Join Empire or Stormcloaks? My Thoughts

[kimmera]

@Kimmera

 

Hammerfell was the AD's main objective, until Cyrodil proved weaker than expected. But it continued to be a secondary objective with a whole army dedicated to taking it. But at the begging the invasion of Cyrodil was intended to help the invasion of Hammerfell, not the other way around.

 

The Empire did take extremely heavy casualties yes, but "In the end, the main Aldmeri army in Cyrodiil was completely destroyed."

 

Yes, the author says that saying the Empire surrendered to easily is a valid position, even if it is not necessarily correct.

 

You act like the AD has an infinite supply of troops, you do realize that the AD lost many more troops than the Empire did, right? If the Empire had not surrendered, some troops from Hammerfell would come up to Cyrodil to reinforce the Empire, and the AD would likely have to do the same thing.

 

Hammerfell didn't attack the AD because while they were able to drive the AD out, they couldn't conquer it without help, which they didn't have. But the treaty they signed led to the complete "withdrawal of Aldmeri forces from Hammerfell", so they got what they wanted.

 

The Great War does not say what you claim it says. Yes the main Aldmeri in Cyrodiil was eliminated but so was the entire Imperial force, which consisted of every troop unit they could pull from anywhere.

 

Even if the Hammerfell forces were stronger than expected, the Emperor didn't know that yet, and if they were that strong, perhaps more of them should have obeyed and come to Imperial City when commanded to do so. The Empire had good leadership as proven by the fact that they did win the Battle of the Red Ring with inferior troop numbers. How could they rely on troops that disobeyed orders?

 

The Emperor has no loyal troops left in reserve. The forces still in Hammerfell were of questionable loyalty. The AD remaining troop reserve strength was an unknown. AD territory was never invaded during the war, and we do not even have any hints about it being scouted. The Blades were seemingly useless in that regard.

 

Hammerfell wouldn't have had help from the Empire because the Empire were still recovering. As you yourself have pointed out they had internal conflicts breaking out due to low troop strengths and due to troops having to be taken off regular police duties to save the Empire at Imperial City.

 

The author of The Great War makes it clear that the main body of the Empire was not in any condition to continue. Hammerfell's troops were all that were left and even with them the official story the Emperor had been told was that those left behind were those too weak or crippled to defend/recapture Imperial City. The Emperor had to make a decision based on the available information, not one made based on what would be known years later. The Emperor also had to make a decision based on what would be good for the entire Empire, not just Hammerfell or even Skyrim.

 

And Skyrim came through untouched except for the edict regarding Talos worship. There isn't even a mention of loss of lives of soldiers who were deployed to Cyrodiil. Did Skyrim even fully mobilize and do all it could? How is it so many Stormcloaks were available to fight at Markarth anyway? There is seemingly no gratitude at all for the fact that the Empire did hold at Imperial City and unlike Hammerfell, Skyrim wasn't invaded. In the case of Hammerfell at least, separating from the Empire was likely a price of their treaty. The war never reached Skyrim until after the war by way of the WGC, yet they are complaining and treating the situation like the war was all the Empire's fault.

Edited August 14, 2015 by kimmera

[CaptainPatch]

 

you do realize that the AD lost many more troops than the Empire did, right?

Where is that ever stated? I always got the impression that overall, for the length of the Great War, the Empire suffered a LOT more. Consider the large number of civilian casualties inflicted by the Thalmor Occupation. That hurts the Military two ways: 1) It reduces the population from which soldiers are drawn. 2) Both soldier-capable civilians and actual soldiers will be motivated to return to what is left of their families and homes to try to pick up the pieces as best they can.

 

In contrast, the Thalmor were NOT dealing with any similar devastation on their home front.

[kimmera]

 

 

you do realize that the AD lost many more troops than the Empire did, right?

Where is that ever stated? I always got the impression that overall, for the length of the Great War, the Empire suffered a LOT more. Consider the large number of civilian casualties inflicted by the Thalmor Occupation. That hurts the Military two ways: 1) It reduces the population from which soldiers are drawn. 2) Both soldier-capable civilians and actual soldiers will be motivated to return to what is left of their families and homes to try to pick up the pieces as best they can.

 

In contrast, the Thalmor were NOT dealing with any similar devastation on their home front.

 

 

I am guessing he is making that inference out of the fact that the Empire was outnumbered at Red Ring but won, therefore the Imperial losses at that battle had to be less than the AD losses at that battle.

 

Where that theory falls apart, though is the assumption that the AD didn't have any reserves at all. That is a huge assumption. We know that the Empire had no reserves, at least none that the Emperor knew of. We know from Cicero the internal costs of the Imperial losses.

[Elimc]

@Kimmera

 

The entire Imperial army was not eliminated, they lost most of their troops, but if they only had ten legions at the beginning of the war, and three were destroyed with the rest at less than half, the Empire probably had somewhere between two or three legions left.

 

The Redguards were ordered to abandon their province to the AD to try to save Cyrodil. Since they did not want to let Hammerfell be destroyed by the AD, they left some people behind while most continued on to Cyrodil. Most of them did fight in the Battle of the Red Ring, but their general was smart enough not to sacrifice Hammerfell to save Cyrodil.

 

The Empire had two or three legions left, and the Blades had been scouting the AD before the war, "The Thalmor ambassador upended the cart, spilling over a hundred heads on the floor: every Blades agent in Summerset and Valenwood."

 

Yes, but Cyrodil would have had help from Hammerfell.

 

The nords did help fight the war: "The second army, largely of Nord legions under General Jonna, took up position near Cheydinhal." The Markarth Incident also took place after the Great War, or Ulfric wouldn't have been able to fight in it, so Ulfric's militia could have been formed from survivors of the Great War.

 

If the AD had reserves, then why didn't they use them to defeat Hammerfell?

[CaptainPatch]

@Kimmera

 

The entire Imperial army was not eliminated, they lost most of their troops, but if they only had ten legions at the beginning of the war, and three were destroyed with the rest at less than half, the Empire probably had somewhere between two or three legions left.

 

The Redguards were ordered to abandon their province to the AD to try to save Cyrodil. Since they did not want to let Hammerfell be destroyed by the AD, they left some people behind while most continued on to Cyrodil. Most of them did fight in the Battle of the Red Ring, but their general was smart enough not to sacrifice Hammerfell to save Cyrodil.

 

The Empire had two or three legions left, and the Blades had been scouting the AD before the war, "The Thalmor ambassador upended the cart, spilling over a hundred heads on the floor: every Blades agent in Summerset and Valenwood."

 

Yes, but Cyrodil would have had help from Hammerfell.

 

The nords did help fight the war: "The second army, largely of Nord legions under General Jonna, took up position near Cheydinhal." The Markarth Incident also took place after the Great War, or Ulfric wouldn't have been able to fight in it, so Ulfric's militia could have been formed from survivors of the Great War.

 

If the AD had reserves, then why didn't they use them to defeat Hammerfell?

The actual wording was more akin to, "Those legions that were not destroyed outright had sustained at least 50% casualties." So, it wouldn't have been "two or three legions left", but rather 7 legion remnants. Organizationally, Armies do NOT like to just shuffle unit fragments into composite full-strength units. They sink a lot of effort into building esprit de corps for each major unit. "The Bloody 5th" or "The Fighting 4th", etc. Normally, units that took substantial losses will get built back up to full strength rather than essentially disbanding the unit by merging it with other unit fragments. In more immediate concern is that all those fragments will NOT coordinate well, not having worked closely together as they had with their comrades in the destroyed portion of the unit. Additionally there is the consideration of what happens when you merge multiple command structures: You mix three command hierarchies together, but you only need ONE chain of command. Effectively, 2/3rds of the command chain have just been demoted -- which further hurts the morale of the ad hoc unit.

 

In contrast, the AD still had the garrisons they maintained in both Valenwood and Elswyr (both of which were Occupied provinces that had been long since pacified). Fresh, still parts of coherent, intact command structures. Plus whatever Home Guard/Imperial Guard/Household Guards or whatever label the Thalmor used to designate the units that had been left to guard the Thalmor Capital while the rest of their forces fighting the Empire. So, not just other fresh Thalmor units, but also some elite units as well.

 

It seems an odd supposition that most of the legions assigned to be Hammerfell would deliberately NOT participate in the fighting in either Hammerfell or Cyrodiil. The Empire is getting trashed, and those guys sit out the fighting? Sounds cowardly, doesn't it.

 

Given how much longer-lived elves are than humans, the Thalmor might have been seeing a golden opportunity. Whichever side rebuilt its armies first would have a distinct (probably overwhelming) advantage in the next war. And since the perceived loser would be dealing with social disruption at home, the Empire with it's civil war in Skyrim and the total loss of Hammerfell would be at a very distinct disadvantage trying to rebuild its shattered Military. The AD could easily get to the next D-Day 30-40 years ahead of the Empire's rebuilding schedule. (And the AD's ability to have roving military patrols throughout the Empire gives them a very useful ability to be constantly updating their evaluation of the Empire's military preparedness.

[jukkka1]

I always thought that the imperials were clearly right and the stormcloaks were clearly wrong. This was because of the common arguments: the empire needs to stay together to be a match for the thalmor, banning Talos worship was a necessary evil and not any worse than the stormcloaks' nord supremacy talk, imperial jarls are charming feel-good people while stormcloak jarls are malcontents, Solitude is a happy-happy-joy-joy kind of place while Windhelm is a mess, and all that. But looking at it from the nords point of view I just changed my mind.

 

The nords' friends and familiy are being hauled off to Thalmor prisons to be tortured and executed. And when they rise up to free themselves from their oppressors, the imperial legion that should be protecting the nords instead stands in their way to protect the murderers. Whether or not that peace treaty was necessary doesn't matter to those that the treaty sold out. Whether or not an united empire is a match for thalmor doesn't matter if that empire is already allied with the thalmor against you. As for the jarls and Solitude vs Windhelm, it's easy to be charming with your pockets full of the emperor's gold as you close eyes and ears from what the thalmor are doing to your people. Stormcloak controlled areas are harsh and cruel because they have to deal with the reality of the war instead of the gilded lie. Torygg, Balgruuf and the rest of the "good guys" didn't care what happened to the people it was their duty to protect, as long as they themselves were rich and safe. But Ulfric was himself a victim of thalmor torture, and he couldn't just look the other way as the thalmor were doing to his people what they first did to him. Any who protect the thalmor as they torture your family is just as bad as the thalmor.

 

So that's about it, the stormcloaks were right all along. It just took me several years to realize it because Bethesda deviously pulled so much pro-imperial wool over our eyes to cloud the issue and make it seem not so black-and-white. Empire's stance towards allowing and enabling the thalmor to do what they want to the nords might be necessary in some calculating nihilistic way, but the stormcloaks clearly have the moral high ground.

[Elimc]

@Kimmera

 

I should have said the equivalent of two or three legions, and that is assuming there are only ten legions. They could leave the legions with only a fraction of their full strength, but they would still have the equivalent of at least two full legions. And while they would have to demote some people, winning a major battle would increase moral, especially since they had killed the entire Aldmeri invasion force and would have a while to prepare while the AD got ready for a second assault.

 

Elswyr does not necessarily have a large garrison in it, since it is only a client state of the Dominion, and might just be controlled with only a few Thalmor, much like Skyrim is. And Valenwood is not necessarily pacified, since elves live longer and therefore have longer memories, it would take much longer to brainwash them into submission.

 

They wouldn't sit out of the fighting, they would fight in Hammerfell.

 

Hammerfell seems to be pretty peaceful, and after a brief civil war Skyrim is peaceful too, and still has all of its infrastructure intact. Only Cyrodil seems to be collapsing.

 

@Jukka1

 

Both the Empire and the Stormcloaks have good and bad points, and while I like the Stormcloaks more, there is no side that is clearly right or wrong.

[kimmera]

@Kimmera

 

I should have said the equivalent of two or three legions, and that is assuming there are only ten legions. They could leave the legions with only a fraction of their full strength, but they would still have the equivalent of at least two full legions. And while they would have to demote some people, winning a major battle would increase moral, especially since they had killed the entire Aldmeri invasion force and would have a while to prepare while the AD got ready for a second assault.

 

Elswyr does not necessarily have a large garrison in it, since it is only a client state of the Dominion, and might just be controlled with only a few Thalmor, much like Skyrim is. And Valenwood is not necessarily pacified, since elves live longer and therefore have longer memories, it would take much longer to brainwash them into submission.

 

They wouldn't sit out of the fighting, they would fight in Hammerfell.

 

Hammerfell seems to be pretty peaceful, and after a brief civil war Skyrim is peaceful too, and still has all of its infrastructure intact. Only Cyrodil seems to be collapsing.

 

@Jukka1

 

Both the Empire and the Stormcloaks have good and bad points, and while I like the Stormcloaks more, there is no side that is clearly right or wrong.

 

Why do you assume it would have taken the Aldmeri a while to be ready to continue? The Aldmeri were at least partially caught off guard. They had won the Capital and likely didn't think the Empire had enough left to kick them out. On paper, the Empire didn't, but won anyway. But that doesn't mean the Aldmeri were completely out of troops.

 

Skyrim and Hammerfell had already sent everything they were willing to send and Hammerfell was still occupied. There is no way that the Emperor had news of any victories in Hammerfell that quickly. Even if the Empire could have pieced together two legions, they had no way of knowing what the Aldmeri had left. And regardless of actual numbers suriving, the author of The Great War bluntly states "Although victorious, the Imperial armies were in no shape to continue the war."

 

Again, these are real troops, not cardboard pieces in a board game. Even if two or three legions really were enough to continue with, that doesn't mean there was enough supply for them, doesn't mean supply lines were intact at all, doesn't mean they were in any condition to march anywhere (particularly considering the journeys most of them had to make just to be at the battle at all).

 

And I don't think Hammerfell is in all that great a shape. At the very least there is an issue with a princess hiding out in Skyrim so there is at least some remaining internal strife. Moreover, that is now. Hammerfell was still fighting at the time of the WGC. It certainly didn't have any additional troops to sent to Cyrodiil. Skyrim has to be assumed to have sent everything it was willing to send as well. You cannot cite conditions 20 years later as reason for continuing. Conditions now might have been a lot worse if they hadn't signed the treaty.

 

@Jukkka1 : Nords that were hauled off were hauled for disobeying the treaty and thus disobeying Imperial Law.

[CaptainPatch]

I'm not sure that there's a timeline of the fighting in Hammerfell, but I gather that at the time of WGC, the fighting was still going on. Furthermore, I get the impression that the "Redguard victories in Hammerfell" didn't start happening until after the WGC had been signed. So, absent any news of Redguards routing Thalmor forces several times, I can't imagine that there was anything for the Emperor to feel optimistic about the fighting in Hammerfell. It's like the ONLY "victory" he could see was the Battle of the Red Ring -- and as Pyrrhus famously said, "Another such victory and I come back ....alone",^[

[Elimc]

@Kimmera

 

But the AD was out of troops, or they would have conquered Hammerfell easily.

 

The reasons he gives for the Empire not being able to continue the war is the huge losses they took, not anything else.

 

The troops wouldn't need to march out of Cyrodil, and if they had been able to supply ten legions, then they should be able to supply two without a problem, even if southern Cyrodil had been destroyed by the AD.

 

Southern Hammerfell was ravaged, but the rest of it was not touched by the war, so why do you think they couldn't have rebuilt. If Saadia is telling the truth, then the AD has taken over Hammerfell, but if she is lying Hammerfell is still resisting the AD. The AD wouldn't have been able to mount a serious attack on Cyrodil after the Battle of the Red Ring without withdrawing from Hammerfell, which would allow the Empire to pull some local forces from Hammerfell to help.

 

@CaptainPatch

 

The Legions in Hammerfell had stopped the Aldmeri advance before the Battle of the Red Ring, and you should really read this book if you want to know about the Great War. They hadn't defeated the AD, but they had stopped them from moving forwards. And unlike the Romans Pyrrhus faced, the AD did not have a huge supply of reinforcements waiting to destroy the Empire.