For my current character I decided to make an Altmer Crusader. I was going through the intro and it hit me, that nasty Captain that just says "whatever, kill 'em anyways" totally could have just started a second great war. We can assume that they knew I wasn't with the Thalmor Embassy, but how do they know I wasn't Thalmor? I could have been just arriving in Skyrim and on my way to Solitude to report to the embassy, and one [censored]y imperial captain just says "[censored] it," and sends me to my death with no proof of any crime. We know that the imperials and Thalmor aren't buddy-buddy, but we also know that the Imperials can't afford to piss the Thalmor off cause they know they will get their asses handed to them again. I know that's just supposed to be her character, and it works with the other races alright. Nobody in Skyrim would care if some Argonian or Bosmer were put to death, if it were a Nord it could be assumed that they were Stormcloak, and the Imperials would probably know if they were executing one of their own agents. But with an Altmer, you are running a serious risk of pissing off the big-wigs in Alinor and causing another war, just because one [censored] didn't feel like taking the time to check up on an unidentified prisoner.

Not likely, considering that the Thalmor Ambassador herself is at Helgen. If you were a Thalmor agent they would have demanded your release right away.

wouldn't that be the coolest thing ever, multiple starting events if you pick different races OR a different starting option!!!

damn you Bethesda Y U NO DO LIKE DRAGON AGE !!!

lol Because Bioware is Bethesda's arch-nemesis?

I think it would be cool if you got to go up to the captain who just sentenced you to death for no good reason, then bite her ear off.

Does that make me a Bad Person?

I would have like different beginnings based off of races and gender. This is what they could be

Imperial: Enlisted into Imperial army and sent to solitude (You have the option to escape and join the SC)

Nords: Execution from the vanilla game

Altmer: Thalmor ambassador takes you from custody and drops you off at the embassy, where you receive gold, armor, weapons ect

Breton: Forsworn decided to raid farther out of their territory due to lack of supplies. They see you and realize your a fellow breton. They take you back to one of their forts and gives you supplies

Khajiit: Your part of nomadic Khajiit merchants, so you don't get captured.

Bosmer: Sames as the Altmer

Argonian: You just use your sneaky skills to run away.

If you were Argonian, I think that you could be a dock worker, or better yet a sailor who just arrived on a ship.

And an orc could have come from any one of those orc camps, maybe he gets exiled, but is given supplies.

A Dunmer would have just come from Morrowind, of course.

It's my opintion that all Altmer should be put to death anyways

Why?

Who? Elenwen? She wasn't at Helgen.

Was she?

Edit: Nevermind. Apparently she is. Wow. Never knew that.

Now I wonder what specifically she was doing there and how she escaped.

Warning: Actual spoilers.

Don't forget Poland the Dunmer.
I like your ideas but the one with the Forsworn going up all the way to Helgen (deep in the mountains) to raid and then decide to attack a heavily fortified Imperial position with both Imperial and Thalmor big wigs present, just to rescue some random Breton (who may actually be an Imperial... he's pretty far away ) is far fetched lore-wise.

Agreed.

Actually, The Empire technically won the Great War. They destroyed the Altmer military presence in Cyrodill and left the commander of the Altmer army rotting on the White-Gold Tower. The treaty was just a way of making peace between the two. Honestly they should have finished them off. Elves cant reproduce nearly as fast as humans as they have 1000 year lifespans and can only have 1 or 2 children at the most.

And that, my friends, is why I always follow Ralof into the keep no matter what my plans for later are. The first person I get to kill is her.

Makes perfect sense really. I figured she was most likely there to attempt to get Ulfrics execution stalled or halted, but I was pondering how she was going to do that. Demanding that Tulius hand him over on the basis of the Talos ban seems like logically what was going on.

It also does beg the question if she might have aided Ulfrics escape.


Techinally it was a stalemate. While the Empire managed to keep hold of Cyrodiil, I don't think you can call the loss of a province, the utter and complete sacking of your Capital, and the capture or sack of just about every city in your home province aside from Bruma to be a victory. If it is, its an extremely Pyrrhic one.

Likewise, while the Elven army in Cyrodiil was destroyed, no destruction whatsoever was visited on Dominion lands.

I can't take credit for the idea about Elenwen trying to get Ulfric turned over to Thalmor custody, someone else - most likely Celan or Cecliff or someone else who I'm forgetting, if so please forgive me - mentioned it first. But it does make sense. And just think about what it would do to the situation in Skyrim if the Legion handed Ulfric to the Thalmor and he escaped - again (since it seems clear from the dossier that everyone excluding the Thalmor believes he did it once already during the GW). Much better than a dead martyr IMO. The leader of the movement is alive and well, has escaped from the clutches of the hated Dominion a second time, and the Imperials... well, it's gonna be common knowledge that they gave him to the Thalmor, which is probably the only thing likely to inspire more hatred than killing him outright.

As far as aiding his escape, absolutely I can see her and the other Thalmor doing whatever they can to distract Tullius and his men from preventing it, altho I think Alduin did a pretty good job of that already. But perhaps insisting on soldiers for protection on the journey back to Solitude, that sort of thing... to delay or undercut any attempt at pursuit once the smoke cleared. I can totally see that. But I think anything they did would have to be very subtle and certainly it could not be an overt attempt to aid his escape, not one that either Tullius or Ulfric would recognize as such or that would require Ulfric to knowingly accept their assistance. I don't see him allowing some Thalmor agent to guide him and his soldiers out of the city, that's just ludicrous IMO.

I can as well. Obviously Ulfric wouldn't have accepted their help outright and the Legion would have noticed a Thalmor Justiciar escorting Ulfric, but the idea of Elenwen working subtly to get Ulfric out of there seems completely plausible.

Sadly, I agree with you... Since I've never met a nice Altmer, while in Skyrim.

There are some who will warm up to you after a while, altho they can be pretty crusty at first and never entirely lose the haughty demeanor. I'm rather fond of Calcemo, the court wizard in Markarth, especially after doing the Mara quest that includes him. But I'm partial to crusty old codgers who are just big softies at heart. Niranye, the merchant in Windhelm, also seems pretty decent.

This, I like this idea.

i dont what if your trying to rp an altmer that considers the thalmor a disgrace to the altmer people altho i suppose one could explain it away as mistaken identity but i always go with ralof so i can share a few words with captain pms.

some thing like that

The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, having all the races available to choose anyway, is a game that was designed to be played as a Nord, as that's the race that is more logical to be the Dragonborn. Like Morrowind, despite having again all the races, it was a game designed for the player to be a Dunmer, as it was more logical (not wrong). So Skyrim's intro was designed to have a dragon attacking, regardless of the race or how the war is going on. And sadly there will never be an other option for the intro, because it has to do with the return of the dragons. Skyrim is not a game about political matters, war, even if those elements are there, it's about how to discover a way to definetly defeat Alduin, the dragon god that will destroy the world. Maybe if this game was set in an other more civilized province like Summerset, it would have been a game more focused on war, conspiracies, political matters and stuff, but it's not.

I agree with you, OP. I just started a new character, a young female Redguard, and the fact that I get treated like that in Helgen doesn't help me building up a nice story behind her. Why? Again, because this game is set in Skyrim, thus being more logical for the main character to be a brute Nord, like the 'Dovahkiin preset'. What if I wanted my character to be a simple adventurer or explorer that just got in Skyrim to visit it, dig the culture, meet new people? I can't, because the game forces you be brute, even if not a Nord, but again, you are forced to deal with a great menace and stuff.

I find this very frustrating as every single character you make is always nothing more than a criminal, rubbish that got caught in a group of rebels which maybe my main character's custom backstory doesn't include that. But I am forced to include that in my backstory, because that's what actually happens.