Sprite
- This article covers the family of fey creatures. For the sprite heritage commonly referred to generically as "sprites", see firefly sprite.
Sprites are a diminutive fey ancestry of the First World.12 They are the creatures most commonly associated with fey among mortals.3
Appearance
Sprites resemble tiny winged humanoids who rarely grow taller than nine inches.1 Their features vary wildly but often mimic other forms of nature, such as insects, bats, and even dragons.2
Some sprites are also naturally magically luminescent and are known as luminous sprites. Unusually large sprites are called pixies.4
Abilities
Some sprites can transform into inanimate objects smaller then a human's thumb, but only when they sleep. Some sprites in Tian Xia have learned how to speak with any inanimate object and its slumbering spirit. Some powerful sprites from Tian Xia or who are followers of Sangpotshi can transform upon death into an immaterial ball of light that reincarnates after a week into a random type of sprite.5
Culture
Sprites are exuberant pranksters who choose to defend magic and nature, though not all recipients of their protection want or need it. Their jokes are rarely malicious or dangerous and, due to their skittish behaviour, rarely long-lasting.1 They are curious about magic,2 and some sprites are receptive to becoming a spellcaster's familiar or congregate around places of magical power, such as a ley line nexus.1 Many sprites are distrustful of creatures, including other fey and creatures that might prey on them, such as cats.1 However, sprites in the Universe often band together with other sprites.2
On Golarion
Sprites' curiosity about magic led some to risk traveling from the First World to the Universe, where they explored the arts of music and pranks, and guarded locations of nature and magic. However, many who remained in the Universe for long periods lost their wings, and the children of sprites in the Universe also lacked wings.2
These progeny, known as the Wingless, are renowned for their powerful affinity for magic and eventually grow distinct, larger wings than their First World kin upon maturing, which they do at the same rate as humans. Sprites in the Universe can survive for more than a millennium as long as they stay out of fatal trouble, and many try to return to the First World for reincarnation before their deaths. A few, however, are so driven by curiosity that they intentionally want to attempt to enter the mortal cycle of souls.2
Sprites who travel together to live on Golarion congregate near interesting locations and form villages, and not only welcome but celebrate the arrival of new sprites to their communities.2 Most sprites avoid other mortal civilizations and settlements because they prefer to live in places where they are welcomed.6
Sprites in the Universe have long adopted dogs, especially corgis, as mounts, and a common pattern of color on the backs of corgis is referred to as a faerie saddle.4 Taldan dog breeders impressed with the loyalty and agility of faerie mounts—dog-like creatures of the First World commonly used as a mount by other fey—bred their corgis to specifically resemble faerie mounts.7
Adventurers
Wingless who become adventurers are most often bards, rogues, or sorcerers, though sprite rangers and druids do exist and tap into their love of nature. Similarly, sprite witches and wizards are even more enthusiastic about learning the secrets of magic, and sprite oracles approach the contradictions of their mystery from the experience of living the contradictions between the fey and mortal worlds.8
Religion
Most sprites worship the Eldest of the First World, particularly Shyka and the trickster Lantern King. They also respect Desna, and some claim her as one of their own, for her sprite-like common depiction as a woman with butterfly wings. Cayden Cailean and Shelyn are also compatible with sprite tendencies.2
In Tian Xia
In Tian Xia, populations of sprites are notable in the nations of Minata9 and Minkai.10 The people of Tian Xia are accepting of the mixing of mundanity and magic, and sprites are often more accepted in communities there than in other parts of Golarion, and some sprites even form small settlements of their own within communities of other ancestries in Tian Xia.6
Mortals often confuse sprites with yaoguai, spirits, or tiny deities, which means their treatment differs by town and region, depending on the community's knowledge and disposition. Sprites generally feel strong familial ties with each other even when not directly related, and in Tian Xia many adopt local customs of referring to each other by terms like brother, sister, cousin, uncle, or grandmother regardless of relation.
Draxies, grigs, melixies, and nykteras are less common in Tian Xia than other parts of Golarion, and dijiang, gandharva, kanchil, and leungli sprites originate only in Tian Xia.6
Leshies deep within Tian woods and forests often work with sprites in a kind of form of symbiotic relationship, with leshies offering them food, shelter, and protection, and sprites aiding leshies with manual labor.11
In the Great Beyond
Most sprites live in their native First World, where they reincarnate rather than die, combine with other sprites to become larger sprites, or divide themselves into multiple fey.2
Types of sprites
Natives of the Universe often try to classify sprites by characteristics, a tendency sprites themselves do not share (and find amusing).2
Firefly sprites, the most common type in both the First World and Golarion, are often generically referred to as "sprites" or "common sprites".312 Other types include:2
Chaneques
The vile fey known as chaneques often hunt and kill sprites, using their skulls as ingredients in their soul-stealing bombs.14[citation needed]
References
Paizo published a major chapter about sprites in Fey Revisited and featured sprites as an ancestry in Ancestry Guide.
For additional as-yet unincorporated sources about this subject, see the Meta page.
- ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 1.3 1.4 . “Sprite” in Monster Core, 322. Paizo Inc., 2024
- ↑ 2.00 2.01 2.02 2.03 2.04 2.05 2.06 2.07 2.08 2.09 2.10 . “Sprite” in Ancestry Guide, 126–127. Paizo Inc., 2021
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 . “Sprite” in Ancestry Guide, 127. Paizo Inc., 2021
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 . “Sprite” in Ancestry Guide, 129. Paizo Inc., 2021
- ↑ . “Tian sprite” in Tian Xia Character Guide, 47. Paizo Inc., 2024 . This refers to the Charmed Sleep, Speak with the Sleeping, and Along the Deep River mechanical feats specific to Pathfinder Second Edition.
- ↑ 6.0 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4 6.5 6.6 . “Tian sprite” in Tian Xia Character Guide, 46. Paizo Inc., 2024
- ↑ . “Bestiary” in Prisoners of the Blight, 82. Paizo Inc., 2017
- ↑ . “Sprite” in Ancestry Guide, 130. Paizo Inc., 2021
- ↑ . “Minata” in Tian Xia World Guide, 138. Paizo Inc., 2024
- ↑ . “Minkai and the Forest of Spirits” in Tian Xia World Guide, 146. Paizo Inc., 2024
- ↑ . “Tian leshy” in Tian Xia Character Guide, 43. Paizo Inc., 2024
- ↑ Paizo refers to firefly sprites generically as "sprites" prior to, and in most works outside of, Ancestry Guide.
- ↑ . “Adventure Toolbox” in Cult of the Cave Worm, 89. Paizo Inc., 2023
- ↑ . “Monsters A to Z” in Bestiary 4, 28. Paizo Inc., 2013
External links
- Sprite ancestry on Archives of Nethys
- Sprite (folklore) (real-world folkloric creature) on Wikipedia