Warp Of the North's going to happen, I'm calling it early.

I think it would be the best if they say that the Empire wins the civil war but eventually (after the happenings of the game) the Stormcloaks make it independent. Or vice versa

A volcano will destroy Skyrim, problem solved!

If one thing should be noticed here, its that in the TES games you save the world, and then regardless the world goes to hell anyways in between games.

Kinda depressing tbh. Except when I'm RP'ing an evil character. My current assassin dude loves the chaos boiling around him.

I hope there will be a Thalmor-centric DLC, although it may be too large to fit in, especially seeing as Beth don't focus that much on story.

This. Skyrim will end up part of the empire as did Morrowind. Morrwind were able to continue slavery even though it was abolished by the empire as part of the deal for them to join. Same as Valenwood was left almost untouched even though it is under the empire, the emperor decided it would be too costly to fully conqure the vast forrests. I do like this in the lore, diplomacy, its nice when its not all wipe out one place then make it part of the empire, shows writers have really thought about each land.

But as someone else mentioned, it will only get a small mention here and there. Such as if you read the novels, umbriel only gets a small bit of dialogue, and now and then you find sap fo the tree in game.

A Dragon break.

200 years from now no one remembers this civil war because in the grand scheme of things it just didnt matter. No one remembers Tullius. No one remembers Ulfriic.

Ulfric is an Elder Scroll.

DUDE! Spoilers.

I didn't find the decision to be a difficult one. The more I played, the less I sympathized with the Stormcloaks.

I suspect the canon resolution will be an Imperial victory.

I'll tell you what I tell everyone else who asks, Dragon Break. Rinse, repeat and move on.


I like this idea.

Or it could come down to

The Thalmor conquer an independant Skyrim and go on to dominate the already weakened and increasingly destabilized Empire.
Or the Empire stays together but in the end it is for naught and the empire ceases to exist as it is know under the Thalmor.
Or Skyrim gains independance for a time but the Empire eventually retakes it (perhaps Ulfric creates own division). Then the Thalmore gets involved.

Next game takes place in Thalmor dominated province/home province or in Hammerfell.

Or Skyrim becomes independent and the Thalmor avoid it and take down the Empire.
Or Skyrim stays with the Empire but can't save the Empire so becomes independent after it falls.


Apprently a lot of Nords disagree he is the rightful High King in accordance with the old Nord ways - it wouldn't be much of a civil war if Ulfric was obviously in the right.


How detailed does the Lore need to be?


Hard to say - of course some people would complain - "I did this, why doesn't future game recognise what I decided to do (my cannon character sets all lore!). But not me.

The last three ES games haven't really been about the PC redefining the politics of the age or vastly changing the political/cultural structure as such (Skyrim has come closest to that). You have a big picture objective (stopping Dagoth Ur, stopping the invasion through the Oblivion Gates, stopping the world being eaten by dragons) - in the course of doing that you move through the culture and politics, perhaps have an immediate impact in that immediate time/place and immediate future but you don't take over Morrowind, don't get put on the throne or any of that.

You stop Dagoth Ur in Morrowind, the rest is personal detail. You help close the Oblivion Gates, the rest is personal detail. You save the world from Dragons, the rest is personal detail. In Morrowind regardless of which house you put on top through your actions or who you kill the fate of Morrowind is the same.

Maybe the easiest thing would be to have it set far enough in the future where the outcome's ripples have died down. Just have a conversation early in the game that will set a limited number of lore related objects. While a prisoner someone asks you something and mentions the Skyrim civil war. You have an option of saying something about Imperials or something about Nords. Depending on which you select the lore books switch over and relate to one side winning or the other. Whoever won doesn't have much impact on the game at hand though (though again I imagine cannon obsessives not liking that).

History has a way to repeat itself and we all know what happened the the earlier Aldmeri Dominion. It would be great if the Thalmor win this battle and the next TES game will be about a revolution in the Dominion. A bit like how the Nerevarine broke down the Tribunal.

TES games are always great in impact but after that your character disappears and things move on. You always set things in motion but how it will all unfold isn't really up to us and hopefully it stays that way. Though I'd like to know more about what happens to our heroes, Nerevarine simply vanishing ticks me off, I think people will be upset that they can't identify with what they played or the choices they feel they made. I'd much rather prefer a more open-ended ending they can work with than somebody filling in the blanks for me. Up to this point I haven't felt that they forgot about the chars I played, though they are unnamed and seem to be fond of disappearing suddenly
I'd hate to have another Warp in teh West...North/whatever.

Doesn't matter which side wins the civil war. A simple sentence will suffice:

"Eventually the province was brought under control of _________."

They needn't explain the details.

Falmer invasion happens..... Skyrim falls to the Falmer....

The game draws many parallels between Tiber Septim and the player character. Enough that it strikes me as blatantly telegraphing that the future lore will involve this new Dragonborn following in Septim's footsteps to re-unify the shattered Empire, perhaps even ascending to join (or replace?) Talos among the Divines.

Given this projection, there will clearly be no need to specify an outcome to the Stormcloak Rebellion. They can simply say, "After the Great War, the Empire fragmented and provinces broke away." They don't need to specify whether Skyrim was among the provinces that broke away or not. This doesn't even require the PC to be the founder of the new Empire, just that the Empire falls apart and re-forms.

Another possibility would be for canon to state that the Rebellion was winding down (again without specifying which side was dominant in Skyrim) when the Thalmor resumed hostilities, forcing the warring factions in Skyrim to set aside their differences in order to face the greater common threat. Given that the ban on Talos worship and Imperial subservience to the Thalmor seem to be the Stormcloaks' major issues, the dissolution of the White Gold Concordat would make it much easier for the Empire and the Stormcloaks to join forces even without the Dominion resuming open hostilities.

Dragon Break. You killed an aspect of Akatosh. You tore open a hole in time with the Elder Scroll. That would distort the timestream enough to make both endings canon.

There are three endings.

Empire, Stormcloaks and neutral. The neutral ending happens you don't side with either.

I don't know whether outcomes of side quest lines affect the canon. The MQ always happens, and all other things are sidelined. The Nerevarine was never spoken of as having been the archmagister, archduke or grandmaster, nor a Morag Tong assassin or werewolf, but did kill Almalexia, and was mentioned as playing a part in the Bloodmoon prophecy. Same with the MQ and DLCs of the doings fo the CoC.

Regardless things that happen in Side Quests always happened in the next game... Of course relatively minor things as which settlement prospered on Vvardenfell or which guys died in Dark Brotherhood or Morag Tong quests don't make a difference in the grand scale so they don't have to be mentioned. But the guy from the DB in Oblivion can be summoned in Skyrim and definitely died like he did in Oblivion (I forgot his name...)

The same applies to all the other side quests, however here there is a huge conflict of interests and a possibly very big difference in overal outcome between the two sides. So it's a bit more difficult to say what will or will not happen.

Ulfric is really Sheogorath and he did it all for a joke before he pulls down his pants does a big daedric fart, kills the entire population of Tamriel and says 'well that was a laugh' and goes back to Shivering Isles and plays poker with Pelinal Whitestrake.

The Thalmor may have lost influence in Skyrim but the Empire is weakened and the heart of the Thalmor is in the Aldmeri Dominion.

Perhaps the civil war is just the punk (as in rotting wood) used to light the real fire. Maybe the Aldmeri Dominion are secretly building up for world Domination.

Why else would they cause discord among mankind and weaken the Empire.

Maybe they intend to ride on Cyrodil