Why wouldn't the empire execute Ulfric first?

Never tought about that. It's really a freaking good question. Good point.

Some will way "No, they wanted to left ulfric to die last" but.. that doesn't make sense at all. He is the dangerous guy there. He can "Shout a nord to death". Just let loose this mouth and fus ro dah.

Whatever.. it's a good point, besides it's part of the lore! XD

because then you would have no option to join him later. but yes i wondered that as well.

I figured they were gonna leave him til last so they could gloat over him watching his men die... Tulius evidentlly has never read http://www.eviloverlord.com/lists/overlord.html

Wonderful. we know WHY alduin didn't kill you either Ulfric or Tullius. "What you will burn, what will you spare.."
He feeds on the souls in sovngarde, so keeping the war is delicious. (got it?)

But we don't know why tullius didn't kill the utter evil rebel menace first.

For the satisfaction of forcing him to watch his men get beheaded. They could have killed him first, in front of his men, but why would that have mattered? They were all going to die anyway. And he may be "dangerous" because he knows the Way of the Voice, but he was bound and gagged. He couldn't use his voice, and even if he could, he certainly couldn't have fought off all the Imperial soldiers surrounding him. Tullius was being cocky and forcing Ulfric to watch as his loyal soldiers died one by one in front of him.

Perhaps a better question is why did they even bother with the public execution farce. There was no trial, and Helgen is pretty far out of the way, so they didn't make a big production about hauling him off to Solitude or anything. They could have just as easily run through all the Stormcloaks during the ambush and then taken Ulfric's body to a major city to show as an example... Presumably though they wanted to have it some place public so word could spread about Ulfric's death, but they didn't want to risk a long journey where he could get free or be freed by other Stormcloaks.

As for why they didn't start with Ulfric, well the nameless Stormcloak who gets the axe before you sort of moved himself to the front of the line by interrupting the last rights and insisting he be killed right away. Then the Imperial Captain picked you to be killed next... I think she just has a hate on for the character for some reason. After all, you aren't on the execution list, though the horse thief was. But she said 'damn the rules, we're killing this one too anyway.'

Personally, she's the major reason I like to side with Ralof when you escape.. So you have a chance to cut her down and wear her armor around as a trophy...

She is a female dog, isn't she?

As for why Helgen, I gonna say they needed General Tullius's authority to kill a Jarl. (At least, one who has surrendered.) When entering Helgen, Ralof notes that General Tullius is there, so probably it was a rendezvous point.

As for why Tullius wasn't at the ambush, that's easy. In case the information about Ulfric was a ruse to lure Tullius to a spot where he might be captured instead. So they sent some lower-ranking officers to handle the skimish, then handed over the results to someone with enough rank to take the credit/bury the evidence of bungling.

I guess they were going to save him for last so that they can get that feeling of conquest, Alduin ruined that plan.

As to why Ulfric was executed in Helgan, my theory is the longer they keep him alive the greater the chance the Stormcloaks attack and free him.

Actually last seems most natural, he's the show stopper, head liner act, so to speak, it is a bit odd that tulius rants at him first though but maybe thats just for all those that would go before him would get to hear it.
The place seems odd to me, you'd think they'd have 2 choices, go do it in the empire, cyrodil and have the big show to calm the people and pacify those that would want to rebel, or do it quickly and quietly in a small town.
1st off helgen is a fairly large town, bigger then a few of the main cities prior destruction, even with a wall covering all sides and towers. Really why wasn't this the main city of the hold of Falkreath. Like they wanted a big active town to impress us and spent way to much time making characters that corpses don't even remain where they should be, then making it fit for purpose. Hard to believe not one person was outside the walls during the attack and no one in the main city cares about the loss of such a large "settlement".
2nd Falkreath is only questionably an imperial city, yes the war map markers are red for it but it was at some point near the start of the game the pro stormcloaks Jarl was tossed out, although the timeline frequently seems confused, the whole stormcloaks rebellion is fairly new, more or less the killing of the king was the real start but maybe he had be preparing for it in advance. But even then not the whole hold is pro imperial, seems like a risky place to choose to execute someone publicly.
3rd, this one bothers me massively, probally an effect of someone not properly plotting out the events timeline, but the general impression is Ulfric was fine, free to go anywhere even speak to the high king if he wanted to. He wasn't officially an enemy of the empire, maybe just spoke out against the banning of talos to that point and mad at them for thier massive betrayal. So he travels all the way west to Solitude, where he's allowed in and challenges the king to a duel before anyone realises what he's up to, even the imperial guards, including tulius whos there to try sort out the problems skyrim has and keep it's self in a favourable position, he kills the king and rides off, at this point the empire which Ulfric knew they would completely disregards nordic traditions, in fact probally relying on it to gain more favour of the nords, wants him dead so they can keep skyrim in control and protect thier money making ways and safehouses. Fleeing he either goes back to windhelm to get people/supplies and starts to head for the border for whatever next step, passes though Darkwater (east side of High Horthgar) and is ambushed and caught. Then the imperials decide to travel west all the way round HH and south to Helgen? why?
On top of the offscreen poorly timed events the intro itself can't even be in time, no soldier it's not up in the clouds it clearly just landed on the tower before you began to say that. And thats the intro, somewhere they would have started and wanted to keep impressive, yet it's done so sloppily it sets the bar for the rest of the game. It's not unusual to have a epic intro and the quality slips though the game as they rush for the release, maybe bit off more then they could handle. But to begin in such a manner...shocking.

My question is, why would eight prisoners being led to their execution, escorted by only four soldiers, and with only their hands bound, not try to escape? What, bad knees?

Meh! You start with the rabble and keep the best for the end or you could kill the "show".

Ulfric starts with "U"

the empire is a stickler for their lists.

What is odd is why did they try to execute you 2nd? Your name is so random so it could be first or last.

Nobody reads the list. They think nothing will happen to them.

Actually, Tullius is leading the parade on his horse - when you head into Helgen, the guard on the catwalk above tells him the headsman is ready. Then as the wagons turn left-ish into Helgen, Tullius goes to the right and stops by the Thalmor (who I *think* might be Elenwen.... not sure about that....)

So I think Tullius was leading the ambush....

Damn, good point.
In this case, I am going to have to go for: if they had not tried to execute Ulfric in Helgen, there would be no intro dungeon.

*laughing* Yep. That's about it.