Manor Lords players debate whether it should get gallows, but the historical accuracy crowd says they should be in the stocks for even thinking of it
A crime punishable by death.
We've seen plenty of great additions to Manor Lords recently—just the other week, developer Greg "Slavic Magic" Styczeń released a massive patch that tweaked a couple of issues like harsh trading and added a King's Tax. Still, all of that hasn't stopped players from dreaming up new ways to interact with their medieval villages.
The player Nucleif took to r/ManorLords to share the idea that "we should have a Gallows in Manor Lords." While new ideas for spicing up Manor Lords are great, this suggestion hasn't been received very well, with most players pointing out that despite popular belief, the gallows aren't actually historically accurate to the time period.
"I think Slavic has already ruled out the idea of a town guard as it was not historically accurate as we think of it," one player replies. "Though I imagine there will be some mechanic worked in for this type of thing."
While hanging has been a known form of punishment since the fifth century, or as long as early man figured out it could kill a person, its use in small villages wasn't all that common. While the local lord would handle minor cases like theft in a manor court, most of the heavy-duty stuff was left up for the King's court and royal judges to police.
"People often don't realize that modern law enforcement really only came into existence around the time of the Industrial Revolution," another player adds. "Prior to that, maintaining order/control was more about protecting the revenue-generating assets of serfs, tenants, and peasants. Much closer to activities like keeping livestock protected than anything we'd recognize as formal law enforcement today."
You can already protect your goods from pesky bandits in Manor Lords by hiring mercenaries to go and destroy their camp, and brave villagers will also try to fight off attacking bandits if they get caught in the middle of a skirmish. There's also a way to promote villagers to men-at-arms who can serve the Lord if needed.
Styczeń has previously said that "you can't die on every historical hill" in response to players who dismiss ideas if they lack historical accuracy (though one medievalist who played it was seriously impressed by how it represents medieval life). "I think there needs to be some understanding that the game's foundation is definitely rooted in historical accuracy, but there are absolutely going to be deviations from it for the sake of having a game. And many of you just need to be at peace with that." So just because a local guard and gallows wouldn't exactly fit into the historical time period doesn't mean it's completely off the table.
A crime and punishment system wouldn't even be an outrageous feature to add in the future. Manor Lords already has a public order meter that is impacted by unemployment, homelessness, or a lack of administrative buildings, so there's no reason why more features couldn't be added to this. And while the historical accuracy of Town's Guards as we know it may be questionable, it would be fun to have an option to add permanent militias that can act as watchmen or a Lord's retinue that could patrol the streets.