I had an idea about how the peculiar modern and historical effects of the Sphere of Athas and the Dark Sun of Athas and the RPG rules might be harmonized.
Rather than the Sphere having been locked by the High Magic spell (or some variant thereof) which locks and unlocks planar spheres, I propose a different solution.
Please note the following:
- A sun changing colors is a process that normally takes millions of years.
- The Dark Sun changed color out of normal stellar order of progression.
- The Pristine Tower seems to be the lynchpin of the change; it also displays anomalies from a meta rule perspective.
- Temporal effects exist in the setting Athas, much as people are not fond of certain ones.
- Temporal effects are associated with the color silver, which can appear as grey and black in certain circumstances.
- Millions of years of accumulation could provide an enormous amount of power to make large scale changes to the world, even after the amount of power needed to create and maintain the accumulation effect is subtracted.
Proposed solution:
Athas has either been flung through time (blueshifted) at a very high temporal rate of travel, or has been almost completely time stopped (redshifted), both at different times, or it is oscillating violently between two distant temporal states as it seeks to find a temporal energy neutral state to finally come to rest in!
The Pristine Tower was likely and originally a temporal device, vehicle, artifact, or fragment. Perhaps a Starship part or core designed to offset the vast amounts of time needed to travel between stars. Chances are whatever temporal abilities it had were limited and modest compared to what is happening now. But when linked to the sun as a power source, the temporal circuits probably supercharged and possibly fused into an overload state.
During the great drawings of power in the past the Tower probably drew upon the differential energies of Athas and the Sun being in variant temporal phases, which afterwards deposited Athas in its new temporal alignment with the Sun having aged or youthened to a different color, and probably changing Athas’ orbit to boot.
The side effects of extreme and severe temporal shifting would create the Grey and the Black, as the normal linkages between the Transient planes and the outer planes are out of ambit with each other, not only severing the paths but also preventing the Powers from interacting with Athas… or at least making the endeavor so costly in divine power that most won’t bother, or possibly actually can’t afford it.
The outer planes still exist, and may be explored. However, chances are they are empty temporal echoes, physically present by void of all life. Drawing or leaching power from the outer planes would still be possible, and would barely be noticed as millions of years are in the process of passing by… except possibly by a Greater Power with the portfolio of Time.
Once the sun and planet were temporally in sync internally, that would leave the remaining excess of energies to cast the Sphere adrift back and forth across the tide of Time until it finds a new rest point.
This could explain why the Grey, the Black, and almost any other energy source one cares to name.
It explains why the Powers disappeared, why the planes still exist yet the outer ones are empty or underpopulated.
It explains why certain artifacts allow for outsiders to visit (even a broken clock is right twice a day) when the temporal phase syncs briefly.
It would explain why the Sphere cannot be found normally in physical or planar spaces.
Since visitors are possible, then it tracks that certain natural artifacts in the elemental and possibly outer planes also sync rarely, allowing some outsiders to enter… likely to be trapped which could explain certain anomalies in lore.
Another possible variant could be that the entire Sphere is traveling at near light speed, with prexisting Greater Teleportation artifacts being the only remaining ways to reach it. Thus the redshift / blueshift effect would be due to spatial travel instead of temporal travel.
Still, there remain details to be hammered out, however I will stop here.
Feedback, please?