Apparently, the Stormcloaks and City Guards wear exactly the same armour, or almost exactly the same anyway. So how will we differentiate between them?

IMO this is simply a matter of colour. My opinion, however, is based on the assumption that Riften is controlled by the Stormcloaks. http://images.wikia.com/elderscrolls/images/3/38/Riften_Guard.png picture shows a Riften Guard and http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Whiterun_Guard picture shows a guard from Whiterun. The Riften Guard has blue cloth on his armour while the Guard from Whiterun has yellow cloth. Whiterun is known to be a neutral city and blue is known to be the colour of the Stormcloaks.

If what I think is correct, then the Markarth Incident should be truly a Stormcloak thing, because I read that the perpetrators were wearing blue.

I haven't started main quest at all. I mean looking at it or anything.

Well, the leader of the Stormcloaks is Jarl Ulfric, and I believe he is the leader of an entire Hold (Windhelm - idk correct me if I'm wrong). Each hold has its own coat of arms, and each coat has its own color scheme. I believe that the cloaks worn by the guards are color-oriented to their specific Hold's Coat of Arms. Stormcloaks are blue, Whiterun is orange, etc...

Edit: Also I believe the Riften guard is actually wearing Purple, and the Whiterun is wearing Orange... might be wrong, but I'm pretty sure.

Really sorry about the mix-up. I was going off of what I remembered and I instantly thought blue = stormcloak. Now we'll all have to wait to see who those bad Nords were.

Hmm, maybe, but that might also be due to the warm lighting from the torch.


I'm under the impression that blue = stormcloak myself. All the stormcloaks in the beginning dungen wore armour with blue cloth.

Okay, so upon seeing the guards in Markarth again, I can 100% verify that they are Stormcloaks. Their names are 'Stormcloak soldier'. That means I'm not crazy and the Forsworn incident in Markarth IS instead something the Stormcloaks did!

I don't think its due to the lighting. In this recent footage it shows 2 guards of another Hold wearing green cloaks: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=fn0N294NFy0. Also, the guards at Solitude have Red cloaks. This may be because the legion is there, but most likely because it is the primary color of the Coat of Arms. I highly doubt the Jarls that want to play neutral all decided to wear Orange instead of Red or Blue. Pretty sure each hold has its own primary color that its guards wear. Red = Solitude, Blue = Windhelm (or whichever is Ulfric's Hold), Orange = Whiterun, Purple = Riften, Green = ?, etc..

Great, that's a confirmation on this so there should be no confusion now. Thanks.


True, and I guess my theory about Riften and Windhelm guards is wrong then. However, it does seem that all Stormcloaks wear blue, so it should still be the main thing that separates them from the normal Guards, despite them looking so similar.

For sure! That was what I was trying to point out, lol. An interesting thing that may happen within the civil war is the ability to gain allies (other Jarls and their respective Holds) to your faction. If that is the case, knowing which colors are allies will become necessary. This is just a guess, no confirmation that its in, but I'd love to see it.

Oh, sorry I didn't get your point earlier. As for the conquering/allied holds thing, I actually never thought of that myself, it would be a nice touch if they added it in.