I never once said the Imperials were not racist. I was just saying that Ulfric was. The Imperials were racist back in Oblivion

Um...what? When did I say it wasn't his job?

Trying to get the discussion back to something pertinent. I like discussions about Tamriel-wide politics. I'm sick of hearing about how Nirn-shattering Rolff's drunken raving is.

Something not to be forgotten in a discussion of Tamrielic forces is the mythical. The Dominion may come out on top simply because Auriel is ascendant and Akatosh is distracted trying to keep his pieces in line, and also no longer playing favorites among the human nations.

Maybe not if MK's chart is canon, as that means we're going further away from the mythic, and mortals will be stronger on their own. Self reliant. Mundus right now in the 4th era is at the peak I believe.

Really? Where does MK say this?

As far as the Dunmer are concerned, if the game Morrowind is any indication, they are extremely racist, as well. It is ironic that they are crying about being mistreated in Skyrim. I don't think they want anything to do with the Altmeri Dominion. But then, their country was recently turned into a sinkhole, so maybe the Thalmor won't want it.

I'll dig it up.

From memory, it's a "U" shaped diagram that is thicker on the ends than in the center. The idea is that as the provinces are more unified, they are individually weaker, but as they become more fractured they're stronger individually. Seems to be how Bethesda is going. Morrowind, even without the Tribunal, looked like it might be completely decimated, but they've taken a turn for the badass instead. The Argonians were the first to split from the empire but they sent Dagon's minions screaming for their pits and almost conquered White Gold itself via Umbriel. An independent Summerset Isles is suddenly a threat to the entire continent whereas they could never manage much more than to make trouble in the south before.

This is why I said there's no clear interest. There is about equal risk of Nord territorial ambitions as imperial, and no sign yet that the Thalmor are interested in them one way or the other.

If stormcloaks actually are interested in fighting Dominion (as in actually sending soldiers to war with dominion to help others who fight , rather then only waiting till dominion invade them and defending themselves ) and they most likely are then it doesn't matter who win, basicly there two groups thouse who don't care ( Morrowind, Black marsh) and thouse who will benefit from war with Dominion ( Hammerfell , Elsweyr) . Empire makes it clear that there will be second war and they will fight against Dominion, same things most likely goes for independent Skyrim. So debate is pretty much pointless when we talk about it in context of whole continent rather then localy.

Thalmor want the stormcloaks to win due to, you know, it's breaking up humanity and their unity, as for most places they wouldn't care.


Stormcloaks wouldn't be able to fight the Dominion because they are stuck in skyrim which is extremely far from Summerset Isles. Honestly if Ulfric does win I doubt he would actually hold his promise of an attack on the dominion where as the Empire has the ships, troops, resources and a bigger drive to attack the Dominion.

Ugh, I can't even find the damn thing. Not on mk's post or texts. Is there a section for pics in the imperial library somewhere?

And no, I never said the Imperials weren't racist. There are no outsiders in the Stormcloak army, but there are few of anyone outside of Nords and Imperials in the Imperial army. I am not saying the Stormcloaks stand alone in their racism, but it is pretty obvious that Beth painted them as racist. This happens in every Elder Scrolls game.

High Rock hasn't given a crap for the Empire since Lysandus got whacked in the War of Betony way back in the Third Era.

Never mind the anti-Imperial sentiment among the local clans of High Rock.

If you went by what was presented to you on the surface, then you could say the devs painted the Empire as oppressive due to that one captain.

They don't need to reach summerset. There's a dominion right there on the main land.

We actually don't know the relationship between High Rock and the empire only that High Rock refuses to work with Ulfric and Galmar (or Ulfric, I honestly don't have a clue which) claims that High Rock won't betray the empire because the empire hasn't done anything bad to High Rock, though it says something when not one kingdom in High Rock responds to Ulfric's pleas.

They also dont give the Empire support. We know that as well.

Who said the Empire asked for support is the thing? Does Tulius ever mention demanding reinforcements from the empire or High rock at all?

I woudn't say that if they want activily fight Dominion then they could simple send diplomats to hammerfell and say "Yo can we help you?" Nothing stops them from sending their troops to support other independent countries, hell when war will start even empire will gladly accept help from independend skyrim if such help will be offered.

ah yes, the whole "LET'S ALL BE FRIENDS AND MAKE AN ALLIANCE TO ATTACK THALMOR" theory, whose to say that the Redguards wouldn't turn the stormcloaks away? This is Tamriel, alliances are very rare.

Purely speculation. Cyrodiil is not what it once was, and they don't show a lot of drive to attack the Dominion now, Tullius' words notwithstanding. They appear resigned to an appeasemant policy.

They refuse to work with Tullius as well. The only thing it says is that they're staying out of Skyrim's war. We have no idea what's going on in High Rock. Given that their territory was attacked in the Night of Green Fire and the fact that they also supplied troops to defend the IC, they might not be thrilled at the empire appeasing the Thalmor. Impossible to say.

Yes, he does.

And the empire can't enforce its claims on the help of other provinces, so either way, alliances have to be made on the basis of free-will cooperation and common interests, not the legion boot.

Directly contradicted by Ulfric's dossier.

As said already the Bretons don't aid the empire either. It seems they only wish to wait till one of the sides wins and then declare allegiance or an alliance with that group if it benefits them. The Bretons are also the most intelligent and politically scheming of all the human races so if you think they won't backstab the Empire out of "honor" you sadly don't know much about them.

We can't say that for sure because we have no clue what is going on in High Rock, they could be at war with themselves for all we know.


Pure speculation to say either one is right due to, you know, WE DON'T ACTUALLY KNOW. A very big problem skyrim has is the lack of lore dealing with the other countries.

You have no problem saying so.

Nobody says that this will be some ages long alliance of happy rainbows, "We all hate dominion let's kick dominion ass and THEN try to kill each others"

For the record I sided with Empire but Stormcloak option also can be legitamate way if you think about it.

Because civilizations can prosper after large wars, especially since 30 years is a long time to rebuild and I honestly doubt the Empire has been sitting around doing nothing for those 30 years, especially since you know, we have a source saying the empire is planning a counter attack on the Dominion meaning they must have the troops and resources to launch said counter attack.