I know that it's because Inquisition had to leave the option for players to back either side of the Mage/Templar conflict and for either side to potentially be allied vs conscripted. Therefore, Veilguard cannot assume what kind of model the Inquisition set forth on the issue for characters like Harding.
But when I get Harding's dialogue with Neve about Templars in Tevinter and "What do you do when you can't trust the people in power to do the right thing?" my gut reaction is something like:
Lace. Sweetheart. Did you not listen to anything the Inquisitor [my mage Trevelyan who was gentle/polite/well behaved enough to be considered one of the "good ones" in her Circle, something her noble blood helped considerably, but was still almost driven to suicidal depression] had to say about the southern Templar Order as a whole? Ever?"
And my Inquisitor became less and less Chantry-appeasing and more and more openly pro-Mage as she went, too. Leiliana became Divine, permanently allowed the Mages to live outside Circles, and immediately began massive Chantry reforms.
But if you want to take what is mostly just a function of necessity in video game programming/ writing the script broadly to not invalidate past choices and make it work in universe?
It does kind of circle back nicely to the idea of the Inquisitor as a person and their personal convictions or decision making versus the Inquisitor as someone who has become living religious iconography, a symbol that people interpret into their own faith and world view.
It isn't that my Inquisitor Trevelyan didn't manage to use her position to make very significant progress for mages (and her other causes, which are less relevant here). Again, the Circles are done with. She put her thumb on the scale and Leliana, a reform driven, pro-Mage Divine is in place in Val Royeaux. That's a remarkable amount of change from the last several ages in southern Thedas.
But her power was acquired in a very specific manner. She had games she had to play for security, and a role she had to perform to be seen as deserving of that power. She was not in favor of the Chantry, but the Inquisition still was born from a Chantry organization and lead by former Chantry officials. Many if not most of her followers were there because of their faith in Andrastianism. The Inquisition is still a religious institution, even if the Inquisitor wants to break free or is left screaming on the inside.
So you end up with someone like Lace Harding, who is generally kind hearted and driven by good intent, still not understanding why the Inquisitor chose the Mages over the Templars.
The history the Templars have if you aren't Andrastian or if you have magic or if you are a non-human who either isn't sufficiently integrated into the local culture or who isn't allowed to be? Somehow didn't get communicated even though a good portion of the message was "The Templar Order as an institution is cruel and cannot be trusted; the Chantry has not used its authority in a way that is appropriate".
(Along with "No one should have this much power over someone else's life and personhood much less due to an accident of birth", but again that's the less relevant statement to the post.)
And Lace even has the line in Treviso about not always liking the people she found in Chantries! So I don't think she's entirely unaware. She's definitely not malicious.
But somehow with the cultural influences and pressures of the south, the use of the Inquisitor as an Andrastian symbol, willing or unwilling, and probably a long childhood of hearing about how Templars protect people and "Magic exists to serve man, and never to rule over him."
You still end up with a Lace Harding, kind and driven by justice as she is, who is confused by northern Templars being corrupt and doesn't make the connection that the Templar authorities in the south also couldn't be trusted.
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