I hope this doesn't get moved to the spoiler section. It's pretty dead there, and everyone knows that the dude dies from the trailers.

Do you believe it was right for the Empire to punish Roggvir to open the gates, letting Ulfric Stormcloak escape after killing Torygg? I understand the decision completely, it was complete treason, and a little disrespectful. Yay or nay?

He should have known that he'd end up being punished so he should have ran out the city with Ulfric after opening the gate.

yes they should have executed him..

there is a legal term called "Accessory After the Fact", which basically means if you help someone escape after committing a crime, or hide a fugitive, you are just as guilty as they are and CAN be brought up on the same charges they were..

The thing is, while I support the Empire, I don't believe the duel was actually a crime. Ulfric's duel was legitimate, especially because Torygg accepted it. But if your Jarl says to close the gates, even if unjustified, it was Roggvir's duty to listen as a guard of Solitude, NOT as a soldier of the legion.

He DID just help the guy who killed the high king of Skyrim and start a revolution. that basically makes him a traitor to the government of skyrim (and the empire as a whole.) While i am not a HUGE fan of the death penalty, he was sort of asking for it by doing that and doing it so blatantly.

Whether you support Ulfric or not, look at the situation. First, there's two gates, and he couldn't be guarding both, so why is he the only one being executed? Second, the duel was accepted by their King, and the guards probably followed Nord law until the Legion came in to exert Imperial law. The legion was fighting rebels at that time but it was light skirmishes and the Nords were uninvolved besides the rebels. So if anyone is to blame, it wouldn't be Roggvir and the guards, but if so, there should be two guards at least being executed.

Roggvir clearly was a scapegoat so that Solitude didn't take heat from the Empire or looked bad.

Yay as in "Yes, it is right he got his head chopped off"

Traitor is a made-up word, and law in the hands of corrupt tyrants is just a different kind of weapon. Roggvir being one example, and the fact that the imperials rewarded Igmund's family for the same "crime" they imprisoned Ulfric for.

Forcing your own people to bow to the enemy and turn their backs on the founder of the empire is the real betrayal.

Your are SO asking for another Civil war debate, so i am not going to bother answering.....

What did you expect, look at the subject.

And you weren't? The fact is, the imperial government has no leg to stand on when accusing Roggvir of treason. It's just a naked power play, trying to terrorize people into not supporting the rebellion. I don't blame them for trying, but an attempt to justify it on a moral or legal ground is BS.

Then ignore him and don't quote and react to it.

I don't support him but I don't think he was wrong in what he did. He was definitely in the right in allowing Ulfric entrance into the city, whether or not he knew about the duel. Allowing him to run away is a bit more dicey but as far as he was concerned, the duel was legitimate and in accordance with Nord tradition. He must have known he'd be punished for it but stayed anyway.

You left out "no, the Empire should have let the Solitude guards execute him"...they're the ones he was a sworn member of and betrayed.

They did, the captain of the guard oversees the execution... and anyway, he didn't betray them. If he did, where's the other guard who watched the second gate? Whys he not being killed too?

They might have known which gate Ulfric left out of, which would the other gate's guard would have had nothing to do with it.

Which? There's only two you have to walk through in a row. He had to go through both.

Gameplay and story segregation.

On that night, there was one guard guarding the gate. That guard was Roggvir.

it is possible Roggvir had control of both gates, or only was was closed at the time. It is not exactly normal for someone to walk into the capital of a region to kill it's leader, and they might have had only once closed and not needed the other one closed.

I wouldn't doubt it. They probably didn't even think about there being two gates when they made this up, knowing them. Laziness sure isn't something they're strangers to, but lorewise, I'm going with what makes sense.

From http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Legal_Basics:

Sounds like the indirectly clauses are being applied in Roggvir's case. He indirectly acted against the High King by opening the gate for the High King's killer.

Keep in mind that there is the side gate that Ulfric could have gone through. It's two doors and a staircase, so I doubt they'd have two people guarding it.

That said, I don't really agree with the decision to kill Roggvir. At least, I don't agree with Bethesda's decision to kill him without giving the player an opportunity to break him out of prison or rescue him in some other fashion.

Edit: What the hell happened to my post? I really don't like the new quote format... grr...

Possible, sure, from Beth laziness, but likely? Him guarding both gates to such a large city? Realistically it doesn't make sense. And if he was, that's the guard captain's stupidity.

he could have also been in on the plan and possibly killed the other guards so as to be the only one there. would not seem that hard to kill them with a bow and arrow or a sword through the chest in the middle of the night.

That's a wide brush then. You could paint a lot of individuals in Solitude with it if you want to get technical about it.

I think we'd have heard about him murdering someone during his execution, don't you think? Or someone slandering Ulfric for it.