1. Enter Whiterun castle. (Dragonsreach)

2. Go to the back of the hall up the stairs. (Jarls Quarters and planning.)

3. Find the book cases behind the war map.

4. Find the book entitled: "The Great War"



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Based on what I gleaned out of the book.
The empire now looks something like http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/846/tamriel.png/

Thanks Shauker for the map outline.

I didn't think Alinor had conquered that much of the Imperial Province. Other than southern Hammerfell, Cyrodiil didn't make any other territory concessions. If anything, that map should only remove Hammerfell, Valenwood, and Elsweyr from the Empire.

Generally speaking, after the Battle of the Red Ring, the forces of the Aldmeri Dominion no longer had the forces to continue fighting anywhere besides Hammerfell, so I'd think that the Cyrodiilic cities seized during the Great War by the Dominion would return to Cyrodiilic control.

For future reference, if ya'll come across anything important like this take screenshots and send them my way so that I can get them on TIL nice and early.

Sounds good

Unfortunately, snapshots from my tv from my cell phone probably wouldn't make the grade.

Aah, damn there is a quest where you can only make the "right" choice if you've read this book. Then again the other choice was going up against 4-5 enemies on high ground. Yeah, easy choice.

We've got it:

http://www.imperial-library.info/content/concises-account-great-war-between-empire-and-aldmeri-dominion

OMG YES. Exactly the sort of thing I wanted to see.

Prow: fixed some typos in the book. I assume they were yours rather than the ingame authors?

Fantastic!

Interesting read, though since Hammerfell/Skyrim/High Rock all were still appart of the Empire I see no reason why the Dominion had such great success. Honestly, its like Germany invading Russia, only this Russia has had the greatest military force on earth with the manpower to boot.

I think that about half of those were mine, the other half were in the book already.



The Altmer are some though bastards to begin with. The only reason Tiber Septim actually conquered Summerset was because of the Numidium. Reman didn't try, the Isles and Empire simply accommodated each other. (We'll be part of your empire if you never set foot on our land.)

At the start of the war the Thalmor command were able to concentrate their forces on a fairly small region while the Imperial forces were spread out across the Empire. At the end the Empire had all that remained of it's legions in the area around the Imperial city while the Thalmor command had it's forces spread out in south Cyrodiil and Hammerfell.

I suppose that what is missing from the over view is the disposition of the Thalmor forces at the end of the war. I imagine they're also very much depleted.

I'm not very far into Skyrim yet, but after reading that, I'll be very dissapointed if BOTH faction's endings didn't end with them joining together and kicking some Aldmeri ass with Dovahkiin. I mean, the whole civil war is practically over the banning of Talos, and that seems to be a direct result of the Thalmor occupation. This way, everyone wins.

Yeah, the Great War was the most interesting book I've found so far. I'd been dying to know what was going on in the intervening years, and was curious about whether or not the Medes were still in power. It's interesting, though, that the coinage is still named after the Septims, and that the Empire considers itself fundamentally the same entity: although it makes sense, as it never truly fell.

From what I'm getting from in-game dialogue, most people seem to regard the Concordat as a surrender rather than a mutual peace. That is, even though the Aldmeri were in a bad position after the recapture of the Imperial City, the Empire was only able to manage peace on the terms the Aldmeri had dictated before the war. Effectively, then, the Aldmeri Dominion is the greatest power on the continent, and the Tamrielic Empire is--though not reduced to a state of vassalage--subject to its demands by treaty. It's not unlike the tributes the Roman Empire occasionally paid to the Sassanid Empire, or vice versa, as a guarentee of peace, although neither lost their key territories in such volume by those arrangements.

The Tamrielic Empire is, essentially, reduced to an empire of Men (excepting Hammerfell).

My favourite book so far. I was really excited to find it in a shopkeeper's shelves.

It's sad that on my first playthrough, my primary objective isn't to slay dragons or to see the beautiful graphics*, it's to READ ALL BOOKS.


* I've got a Core 2 Duo 2GHz and 8800GT video card, so it's actually not much prettier than Oblivion ..

I'm glad the elves finally got their vengeance on man during the sack of the Imperial City for what Pelinal did to them so many years ago.

I'm kind of disappointed that my Altmer in Skyrim can't side with the thalmor, I couldn't stop wincing when I had to kill all of those thalmor agents, felt like the greatest betrayal ever.

My current goal too, as I do plan on making my first character to be my canon character for Summerset Ilse.

Just like you couldn't make a Dunmer character join Dagoth Ur in Morrowind, or join the Mythic Dawn in Oblivion. TES could use a few more choices ala New Vegas.

Incidentally,

Consider the following: The Altmeri held the White-Gold Tower for a lengthy amount of the time during the war.

The Altmer also held Crystal-Like-Law, Tree-Sap, and through their control of moons, the Khajit tower. They also probably had whatever tower is in Hammerfell(I forget).

With all of these towers, including the centre of wheel, why did the Thalmor not take advantage of their position and remake the aurbis? Do they need all of the towers to even do anything?

How long did they control White-Gold? I was under the impression it was only a few months at most - I didn't pay too close attention to the dates in the Great War book. How long does it take to remake aurbis? A moment? Infinity? Are they still fighting Numidium?

What is the status of Red Mountain after the eruption? Do the Altmer aim to control Snow-Throat too?

They are still fighting Numidium. I'd imagine that controlling the white gold would give them the power to triumph and unmake Numidium. But then again, the aldmeri dominion is reformed, and they're re-affirmed their hegemony over southern Tamriel, so perhaps they did roll back time in a matter of speaking.

Lore Spoiler about Crystal-Like-Law and the Thalmor during the Oblivion Crisis

If someone remembers the correct book if I am wrong please correct me. There may be two series of them, and I am not remembering the other.

Wow, I was completely wrong in all of my guesses about the 4th Era.

I love when that happens.


Same. I was so sad when At least I got some nice clothes out of it!



Khajiit was the only still-active tower they controlled. Dagon destroyed Crystal, White was deactivated and Tree-Sap "stopped moving."

I just PMed you a book I found in a library of Vaermina worshipers. In "The Talos Mistake" a human author attempts to explain the White-Gold Concordat. "...the citizens of the Empire must know this: the Emperor did not agree to outlaw the worship of Talos because it was demanded by the Thalmor, the ruling body of the Aldmeri Dominion. The Emperor agree to outlaw the worship of Talos because it was the right thing to do."

It is amazing how people will rationalize things like that.

If White-Gold had the power to disrupt any other Tower, then the Dagonites wouldn't have bothered getting somebody to banish Red Tower's stone; they would have went straight for White-Gold.

I've been trying to find rising threat of ages now, so far I've only suceeded in getting volumes 2 and 4, and I want to start with volume 1.

[censored], losing crystal-like-law must have been a terrible blow to the Altmer. It disheartens me a great deal to realize that I'll never get to wander through the glittering insect wings and many colours of the tower, to see the lines upon lines of tapestries depicting the great histories of the Aldmeri Dominion, and the Aldmeri themselves encased in their tombs. Will make me said when TES: VI Alinor comes out. Seems almost like the devs purposefully bombed Crystal-Like-Law so that they wouldn't have to go through the trouble of designing such a graphically challenging landmark for the next game.

Anyway, did the Altmer not get Orichalc, another active tower?