You keep using that word. Historically this, historically that, like it's a magic spell.
History is the best we know how human societies work, in different stages of development. The game is about a
mostly human society, with
nothing to indicate their psychology, physiology and social structures are
not analogous to RL or very close approximations thereof. The converse, if anything. See the 'catgirls act like real cats' discussion, for example.
But what happend in our real world history doesn't have much weight in the world of a game with a script written with characters that are made to be relatively simple to read, especially antagonists.
In which case, why are you
debating morality? Just say "
I like my fantasy this way!" and be done with it? I'm not putting you down, this is an entirely legitimate stance on the whole thing. Most people don't really want or need to examine their fantasies all that carefully.
Yours is the argument that says "If you can cast Fireball, all village constables can detect lies without error!" because it's convenient for
one specific occasion and ignores the wider (and absolutely
massive) impact something like that would have on society (Edit: while Fireball is just a fancy grenade). I absolutely
hate this stance. A
consistent fantasy that explores the impact of the fantastical elements on the world and its people is always better than a power trip in my book. YMMV.
Interesting choice of you to talk about that specific king, since I'm french.
Well, it's about the best example of this kind of event happening in RL. Cromwell did a similar thing, and ultimately fucked up as well.
Anyway, I'm not sure the logic of our real world and a fantasy world are as much aligned as you seem to want them to be...
They are populated by mostly human characters with mostly human technology, aren't they? What
evidence do you have that they aren't? Because most fantasy assumes the basics remain the same
unless specifically mentioned. Or the author would have to precede
every scene with a lengthy lore dump.
For example: "You see a cow and a peasant girl milking it." WTF is a 'cow' in this setting, what's a 'peasant' and what's 'milking'? How many heads and wings does the 'cow' have? How many does the '
girl' have? Does 'milking' mean some sort of ritual combat? Or is 'she' negotiating with the 'cow'? Is the
'cow' making a marriage proposal? Getting groomed? Declaring war? How many genders do these 'peasants' have and which one is the 'girl'? Etc.
Going by history and
specific lore when that's contradicted is the
sane option.
