Board Thread:Off Topic/@comment-24099618-20140114190300/@comment-24261859-20140515224947

In the future, I'd advise making large texts into paragraph breaks to make it more digestible. That's a bit of a monstrosity to read.

That said, if I understand correctly, you seem to make a curious point. The Aldmeri armies were divided into two main battle groups, one under Lord Naarfin that attacked Cyrodiil, and another under Lady Arannelya. This means that the Elves were also fighting at a roughly 50% "effective strength" at any given point, the Legion was equally spread out, even more so due to the relative provincial autonomy, i.e., legions in Hammerfell especially were fighting independently of those in Cyrodiil since the only way for Hammerfell to keep mounting a resistance was for the legions there to be declared invalid, while Naarfin and Arannelya were likely coordinating.

This proved a disadvantage during the Battle of the Red Ring, though, where Naarfin's forces were unable to draw on those within Arannelya's army (at least this is how I interpret "he called on all available forces," since the utter defeat at that battle would have spelled doom for the Dominion had all their armies been there.). As such, he was able to be outmaneuvered by the relatively fresh Nord legions and those arriving from Hammerfell and thus defeated.

One wonders if it might have been tactically advantageous for the army under Arannelya to enter the battle to support Naarfin. The Emperor was able to drive out the Elves by abandoning the city temporarily in order to regroup and launch an attack against his own, now occupied territory. This gave him a lot of well-needed momentum and, though Naarfin now had a defender's advantage, it effectively pinned down his army, which was formerly designed for an offensive operation, not point defense. Had Arannelya been involved, though, despite her losses at the hands of the Alik'r and remaining Legion defenders in Hammerfell, she could have conducted the same operation against Mede and the legions, performing her own offensive strike against the backs of the attacking armies, sandwiching them inbetween the two Aldmeri battle groups. With their vulnerable stern under attack, the legion's own assault would have been made much less effective, and the vanguard would likely have been crushed while the sternguard were occupied with Arannelya's army.

The comparison to the Maginot line is apt, except that Belgium was neutral, and France did not expect an attack from that direction. The Empire, by contrast, new that Elsewyr and Valenwood were Dominion holdings and most likely prepared accordingly.