The devs are cunning.They shaped the landscape in such a way that Winterhold barely has any space for new buildings. It's a great excuse, isn't it?

Falkreath, Morthal, Dawnstar, and Winterhold are all terrible excuses for "cities". They all feel exactly the same, because they all use the same building models, and there is no real unique characteristics to any of those 4 cities. I guess winterhold has the college, but i consider that separate (and i yeah i know most of the city of winterhold fell into the ocean, how convenient). It was super disappointing when i first discovered these "cities". They definitely should not be hold capitals. Oblivions cities were 10 times better, and that game is like 6 years old now.

I tend to think that the story behind Winterhold was just an excuse to minimize the work on the town. The story is one that has a lot of potential, but when I look at what is actually in the game, there's nothing.

An old and powerful city like Winterhold, devestated by a disaster with most of the city falling off into the ocean...

Oh the things they could have done with that story...

The environment they could have crafted...

Instead, there is absolutely no evidence of the old city. No ruins at the top of the cliffs or at the base. There's no remnants of the collapsing walls that should have surrounded a city of it's importance. There's no remnants of the old houses that once made up the city. No, instead it uses the same stock architecture found in every other minor hold and village. And it uses the same stock ruined houses found elsewhere.

The entire city didn't fall off. Only most of it. There should be some evidence of it somewhere other than the college.

Only 25? Looking at the middle-age-esque conditions and obvious lack of hygene that is actually a miracle.

What about Morthal? Even Dawnstar? Those too are very small but they have their own holds. The only way to justify that it shouldn't have its own hold is to add a larger city in the area, which may not fit well into the game(since you would have to make room for it). I think its fine the way it is. Sure, its capital is small, and there's not much to do, but we can't expect every area to contend with Solitude or Riften.

Yes but it IS called Falkreath Hold in the game, which doesn't make a lot of sense if the capital is Helgen, which he suggested

Uh this is pretty silly. And yeah it would be nice if Falkreath and villages like Morthal were as big and unique as Whiterun but would you rather just not have them exist?

It even says in the impereal hand book that 5 of the holds are nothing more than villages. That's just fine with me I mean look at some of our state capitals, some are pretty small.

Falkreath is my favorite village BTW, reminds me of home.

Uh this is pretty silly. And yeah it would be nice if Falkreath and villages like Morthal were as big and unique as Whiterun but would you rather just not have them exist?

It even says in the impereal hand book that 5 of the holds are nothing more than villages. That's just fine with me I mean look at some of our state capitals, some are pretty small.

Falkreath is my favorite village BTW, reminds me of home.

Uh this is pretty silly. And yeah it would be nice if Falkreath and villages like Morthal were as big and unique as Whiterun but would you rather just not have them exist?

It even says in the impereal hand book that 5 of the holds are nothing more than villages. That's just fine with me I mean look at some of our state capitals, some are pretty small.

Falkreath is my favorite village BTW, reminds me of home.

Wheres the poll? Its no smaller than Dawnstar or Winterhold or Morthal.

any city in skyrim barely deserves to be called a hold. seriously, how many people live in solitude?

Why is everyone forgetting Morthal? :'(

But cities aren't holds....

That should tell you something about Morthal.

THIS!
All of the towns and cities sizes and populations are a joke.

I don't get why Solitude is the capital of Skyrim. It's smaller than Windhelm AND it was built by imperials. Wtf?????? Windhelm is actually a nord built city.
And yes, Falkreath is pretty much just a town. Every city in Skyrim is a town, the major ones are walled towns. Whiterun is a town, Markarth is a town.

I don't see why it's Falkreath hold when Helgen seems like it was the larger city, and actually had a wall surrounding it like the major cities (still kind of does). It's almost as though everybody already knew Helgen would be destroyed, which is true from a developer standpoint, I suppose, but not from an in-game viewpoint.

Also, I was counting the NPC's in the imperial city in Oblivion by looking at UESP and I lost count at around 80 npc's. I remember people saying "lol there are only like 20 people in the imperial city". Well 80+ npc's in the imperial city is more than npc's in all cities in skyrim combined.

Well, the College of Winterhold is right there! So what if the dragons' aim is slightly off?

The Imperial City has almost 6 sections.

It is larger than any city in Skyrim AND any city in Oblivion.

You cannot compare the IC to ANY OTHER CITY EVER.

So please, do not use it as a reference to how a city "should be". A true city in Skyrim should match any city (besides the IC) in Oblivion.

*granted* If we want to measure a city's legit status based on count of NPCs and buildings.

IF we want to do that. Bethesda may have thought that these cities were here based on LORE, not on what one player believed what constitutes a "city".