The civil war quest are so terribly done, that if you are only looking for a enjoiable playtrough, just do the peace treaty quest, and never get involved with either side.

I've seen good discussions on the question on which side is the best choice in practical terms (i.e. which side would give the Thalmor the most headaches?).

But if the OP is asking which side is the "ethical" choice: clearly the stormcloaks. They fight 1. against religious persecution; 2. for the right to selfdetermination. Both are (in these times) generally accepted as legitimate and just causes.

The charge that they are racist is generally based on the impression created by an incident on entering Windhelm, which is unrepresentative of the Stormcloak cause or the political opinions of Ulfric.

I think it depends on what your playing as, if your character supports the Thalmor then go with the StormCloaks.

If you despise the Thalmor or are pro empire side with the Empire.

I think you may have mixed up factions there. The empire is the one aiding in allowing the thalmor free intel and subterfuge(Their main strength). You'll not see a single thalmor in Stormcloak territory

no offense to anybody, but i didnt even bother reading the posts, this question is pointless because their is no correct answer, again and again i have said this and still people argue to the point of comparing ulfric to hitler and the imperials to batch lapdogs.....

please dont bother askign this age-old question again

fisher

I think he's working under the common misconception that Ulfric Stormcloak is a secret Thalmor agent; but this simply isn't the case. It comes from misinterpreting the Thalmor dossier on him.

Maybe a little bit: England and Northern Ireland are Protestant and Ireland proper is Catholic, but, yeah, it wasn't a Holy War outright. That's actually a good anology because while England doesn't ban Catholic churches in N Ireland (at least I'm pretty sure they don't :\ ) just like it doesn't seem that the Empire is enforcing the ban on Talos.

You say that but the empire allows the Thalmor to arrest anyone caught worshipping Talos so it amounts to the same thing as banning it.

I don't want to get into a 'whole thing' here, but according to the map in the Jarl's chamber in Whiterun, Whiterun is in Imperial territory and there's a Talos shrine with a shouting priest in the middle of town. I'm not siding with the Empire necessarily just saying that the Empire could be more heavy-handed about the ban if they wanted to.

The Empire are a bunch of pathetic, weak and useless milk-drinkers who cannot do anything right. There is only one way the Empire can live and grow strong -- with a Dragonborn emperor sitting on the throne!
Since the last one was killed 200 years ago the Empire has crumbled and will continue to crumble until the next Dragonborn conquers Cyrodiil and adds more provinces to the Empire.

I think you'll find that many don't. However, the Empire isn't a Republic. Their rule isn't legitimized by consent of the governed. Theirs is a more feudal social contract, where you get safety in exchange for accepting their laws. Well, when the Empire's laws became intolerable (outlawing the worship of Talos), and the safety of their subjects was no longer assured (witness unchecked Thalmor kidnappings and witch-hunts in Skyrim), then the whole justification for putting up with them falls into pieces.

The Empire is weak. Too weak to defend their people, and a King who doesn't defend his people is no King at all.

Whiterun is only technically imperial territory. The imperials dont run things there and the Jarl wont even let them station their soldiers there.

No one, and everyone. Intentionally so:
The Stormcloaks are religiously oppressed racists.
The Imperials are an invading law-abiding morally correct folk (except the captain in Helgen, but she gets her quick enough).
The Foresworn are left over rebels, but there heritage is one of invaders.
The Falmer are the true residents of Skyrim, and property-wise have claim, but they have turned feral and become blind cannibals.

The Thalmor are the only true bad guys as they are immoral, racist, invaders, encompassing all the bad traits of the other groups.

So who is more morally upright? It depends on whether you hold morality above freedom, or not. It depends on how much weight you give to property rights over the rights of people to be free in their person.

Looking back on it I would say the Stormcloaks. I think the land of the Nords should be able to be ruled by Nords. That was the impression I got from the Stormcloaks; that they wanted Nords ruling Skyrim.

My very first playthrough I was going to join the Imperials. Then I happened to visit Ulfric and I heard his speech about.."I fight for.." when speaking to his right hand man. Honestly this made me want to join the Stormcloaks. Maybe I was blinded by Ulfric's passion for his people but it seemed like the right decision.

Of course, there's the irony.

The Empire isn't invading Skyrim because the majority of its soldiers are Nords themselves.

The Imperial army is from Cyrodil. The country is ruled from outside it's borders, with a figure-head of a king in place. The fact that Nords joined the Legion is irrelevent. There were Iraqis on our side too, it didn't make us any less an invader....

At the time of the writing of my post I did not think about the Protestant vs Catholic tensions in the UK to be honest, but now that you mention it does fit to a certian extent.

It's possible, but there are some of us who think that the Stormcloaks are doing what the Thalmor want them to without taking any orders from the Thalmor. I can only speak for myself, but I think that something akin to the rebellion was what the Thalmor hoped for when they dictated the terms of the peace treay. If the citizens and separatists of the Empire keep killing each other, it leaves less for the Dominion to handle. If I put it this way, let's pretend that there is no recovery after the Great War past the point we are at, and let's simplify it. So we say that the Empire has 10 000 soldiers ready, and the Dominion has 10 000. Then along comes Ulfric, and 5000 of the Imperial troops join the Stormcloaks instead.

Then we have 10 000 Dominion soldiers, 5000 Imperial ones and 5000 stormcloaks. Then we have the civil war itself, and there could be several outcomes but we keep things simple for now, so 4 different endings to the war.
A ) Stormcloaks win a great victory. The Stormcloaks manage to gain independence for Skyrim and has 4000 soldiers left. The Empire only has 1000.
B ) A stalemate is reached, but the Empire agrees to let Skyrim go. Both the Empire and the Stormcloaks have 2500 remaining soldiers each.
C ) Same as B, just that the Stormcloaks concede to defeat. Same number of soldiers, but the Stormcloaks join the Imperial army, Empire ends up with 5000 soldiers.
D ) Empire wins a great victory. Imperials have 4000 soldiers left, plus 1000 surviving Stormcloaks who join the Empire, = 5000 troops.

So, with the Civil War being over, lets look at the odds for the Dominion after all the scenarios.
After outcome A - Dominion has 10 000 soldiers, they now have 2 enemies they can attack separately, independent Skyrim with 4000 soldiers or the Empire with 1000 ready soldiers. 10 000 vs 4000 or 10 000 vs 1000
After outcome B - Dominion has 10 000 soldiers, 2 enemies they can attack separately, Skyrim with 2500 soldiers and the Empire with 2500 soldiers. 10 000 vs 2500 in each war.
After outcome C - Dominion has 10 000 soldiers, only one enemy for the Thalmor, the Empire, fielding 5000 troops. 10 000 vs 5000
After outcome D - Dominion has 10 000 soldiers, Empire has 5000. 10 000 vs 5000

This is oversimplifying things to the extreme, and all the numbers are purely made up, but I figured it was for the best so that everyone could understand it with ease, and it was just to demonstrate how the civil war may benefit the Thalmor.

Who was in the right is up to my whims.

Lol @ trying to find some objective moral highground about it.

Why do you give the thalmor such exorbitant numbers? Elves don't breed very often(And even when they do, they're lucky if they get 2 offspring at most. 4 is the most any has ever recorded). They're going to have a good deal fewer than the empire at the start of the civil war.

It's war. No one is ever right.

No, the Imperial Army is made up almost entirely of Nords. It's something that was confirmed. Only General Tullius is from Cyrodill.

I thought that was a cool thing.

OF COURSE an Empire is going to have its provinces guarded by homelanders.

Edit:

I think the Aldermari dominion's big advantage isn't numbers but the fact it was mobilized for war and has a disproportionate number of magic-users amongst its ranks. It fits the Nazi parallels that the reason they roll over the Empire isn't necessarily because they have inexhaustible reserves but just have better weaponry and are prepped for war - unlike the Empire which seems to have been utterly not.

From what I read in the Thalmor Embassy, it seems like Imperials are right. Or, at the least, it kind of seems like Ulfric is a Thalmor tool.

As said, simplicity. If they are equal at the beginning then the change is clearer. The scenario was there to demonstrate the point of a civil war helping the Thalmor to some extent, not to be realistic. I planned to make it comprehensible for everyone. Just by bringing in different types of soldiers into the scenario we can shift the odds greatly. Like one side having only battlemages and the other peasant levies (without spells, I mean).

To be fair, the Thalmor are being arrogant jackasses about it. It's not that Ulfric is controlled by them, it's that they know which buttons to push to get him to do stuff. In this case, they rilled him up so much they started the civil War.

Whether he's intentionally helping them or not, its still obvious that the Thalmor think he's serving their purposes. All though, if I remember his dossier correctly, I don't think they actually intended him to start a full-fledged Civil War.

Or maybe they didn't want him to win.