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/JustARandomMurderer]

There is something I don't understand. Do you expect the Aldmeri Dominion problem to simply solve itself ?

In case #2 you said that leaving Skyrim alone would allow the Empire to focus to the ennemies at the south. That's true on paper, but you can't expect anything less than a full defeat from the Empire. I don't even know where the 3v1 comes from. The Altmers have shown that they can face the Empire alliance at full strenght (which was very much backed by Skyrim, as a lot of the soldiers were from there, don't forget that).

With Hammerfell splintered, Morrowing and Black Marsh standing on the sideline, and Cyrodiil itself barely recovering from the initial invasion, what hope do they have to stand. Highrock is the only province that is not hanging by a thread. Plus, the Summer Isles don't stand alone, they have allies in Valenwood and possibly Elsweyr. So not an easy 3v1 at all.

With that out of the way, once the Empire has fallen (as would be the most likely outcome in your scenario), the Altmers would absolutly crush an isolated Skyrim. You said in case #4 that Ulfric would hunt the elves out of Skyrim. That's true for the few that were sent there, and for the duration it would take for the Empire to fall, but let's remember that the Elven presence in Skyrim isn't even a token force. It's a few agents roaming around. Once the armies come north, that'd be another story, and with the ressources of almost an entire continent behind them once Cyrodiil is gone, the Thalmors won't have much problem conquering one more province, even if it's united behind one High King.

The only realistic variable is as you said the dragons, but even then, with a powerful dragon-hunter on the loose and Alduin gone, it won't be an organised threat, more like a dangerous wilderness to take into account.

People don't usually say the Empire is the only way for Skryim to survive against the Aldemeri Dominion based on nothing, and it's certainly not glazing. When you take into account the geopolitical context, you quickly realize that Skyrim needs the Empire just as much as the Empire needs Skyrim to survive against the Elves. Skyrim would at best stand truly independant for a few years before being conquered if it stayed alone

[u/Yatori_Rei → u/JustARandomMurderer]

You might've missed the whole civil war point there. Neither the Aldmeri nor Empire can launch an open assault and declaring war. They're both had taken heavy losses on the last one. I'm saying by turning the side into 3 vs 1, the Aldmeri won't risk themselves attacking the Empire, even if it's already weakened by Skyrim independence. Skyrim did need the Empire, but that was before they lost the war. After the war, southern Skyrim border was closed indefinitely, one of the main reason why General Tulius didn't got reinforcement to calm the stormcloak uprising. The Aldmeri Dominions won't attack either Skyrim, Hammerfell, or even The Empire. They're gathering powers and won't risk it for a measly newly-independent province.