I noticed some things about the filler NPCs in the Legion...

1: They're all imperial males (or Nord males for the town guards)

2: Few have shields.

3: Whar Legion Battlemages?

Point 1 seems kinda jarring. We're supposed to believe that the Legion is more egalitarian than the Stormcloaks, having the gamut of races and both sixes in the ranks. But the only time we see current or former female/non-Imperial Legionnaires are named characters; the field legates, Horik and Brina, Rikke, etc. Even the Stormcloaks seem more egalitarian, including women in the rank and file. Replacement town guards are all Nordic, though... but again, none are female.

Point 2 was something I noticed when doing a fort invasion in the civil war questline... None fo the Legionnaires charging the fort had shields. Heck, during the Winterhold fort breakout, all the freed legionnaires decided to forego their swords too!

Point 3... The last time you see Legion battlemages are the guys flinging firebolts at Alduin in the Helgen bedlam in the beginning of the game. After that, it succumbs to Point 1: The only time you see a Legion battlemage is a retired shell-shocked one: Madena, court mage in Dawnstar. You'd think it'd be an advantage over the Stormcloaks they'd press, with the egalitarianism extending to magic users in the ranks.

So where'd the Legion egalitarianism go? And why are the Legion smiths falling behind in their shield quotas?

#1: I have seen a few female town guards, but you're right.. the only females in the Imperial Legion are officials.
#2: I have absolutely no idea.
#3: Bethesda probably thinks magic is overpowered and didn't want the game to be too hard for people who side with Ulfric Stormcloak. Other than that, just plain laziness. Or both.

Greed... Note that the town guards that have women in the ranks... are Stormcloak towns.

Heh, never noticed that. That's weird.

Oh, and now that I think about it, weren't the battlemages at Helgen female? At least some of them were, I think.

1. For some strange reason, all new female recruits to the Imperial legion are being assigned to the Emporer's personal guard in Cyrodiil.

2. The smith in Solitude is working as fast as he can to make shields, but he is short on iron ingots because the nearest smelter is in Stonehills and some odd character called Dragonborn keeps using his anvil, preventing him from getting work done.

3. All Imperial Battlemages in Skyrim were killed at Helgen by a dragon. Replacements have not yet arrived from the Imperial City, the Elder Council assures us that contrary to General Tullius' assertions, they are not "stopping every 5 feet to pick flowers and catch butterflies".

Yeah, it would benefit from making some changes, espesially by adding battlemages.

"Legion...incomplete?"

Madcatz, pretty much like the rest of the game.

Also what is with the Random unkillable Legionarrie standing out in the middle of nowhere west of Whiterun?

I came to a realization... On a setup level, having all the town guards be Nords makes it easier to swap out voice files between the original and new town guards. On an immersion level, having the guards remain Nords makes it a bit easier on the more Stormcloak-minded citizens in a captured town.

But still, the question remains... "Where da wimmen at?"

Question... When the Stormcloaks take over town guard duties in a captured Imperial city, are some of them female?

I think the Reason for all three is beth being lazy...

Agreed. Especially the first one. I'm sure that Bethesda would have put in some female soldiers if they had more time to work on the game.

Laziness, pure and simple.

Time constraints

It would of been cool if the Legion had all those things. It would also make sense, but its not too big of a loss.

Had they decided against adding marriage (half-assedly at that), "revamping" the spell system, and implementing kill animations, there would have been plenty of time to refine what they already had.

Oh, there's a lot about this game that doesn't feel complete. Imperial troops lack women and battlemages. Dragons spend more time roasting mudcrabs in the wilderness than on major population centers, destroying only one worthless town. Alduin implicitly attacks said worthless town at the beginning to get you, and then afterward seems content to either ignore or let one of his flunkies deal with you. Pilgrims claim that you'll only find wolves up the 7000 Steps, yet you're more likely to run into saber cats, ice wraiths, and trolls. There are more Dunmer in Windhelm complaining about the complainers in their community than actually...complaining. And...there's probably a lot more.

But kill animations r important11!!

#4 civil war quests are boring once you enter in the "reunification of Skyrim" phase.

Regardless of which hold is controlled by the Empire/Stormcloacks this boils down to:

Minor quest (steal something, track and kill la courier, etc...)
Capture a fort, where capturing a fort consists in leading a few respawning allies against a lot of respawning enemies.

Repeat it 2-3 times

It would be REALLY nice if there was more variety in quests for the civil war. As in NOT the same thing over and over again, or two branches that are basically the same thing

It's because Bethesda wants to give modders some obvious projects.

I agree though. The portrayed legion is a shabby excuse for the might that the legion should represent. If not because of what it lacks, then because they don't explain any reasons in-game as to why it is so lacking.

My 2 cents, how I imagine it in my game:
The Imperial legions got seriously depleted recently fighting a war for survival against the Thalmor in Cyrodiil itself. I'd imagine it depleting much of it's equipment, resources and manpower in that struggle. It will take the Empire time and proper leadership to rebuild the Legions to their former glory. It's obviously harder to re-fulfill the requirements it has in more talented personnel like battlemages than it is to re-fulfill the requirements it has in common foot-folk.
Also, I would imagine the Empire keeping much of the best it has to offer at this time close to home. Since the piece with the Thalmor is pretty fragile. And since the Empire is crumbling, being more and more surrounded by former subjects who might not necessarily be friendly to it. The Imperial heartland should obviously be more important to them than Skyrim.

For all these questions I think the answer is simple: they didn't think about it, they couldn't be bothered are they like simplicity.

The opening segment was thought out, so they had battle mages there and the important characters were well balanced as well. We had females and characters of other races. Even the 'random farmers' seem to be different races, I've seen Redguards and Dunmers on their way to join the Legion.

It just seems that who ever designed the legionairs and other 'guard' NPCs didn't bother to make them more diverse. Perhaps they figured a clean image of how a guard is supposed to look is better than having them be diverse. By keeping it simple they can easily paint a picture of the two sides. However they aren't consistent as important NPCs are diverse. To me it also seems weird that all the guards are the same almost faceless, characterless, soulless objects. It would definatly have been better if the Legion had more races in it. Orcs in particulary should be more prominant but there could also be a Khajiit and a Dunmer from time to time. And on the Stormcloak side it would be weird to have Elves, but there could be Imperials, Bretons and Redguards in their rank. Just humans who feel they must fight against the Thalmor.

I have similar views on the lore-reasons as you. I still think they should have included a legate or other officer that was a battlemage that played an important role in the quest-line.

Strangely, you can meet dunmer and redguard farmers on their way to join the Stormcloaks or Legion, yet neither group has any non-nord/imperial members. What happens to them...? *cue X-Files theme*