It Took Me 12 Years To Realise The Forsworn Are Utterly Absurd...

the thing is, unlike Novigrad, we have to imagine skyrim cities as 10/100 times bigger than they actually are or nothing makes sense

I will give the Forsworn one thing and that is they are the only bandit faction in any Bethesda game that is even vaguely threatening.

They did conquer Markarth, and even requested to be a province of the empire, but were destroyed by Ulfric. The problem is that they aren't united. They're just a bunch of disjointed clans. It's why the last time someone was able to get them united, they were able to comquer Markarth, and earlier in time, the Longhouse Emperor even held the Cyridilic throne for a time.

There is a theory that the Forsworn are not actually one faction. They're a collection of separate tribes. At least 2. One ruled by Madanach and one ruled by the Matriarch (suspected to be a hagraven) and who knows how many others. That explains why only the Forsworn at one camp are friendly after helping Madanach and why they can't coordinate a large enough force to take over Markarth. Maybe they were united at one time (during the Forsworn Uprising) but later became fractured. It is much easier to defend than to attack, especially if the defending force is better equipped and prepared. The real life guideline for attacking is that you want to have at least 3 times the strength of the enemy. That of course can change depending on other factors. Therefore it's not that farfetched that the Forsworn would not be able to take Markarth. They're not coordinated enough and in order to take a well-defended city with large stone walls they would need a MUCH stronger force.

They did take over Markarth once. Then Ulfric brought over the Stormcloaks and whooped their asses. For details read The Bear of Markarth. If they rebelled again The Imperial Legion who is currently fighting Ulfric would send whatever troops they can and crush them just as easily as Ulfric did. Even while in decline the Empire and the Legion are more than formidable enough to defeat the Forsworn.

That's the thing. You spawned the Foresworn into the city. Markarth is meant to be a giant, natural fortress which is near impossible to crack and enter in the first place. Even once inside, the place is a mass of high vantage points from which arrows and spells can be rained down on any force brave enough or dumb enough to enter. The Silver Bloods, who all but run the city, have a mass of wealth with which they can use to call in help both from the forces within the city and from those outside of it. The city is built upon the lucrative silver mine at its heart after all. While no, The Silver Bloods cannot hire a large enough force to wipe them out, I have no trouble believing that they could actually hold the city if the Foresworn made a concentrated attempt to invade.

You could argue the same about dragons just put two legendary dragons into any city hold and watch them demolish every person they encounter

I think the Forsworn in game strength is more of a game machinic rather than lore to keep the game "challenging" for players, since they will always be bad guys. It comes down to that age all debate of game machinic vs game lore. And though Skyrim has some really great lore, it is not all perfect.

The forsworn aren’t a unified group. They have a similar cause, but are independent tribes. So it makes sense they still attack u after freeing madanach. Many would also find it offensive that he calls himself king.“anyone can be a king in the Reach, but no one is King of the Reach.”

Most cities in Skyrim aren't as big as Bethesda wanted them to be, they are small, limited by the technology of their time.. Im sure this plays a part. If we had Skyrim come out today, we may have had a much tougher and larger markarth with many more soldiers that could repel any attack from forsworn

The Forsworn honestly deserve their own DLC.

You expect consistency from the people who decided that Delphine deserves to be essential to this world? Anyway, if I were to think about this, them not taking over Markarth might just be that the Forsworn lack the ability to put together siege engines. If the Markarth guard were to see Forsworn approaching in huge numbers, they'll probably just lock the gates and wait them out, since the Forsworn don't have the engineering skill to make tall and sturdy enough ladders, let alone huge battering rams, siege towers, or catapults.

Cities and guards in those cities are more representative than literal. Game designers don't typically go out of their way to make sure that a city is realistically big enough to be an actual city or even big enough to house every npc who lives there. Just look at any city in pokemon fire red/leaf green. They look tiny if you can see the whole city at once, but you don't need to be any bigger because in game your screen is restricted to a small area. Likewise sure there are less guards at any given time in markarth than all forsworn, but you're not supposed to know how many guards there are. That's why they respawn. They're dense enough to feel their presence but not so dense the city feels crowded.

If you think about it, the Forsworn are actually the lords of the Reach. They have bases all around the area, including frontiers with other holds, their relegion includes human sacrifices and daedric worship, unpopular with empire/stormcloacks laws. With Markarth under "civilized" influence, they have a constant supply chain of sofisticated goods from traders on the roads, outside city walls they're free to worship whoever they want, don't have to pay imperial taxes, don't abide to imperial/nord laws, etc. while populating the whole Reach. They have a good deal there.

So after 12 years you realised the forsworn are just ancient scots lol I mean there was no king of scotland until they needed to unite the clans against longshanks. But in general, each clan is independent, different alliances. Glencoe massacre, the red wedding in game of thrones is based on that event with the Campbell clan and clan MacDonald. Betrayal of the highest order.

I think the hagravens are actually people but with some ritual performed on them to turn them this way. Likely Hircine is involved similar to how werewolves and werebears are created from his influence. You need special hagraven heads to undo lycanthropy in the Companions questline, further hinting to this association. Illia also explains that her mother is trying to become a hagraven and needs a human sacrifice to do so. There is a friendly hagraven named Melka who gives you a quest to stop her sister. Melka is fairly intelligible when you speak to her, so it follows that they can all probably communicate when they want to. I think some hagravens are allied with the Foresworn and may even be members of the Foresworn, but not all are. Similar to how some werewolves are part of the Companions but you can still find other, unaffiliated ones in the world like Sinding.

tbh in skyrim forsworn live like cultist bandits BUT if anyone play elder scrolls online and know the Reachman storyline its add so much to the lore , for me that was so enlightening to understand the roots of their "culture".

While I completely agree with the point you can't use ingame npc counts as the lore amount (There would be more that 1000 people in markath in real life not 50 people)

Honestly the prison mission disappointed me. I thought I was gonna get to be a forsworn but nope the first camp I go out is the same as always, really annoyed me at the time. (Edit) Yeah I agree with all the comments to a point, but the main one is skyrim feels shallow. And I feel like it's always been that way with Bethesda, continueing to dumb down games for a long time now. I'm getting fallout new Vegas this weekend so if anyone has some tips lmk

I think the strength of the Forsworn shows that they could take Markarth… but are wary of doing so since it would be a hard battle and outside forces could come to unseat them again. Better to quietly rule the other 90% of the reach and see if a chance for a more permanent victory presents itself.