[Verjigorm]

Taking a step costs 15 death gems and 250 gold if you have to build a lab, but the Sphinx is definitely not easy to destroy especially in its own dominion.

Parking it inside a castle is a most excellent defense. Bing! 30 million tons of Astral Malevolence is now guarding your province... and no one can see it until they break down the doors and find their souls ripped out by a massive stone God.

There is one thing you should avoid, however...

The Sphinx cannot tear down a castle wall by itself, nor can it build a lab in a province with a castle. Therefore, if you teleport the Sphinx onto a castle, you need to be sure that the army that it brings along with it can tear down that castle AND storm it successfully as the Sphinx itself cannot do either of these things. Your best bet is to park the Sphinx in a province adjacent to the target castle and then use Gateway to transport in troops to siege and conquer the castle.

There are so many nifty things to do with the Sphinx in EA Arco.... I have played a bit, but haven't fully explored it's awesomeness. One thing is sure, though, I don't take the fountain anymore--The only immobile I select is the Sphinx. I have tried the Statue, and she's quite nice, but not as nice as interesting as Sphinxy. Teleporting the fountain into battle is very dangerous. It says the fountain is difficult to destroy in the description, but it's not that tough and it can't run away.

I've never encountered the "50-turn rout" problem with Sphinx... Not sure what happens, but I bet it's not good on the offense. Fortunately, his offensive movements are few and far between since he usually attacks opportunistically and then defends his landing spot from whatever might come there. If you can predict the path of your opponent's march (bridge provinces) you can set dastardly traps.

Sphinx is my favorite Late Game Astral pretender. Indestructible lovliness.