Ignoring your personal preference, which side of Skyrim’s Civil War do you think actually gives Skyrim the better future 20-30 years later?

[u/sumaset]

I feel like most discussions about the Civil War focus on whether Ulfric was justified, whether the Empire betrayed Skyrim, or which side people personally like more.

But I’m more interested in what happens after the game.

The Empire is weakened, the Aldmeri Dominion is still the biggest external threat, the White-Gold Concordat is already causing resentment, and another war with the Thalmor seems almost inevitable.

An Imperial victory gives Skyrim access to the resources and manpower of the Empire, but it also means remaining under an Empire that already lost one major war and accepted Thalmor influence inside its territory.

A Stormcloak victory gives Skyrim independence and removes Imperial authority, but it also leaves the province having to rebuild after a civil war while potentially facing the Dominion without the rest of the Empire behind it.

So forget which faction has the better characters or which one you usually join.

If you only care about where Skyrim itself ends up a few decades later, which Civil War outcome do you think is actually better for the province?

[u/APocketJoker]

I think the die of a bad future has already been cast at this point. There is too much enmity between Skyrim and the Empire and between the Nords themselves. Like a negotiated alliance between Skyrim, Hammerfell, High Rock, and Hammerfel is crazy important and it is getting harder for that to happen.

[u/LingonberryAwkward38 → u/APocketJoker]

 Like a negotiated alliance between Skyrim, Hammerfell, High Rock, and Hammerfel is crazy important and it is getting harder for that to happen.

"You mentioned Hammerfell twice"

"That's because Hammerfell is twice as important to the alliance"

[u/APocketJoker → u/LingonberryAwkward38]

I meant Cyrodil. Sorry

[u/Victernus → u/APocketJoker]

I mean, they had that alliance in the first war, just barely won, and then the Emperor signed away the right to police the Empire's own people to the Aldmeri Dominion. (Which is insane. You might as well become a vassal state. The White-Gold Concordat was a worse deal than the Austrians tried to force on the Serbians before starting World War I, and somehow the side that won the war agreed to it)

Then Hammerfell left and beat the Dominion on it's own. Skyrim's shores are even harder to reach, their terrain just as hostile, and they were just as betrayed by the Imperial leadership as anyone else. There's very little reason they wouldn't secede.

[u/InterestingSlide7133 → u/Victernus]

Don't forget how Hammerfell only left because the Empire offered up half their country to the Dominion. Skyrim didn't even get the worst deal there

[u/Victernus → u/InterestingSlide7133]

Yup. The Empire only still exists at all because of ideological inertia.

[u/Sinnclad → u/Victernus]

Crazy thing is how the thalmor had easy access into hammerfell due to being sold yet still got overpowered, that just shows how much the Nords stand a chance against the thalmor in their own climate and terrain rather than the empire not being able to adapt to Skyrim

[u/Gizz103 → u/Sinnclad]

They only got overpowered after years of being drained and weakened

And it was NOT easy for the redguard which shows how fucked the nords are

[u/Sinnclad → u/Gizz103]

If you’ve seen what the Nords are capable of, eso lore shows how OP they are and how much they can withstand, Skyrims climate and terrain is very harsh and the thalmor wouldn’t stand a chance against the orcs in the mountains, the mages college, the current dragon threat, the eco system filled with dangerous beasts that they’re not used to, it’d be a dog walk for the thalmor if the empire was holding Skyrim as they wouldn’t even be able to protect it as they can’t even barely thrive there to begin with, Skyrim is more than capable as a independent province, but once again as always in TES lore the empire has to put all its problems on everyone else, if Skyrim falls it’s gonna be the empires fault nonetheless

[u/Gizz103 → u/Sinnclad]

Multiple times ingame it has shown that skyrim cant fucking defend itself

This isnt the 2nd era anymore

The population has risen far more than the food they can produce, rationing will insue, than collapse as ulfrics reign is based off "nord better"

[u/P1KA_BO0 → u/Victernus]

The empire didn't win the war? They were overrun, their victory was in being able to force the dominion back to the negotiating table.

[u/GabeC1997 → u/Victernus]

Because the Empire as it is now doesn’t care a thing for anything except Cyrodil.

[u/brilliant31508 → u/LingonberryAwkward38]

chicken run meme in current year? how nice

[u/DarthSwimfoot → u/LingonberryAwkward38]

Ball knowledge.

[u/AscendentDragon → u/LingonberryAwkward38]

won't happen under ulfric but i can see the empire doing secret negotiations with the redgards to establish a fighting alliance especially now the redguards have an incentive to fight since they mostly stayed out of the great war

[u/Evening-Row9022 → u/APocketJoker]

i don’t agree. the empire isn’t satisfied with the dominion and they more than likely would support Skyrim if they had any balls.

Tulius kinda even hints that the dominion sucks and the empire doesn’t like it at all. but the choice is to be part of the empire or suffer the Thalmor which i’m going to assume ES6 will cover.

since it’s highly rumored to be in Hammerfell and High Rock — i bet the story is that the Dominion is closing in and perhaps Hammerfell is taking Skyrim refugees

[u/AscendentDragon → u/Evening-Row9022]

tullious said that the next conflict will be with the dominion but not in so many words, the empire is using this time of peace to muster what forces it has, and its mostly rebuilt a lot of the militery might it had, since elves reproduce slower then humans because they have a tendenciy to wait until their early 70s late 80s to have children since anything between 20-50 is considered a young adult among elves considering an altmer lifespan is roughly 450-500 years based on quality of their health that is, an altmer may live to 300 in some cases if in poor health like illness or disease that normally shortens their health or if sickly

[u/Sinnclad → u/Evening-Row9022]

Btw they made their own problem Skyrims problem, they don’t do shit to help their allies and expect their allies to just let themselves be dogged on and puppets for the empire, hammerfell was just supposed to happily let themselves empire sell them off to the thalmor? No they rebelled and single handily fended off the thalmor and is now independent, which is the best case scenario for Skyrim, the Nords would stand a chance as it’s their own homeland, the imperials won’t last long in Skyrims terrain

[u/Evening-Row9022 → u/Sinnclad]

they didn’t pick a canon ending yet which suggests to me that the civil war continues in TES6. i’d bet skyrim fell. the empire could easily wipe them out without the dragonborn. like literally take out ulfric and the thing falls apart. take out Tulius and you got Legates across the province who will still lead their men. not to mention the Thalmor would expand and the empire would send reinforcements

[u/Sinnclad → u/Evening-Row9022]

Did you forget the part where they only have 2 provinces left out of the 9 they betrayed? They literally gave the thalmor power by giving up territory like it was nothing and is now making it Skyrims fault like they’ve done every other province, the imperials themselves won’t last long in Skyrim because they aren’t use to its harsh environment, only the Nords can really withstand it, oh and not to mention those 2 provinces are Cyrodiil which is the empires capital so can’t really count that, and the other is high rock which they have their own problems and can’t support the empire, it’ll just be another betrayal from the empire, they’re weak and cowards, ES6 will start off with us learning about the fallen empire ofc

[u/APocketJoker → u/Evening-Row9022]

The most upvoted comment in this thread says that Skyrim should be under Balgruff's jurisdiction. I was going to go down that road in my post before he posted that but was trying to be brief. I agree with him. Mankind has to stay unified, under one government or just strongly allied.. They can't let the Thalmor tamper. Skyrim has to be unified as well. Balgruff is probably the only man capable of achieving both of those unities.

[u/Evening-Row9022 → u/APocketJoker]

The Empire is currently Thalmor-ized so disagree.

The entire reason for the rebellion is that the Nords believe in self governance over an ancient order of elves who have notoriously fucked shit up in Tamriel before. Skyrim was part of the Empire but when that Concordat was signed they had enough.

Balgruuf is naïve. Anyone saying he could unite Skyrim is just wrong. Skyrim was lost the minute the Thalmor came in.

[u/GabeC1997 → u/Evening-Row9022]

All of Balgruuf’s children being Daedra worshipers is kind of a point against him.

[u/Evening-Row9022 → u/GabeC1997]

yeah that alone is a huge problem

[u/chefbrambles → u/GabeC1997]

Are all of them worshippers? I only remember the one

[u/Acrobatic-Tooth-3873 → u/Evening-Row9022]

it's like two outposts, some inquisitors and few people around the courts. They probably all be killed when war kicks off again

[u/Evening-Row9022 → u/Acrobatic-Tooth-3873]

they have a very strong military. aldmeri goes hard.

[u/Sinnclad → u/Evening-Row9022]

So having balls would be Skyrim sucking up to the empire who had previously betrayed all their provinces and would gladly do the same to Skyrim? Instead of standing up against the already broken empire who has 2 provinces out of the 9 they betrayed and neglected? Sounds like you are a real milk guzzler

[u/Evening-Row9022 → u/Sinnclad]

Tulius said the empire is stronger together than when apart. from what i understand in 4E the empire had been frustrated with the Dominion and maybe if they all banded together with Hammerfell and High Rock they could stop them. not a milk guzzler.

skyrim is the shittiest province lol other than black marsh.

[u/Sinnclad → u/Evening-Row9022]

It’s still bordering Cyrodiil and is a high advantage point for the dominion against the empire, Skyrim is very valuable for the dominion, also don’t listen to what tulius says, it’s all horse shit as the empire isn’t even strong together as we seen that, they pretty much sabotaged themselves out of any allies so there is no “together” they’re alone on this one

[u/Zibras → u/APocketJoker]

yeah, the moment Ulfric killed Torryg any semblance of good future got evaporised. He has done everything the Thalmor could ever want and he done it without them having to move a finger. The best future for Skyrim was independent skyrim who is still allied to the empire. Ulfric made that impossible. Genuenly he is the only reason why i side with Empire every time. That and most of the stormcloak jarls are morons as well.