Seeing

I once won an M20 Draft match with Atemsis, All-Seeing by revealing a hand with six different mana value cards, and it felt amazing. You have to do some work in Commander, but triggering the alternate wincon ability might be a puzzle worth pursuing.

Atemsis doesn’t have to deal combat damage, so cards like Chandra's Ignition can get the job done.

#26. Ethersworn Sphinx

Ethersworn Sphinx

Affinity and cascade work amazingly well together, enough so to consider Ethersworn Sphinx in artifact-heavy decks. It’s not an all-star card, but you could potentially pay two mana for a 4/4 flier that cascades into just about anything.

#25. Enigma Sphinx

Enigma Sphinx

This gets a higher ranking than Ethersworn Sphinx because it’s still a respectable combination of stats and value, cascade scales well with higher mana value cards, and Enigma Sphinx can “reset” itself when it dies. You're also in colors that love to scry, draw cards and play with artifacts. Enigma Sphinx nets you a lot of value as long as you can cast it.

#24. Sharding Sphinx

Sharding Sphinx

Back to the artifact synergies, Sharding Sphinx rewards you for hitting your opponents with artifacts by, well, creating more artifacts. It becomes an exponentially worse threat if unopposed, but it’s a bit slow by modern EDH standards.

#23. Enigma Thief

Enigma Thief

Interacting with all opponents at once is the name of the game in Commander. Enigma Sphinx lets you do just that and represents a meaningful upgrade over some of the lesser sphinxes, like Riddlemaster Sphinx.

Pulling this off for its prowl cost is a huge tempo swing in your favor.

#22. Sphinx Summoner

Sphinx Summoner

Sphinx Summoner is an artifact tutor on a stick. It only grabs artifact creatures, but a 5-mana 3/3 flier plus a limited Fabricate sounds like a decent deal to me.

Time has power crept cards like this, as evidenced by Summoner’s rarity downshift in Double Masters 2022.

#21. Isperia the Inscrutable

Isperia the Inscrutable

Isperia the Inscrutable plays a guessing game with your opponent’s hand when it hits them. Guess right and you can tutor a flying creature from your library.

The mana cost is color-intensive and there’s a chance you’ll guess wrong on the first swing, but you’ll gain information for the next round of attacks.

#20. Dream Eater

Dream Eater

The stat line on Dream Eater isn’t the best at 4/3, but surveil 4 and flash more than make up for it. Dream Eater combines interaction and card selection into one tight utility package.

#19. Sharuum the Hegemon

Sharuum the Hegemon

Once a popular commander in the early days of EDH, you don’t see Sharuum the Hegemon much anymore. If you want to relive the olden days of winning with Sharuum, try combining it with Phyrexian Metamorph or Sculpting Steel for an infinite loop.

#18. Defiler of Dreams

Defiler of Dreams

The Defilers from Dominaria United have abilities that turn one of the colored pips in your spells’ mana costs into phyrexian mana. The mana discount is great for colors that don’t normally get mana acceleration.

Defiler of Dreams makes your blue permanents easier to cast and rewards you for doing so with extra cards. It unfortunately only triggers on permanents, so it’s not a great fit for spell-heavy decks.

#17. Unesh, Criosphinx Sovereign

Unesh, Criosphinx Sovereign

Unesh, Criosphinx Sovereign is the premium sphinx tribal commander. It shaves mana off your other sphinxes, which is great considering how expensive they usually are. You also get to play the mini Fact or Fiction game every time a sphinx hits your board.

#16. Sphinx of the Steel Wind

Sphinx of the Steel Wind

Sphinx of the Steel Wind falls in the “keyword soup” category of cards. It isn’t super exciting at eight mana, but I’ve seen Zetalpa, Primal Dawn end enough casual EDH games to respect giant beat sticks like this.

This is a second-rate reanimation target with artifact synergies and two protection abilities to help it stick around.

#15. Eligeth, Crossroads Augur

Eligeth, Crossroads Augur

Eligeth, Crossroads Augur has a powerful textbox but a high enough mana value to hold it back. Turning Preordain into Ancestral Recall is nothing to scoff at, but Eligeth is also a vulnerable 6-mana creature.

Siani, Eye of the Storm is the perfect partner to tag along.

#14. Medomai the Ageless

Medomai the Ageless

Medomai the Ageless was the first mythic rare I ever opened from a booster pack, and I used to think it was the coolest card out there. It’s really an over-costed flier that might get you an extra turn with a little work.

There are convoluted infinites you can achieve with Medomai, but the card is ultimately pretty fair.

#13. Sphinx of the Second Sun

Sphinx of the Second Sun

Sphinx of the Second Sun mentions the beginning phase, which only appears on two other cards in Magic: Unstable’s Clocknapper and the Transformers tie-in card, Cyclonus, Cybertronian Fighter.

An extra beginning phase means an extra untap, upkeep, and draw step, which turns Sphinx of the Second Sun into an extra card and double mana each turn.

#12. Sphinx of the Final Word

Sphinx of the Final Word

If your game plan involves winning with instants and sorceries, Sphinx of the Final Word can make sure that happens. It can't be countered, and hexproof lets it dodge most forms of interaction.

Having this on board is a free ride to resolving whatever spells you wish.

#11. Chancellor of the Spires

Chancellor of the Spires

You shouldn’t care about the opening-hand text on Chancellor of the Spires. You’re here for the ability to cast a spell from an opponent’s graveyard on ETB.

Diluvian Primordial is usually the better of the two, but Chancellor doesn’t exile the chosen spell and opens up infinite loops with copy spells.

#10. Azor, the Lawbringer

Azor, the Lawbringer

Azor, the Lawbringer has Sphinx's Decree stapled to its ETB and Sphinx's Revelation attached to its attack trigger. Drawing cards and gaining life on attacks is nice, but the ETB has always felt underwhelming.

Your opponents can still cast instants during other players’ turns, just not during their own next turn.

#9. Dream Trawler

Dream Trawler

The scourge of Theros: Beyond Death Limited, Dream Trawler is still a powerful threat at EDH tables. It isn’t as unbeatable as it was in Draft pods, but it’s still hard to remove from the battlefield.

This sphinx is resilient, draws extra cards, and stabilizes the board with a lifelinking flier.

#8. Elenda and Azor

Elenda and Azor

Each end step makes Elenda and Azor very attractive with instant-speed card draw. Commanders that have evasion, ward, draw multiple cards, and can make multiple tokens are top-notch, so this Esper commander should be considered as such.

#7. Raffine, Scheming Seer

Raffine, Scheming Seer

The Obscura mob boss Raffine, Scheming Seer has a slightly different take on the types of decks it produces. Raffine rewards you for attacking with more creatures, which lets you connive more and grow a threat even larger.

This is a more low-to-the-ground aggro plan than most other sphinx commanders.

#6. Scholar of the Lost Trove

Scholar of the Lost Trove

Scholar of the Lost Trove doesn’t have the same combo potential as Chancellor of the Spires, but your deck is usually primed to take advantage of your own spells rather than your opponents’. Reanimating an artifact is a nice bump to this ability, and it’s altogether a nice addition to decks full of devastating spells.

#5. Arjun, the Shifting Flame

Arjun, the Shifting Flame

Arjun, the Shifting Flame is basically Mindmoil on a sphinx’s body. As a commander, it’s interested in effects that trigger off drawing lots of cards, and you’ll definitely draw cards.

Niv-Mizzet, Parun, The Locust God, and Psychosis Crawler all turn Arjun’s ability into damage.

#4. Yennett, Cryptic Sovereign

Yennett, Cryptic Sovereign

Something’s odd about Yennett, Cryptic Sovereign, but I can’t quite put my finger on it. You essentially draw a card on attacks, but you get to cast that card for free if you built your deck with mostly odd mana value cards.

#3. Magister Sphinx

Magister Sphinx

Magister Sphinx is the dream-crusher for anyone who thought their life total was too far out of reach. It brings anyone with an unassailable life total back to the realm of mortals, and it can even gain you life if you’re desperately low.

#2. Tivit, Seller of Secrets

Tivit, Seller of Secrets

Tivit, Seller of Secrets generates five artifacts in some combination of Treasures and Clues (in other words, mana and card draw) in a four-player game. It’s meant to be a political commander, but it ends up being more of an “oops-I-outvalued-my-opponents” card instead.

Turns out five artifacts are exactly what you need for Time Sieve, which produces infinite turns in conjunction with a blink effect.

#1. Consecrated Sphinx

Consecrated Sphinx

If you want to find a Consecrated Sphinx, follow the echoes of nearby EDH players groaning and complaining. It’s a game-warping creature that out-cards the other players if it isn’t dealt with immediately.

This is also an instant kill against anyone foolish enough to play Notion Thief.

Best Sphinx Payoffs

Unesh, Criosphinx Sovereign EDH

Unesh, Criosphinx Sovereign

If you’re aiming to build a “sphinx tribal” deck, Unesh, Criosphinx Sovereign is the only explicit payoff. It’s a great tribal lord, especially for a deck with so many high mana value threats.

You’ll want as many cost reducing effects as you can get, so I suggest stocking up on Sapphire Medallion, Herald's Horn, and Urza's Incubator if you plan to go the sphinx tribal route.

“Flying Tribal”

Every sphinx has flying, so naturally you could go the “flying tribal” route as well. These decks generally work better with a bunch of smaller flying creatures like Bird tokens or faeries, but no one’s stopping you from playing a deck full of sphinxes and some flying payoffs.

I’d look at Isperia the Inscrutable as a potential commander and search for explicit flying payoffs like Inniaz, the Gale Force and Archon of Redemption.

Wrap Up

Sandstone Oracle (Iconic Masters) - Illustration by Izzy

Sandstone Oracle (Iconic Masters) | Illustration by Izzy

That closes the door on sphinges for now (ed.: Got ‘em.) The sphinx creature type isn’t as broadly used as some other iconic types like dragons, demons, and angels, but they’re bound to return with new releases.

I’m a huge fan of sphinxes that play into the riddle-maker trope, cards like Master of Predicaments and Conundrum Sphinx. They don’t always hit the mark in terms of playability, but they’re fun, flavorful designs that capture the idea of the ancient Greek sphinx.

Which sphinxes are your favorites? How do you use them in your Commander decks? Let me know in the comments below or check out the Draftsim Discord and Twitter.

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