Board Thread:Lore Discussion/@comment-97.81.240.58-20130603234626/@comment-24261859-20140401183533

I really don't know where you're getting "easily kill them off" from. Even if it were possible for the Empire to drive out the Dominion, to assume that it would be "easy" would be laughable. What I said is still valid: The Empire had lost three whole legions, and the remainder had been depleted of half their troops, if not more. The Imperial City had been sacked, Hammerfell was effectively gone (from the Imperial point of view), and the troops were exhausted.

Note how Hammerfell has the ocean on one side and Cyrodiil on the other acting as a buffer between it and the Dominion, meaning that the campaign there could not be as easily enforced, in addition to its natural advantage of being a desert. Yes, the Redguards beat the Thalmor, but to assume that anywhere else would meet with the same success without these advantages is erroneous, I think.

Meanwhile, the Dominion still posesses both Elsewyr and Valenwood, immediately to the south of Cyrodiil, in striking range of the Imperial City. In order to uproot the Dominion, Mede would have had to march against these territories. In Elsewyr, he would have to face the same difficulties that the Dominion had to face in attacking Hammerfell--Namely, that it's really hard to make a successful campaign through a desert (especially with a few depleted legions that are already exausted. That would surely be a defeat tantamount to attacking Russia in the winter.) In Valenwood, well, you have a huge forest. If the Dominion can do Guerilla warfare at all, then, well, good luck.

Finally, you mention that "they did it like true warriors without giving in." Well, spoken like a true nord, I guess. Too bad the whole notion of pride and honor in battle is foolish and impractical, especially when your enemy does not have it. It's true that a warrior who died fighting the Dominion might be angry to know that they did not win, but what of the boy whose father was killed because the leader refused to sue for peace? Or the civilian family who was slaughtered by the invading forces? There's more to war than just fighting to the last.

It is true that he might have accepted the treaty when it was first proposed, and this is the only time I might consider him foolish. He believed that he could fight the Dominion and succeed without having to impose the terms of the treaty on the Empire, which would disrupt everybody and cause much strife (Like we see as, once it is implemented, Hammerfell and Skyrim both attempt to or actually do secede.) He did not want to make the people of the Empire suffer, so he tried to fight, but, when he realized that he could not, wisely backed down.