I was reading an excerpt of a De Tocqueville piece that talked about the "ancien regime" and the centralization of the state under high crown authority, but i feel like thats a very shallow understanding of the monarchical system, and there's probably so much more to it besides "the king was super powerful and controlled everything, and the people wanted freedom and an end to poverty. The end."
I really want to know what the govt system was like in France at the time.
Generally, the king was very much centralized under the French crown, but that has more to do with the work of Louis XIV than Louis XVI. Now, I would argue that you're putting too much into the concept of the Monarchical system since every kingdom was different than another.
Generally, lords existed as members of bureaucracy within the state; they would help in collecting taxes and would also own land as well as serve as officers within the bureaucracy and the military. Generally, the nobility existed for the service of the king.