Board Thread:Lore Discussion/@comment-27007772-20140611204941/@comment-112.205.18.151-20140628084933

I mostly side with the Empire because numerous reasons:

1. Thalmor. Hammerfell only won against the Dominion because of positioning. The Great War had just ended and since Hammerfell does not border any Dominion Territory( Valenwood does not border Hammerfell. Look at the maps) the only way the Dominion could supply their forces was at sea. Half of the Thalmor army was destroyed at the Imperial City. The other half was trapped between Cyrodill and the Redguard controlled desert as Lady Arannelya was considering aiding Lord Naarfin within Cyrodill when the treaty was signed.

Many Imperial Legionnaires actually remained to defend Hammerfell. The General (I forgot his name) Only sent a token force to flank Naarfin in the IC while he left the majority of his army fighting the Elves in Hammerfell citing them as "invalids" in order to circumvent the order to take his whole force against Naarfin.

To be short the Elves were defeated by "invalid" Imperial Legionnaires and Redguard defenders using scorched earth tactics that devastated the land and because of the difficulty of seiging cities when your supply lines to the sea are constantly raided by Redguards. Arannely could not exert her full might against either the cities or the deserts and was eventually forced to retread due to the war exhaustion stacking within the Dominion.

The argument of the previous people about and an alliance of an independent Skyrim waging war is rendered invalid by the fact that Hammerfell was devastated by the war and could hardly support some grand super alliance in a war. High Rock and Skyrim are the only provinces not devasted that remained in the Empire.

In short. Hammerfell and the Empire are all already weakend while Valenwood, Elsweyr and the Summerset Isle were all unscathed by any Imperial counterattack. The Empire needs to recover quickly to actually fight back against the Thalmor and needs Skyrim to do it.

2. Nord Racism. One look at how Argonians and the Dark elves were treated immediately soured me for joining the Stormcloaks. They were second class citizens who Ulfric did not care about and were ostracized and abused by their Nordic overlords. An example would be the scene when you first enter Windhelm where a dark elf woman is being racialy abused by a Nord through verbal means and he threatens to follow through with a more physical approach and no guard steps in.

3. I find that most who support the Empire are more well informed on most cases.

A previous person said that the person the Empire chose to be the new jarl was bigoted and that comment shocked me. How could anyone talk to Brunwulf and think that?

Brunwulf advocates a more tolerant policy towards minorities. He hates racistm and actually verbally chastises you if you seem bigotted in the dialogue. He expresses how much he hates the narrowminded "Skyrim is for the Nords" policy that the Stormcloaks espouse.

Ulfric doesn't care about the people of Skyrim. He cares about his powerbase and the adoration of his supporters. It is said that when a caravan of dark elf refugees are attacked Ulfric would not claim that his men are all already fighting. But if a Nord village is attacked he is the first to sound the horns and fight.

I understand the arguments of killing POWs but that wasn't what the other guy was talking about. Ulfric didn't just kill those who fought him. He killed all the citizens who didn't fight. All the people who saw the fighting in the streets and hid in their houses were taken out and executed along with the Forsworn as sympathisers. A man who worried that if he fought noone would feed his children if he died was fair game for Ulfric to kill.

4. The Empire's execution of the player character is understandable. If you were a law-abiding citizen you would have been crossing the official border. A man,even if he is in rags, captured where you captured the leader of a rebellion far away from the offiicial border is highly suspect. You could have been a stormcloak prisoner who escaped. Or a farmer who wanted to join the rebellion. You could also have been completely innocent but very few would take that chance.