“ Faerie foods with unusual effects. Like faerie sausages that turn the eaters into wiener dogs, faerie wines that make the drinker whiny, etc. There's a table in Palladium Fantasy RPG which has a table of ideas.”
“ A modern kingdom still strictly adheres to ancient traditions due to their long forgotten deity getting annoyed at the moral decay, appearing as an AI Singularity and forcefully correcting everything it sees as morally wrong. As such, even though the weapons and technology have improved, the culture hasn't.”
“ The Chinese, when attacking a castle or fort, flew kites over the city wall and used the length of string it took to get it there as a measurement to know how far they had to dig a tunnel to get under the wall.”