Board Thread:Questions and Answers/@comment-110.33.239.213-20121226023324/@comment-5367080-20130929220047

Fimber wrote:

Multiple quoting is impossible here unless when using a dozen new windows for each respons to a quote, so I'll "quote" your comments in bold letters.

'''There was time enough to summon some or at least one of the allies because they didn't go to war only from one day to the next. And since nobody knows how long a war will last, the allies could have arrived even later in order to support what's left of Camelot. If Camelot wanted to fight the battle alone for whatever reason, the show could at least have Arthur ask for support on Camelot's borders in case that the Saxons brak through and attack the kingdom. Alas, there wasn't even the mention of an ally. I would say that the show simply completely overlooked this.'''

That is probably true, but theres numerous reasons they might not have, for one there is a fair chance they would not arrive in time and would only be able to help clear out the Saxons, which could have been feasible as we don't really see any of the Knights of Camelot in the area, so it's possible there were others with them. Also, Arthur might have chosen not to call in his allies as it would have taken to long and possibly put his allies as well as himself at risk, let's not forget Arthur's habit of putting others before himself.

Although I must admit the likely choice is as you said, that the producers simply ignored the allies for the sake of a good story. Personally I feel they should have had the allies there, but have Morgana's magical allies giving her the overwhelming advantage.

'''Wasn't Olaf an ally of Camelot? He was one of the leaders of the Five Kingdoms and signed the peace treaty when Uther united the Five Kingdoms. I'm not sure if he was also an ally... I mean, the Five Kingdoms uunited would indicate that they're also allied.'''

'''If he wasnt (and even if he was), I can't see a reason why any king would want to invest in a kingdom that is so weakened that it is an easy target. Conquering it would be much more attractive for any king, not only those who were Camelot's enemies anway. Gwen would have a hard time defending the weakened Camelot against those who seek to conquer it. Camelot's allies would have to think twice if it was worth it to defend a kingdom that can't defend itself anymore and that has lost its king.'''

The Peace Treaty serves only that purpose, peace. It was organised to stop war between the Five Kingdoms, to unite them under the idea of peace, not too unite them under one banner. What you have to remember is that, in Uther's time, Albion was always on the threat of war, this Peace Treaty was designed to deal with that.

And as for why invest in a weak kingdom, I shall refer to an example from real life history. In Russia between 1892 and 1903, Sergei Witte, the economic minister at the time began to raise money to help improve the economic situation by taking on foreign loans, in this way he was showing rival superpowers such as Britain and Germany that Russia was in a state of weakness. Now, any of these nations could have attacked and taken Russia, but by investing in the nation they began to prosper off importing and exporting goods, by improving Russia, so did they improve their trade.

This relates to the situation here as the Kingdoms of Albion, could benefit from taking Camelot, but given Camelot's allies and the finesse of the soldiers that are still active, wouldn't it be more effective to help them rebuild back into a prosperous nation and then enjoy the benefits when they are in a situation to return the favour. It's basically a case of gaining a powerful ally and prosperous trade with little cost, or risking alot in order to capture an admittedly powerful kingdom.

As for the closer allies questioning Camelot, they did not suffer that greatly during the Battle, they lost their king and many soldiers, but many soldiers also survived and now they would have the support of the magical community also. The allies of Camelot would see that Camelot still prospers and would maintain their alliegances, in the hopes of maintaining the unity Arthur has fought for.

'''Merlin never took Arthur back to Camelot but brought him to the lake of Avalon without Gwen's permission. Gwen didn't even have the chance to say good-bye to her husband when Merlin took the liberty of burying Arthur's corpse in the lake. Alone.'''

'''Many people surely would have wanted to say good-bye to their king, yet they didn't get the chance. Also, Merlin obviosuly never returned to Camelot, so Gwen could as well think that all his friends and the kingdom wasn't important to him anymore. This could also make her think that Merlin had only business with Arthur and good reasons to leave Camelot.'''

'''After all, Merlin didn't save Gwens father even though he has such great power. We know that  it was not so easy but Gwen didn't see what we as the viewers saw. There were many things that happened in Camelot of Gwen could think that Merlin was behind it, and only Gaius' word, the one who loved Merlin like a son, can't be enough. Gwen trusted Morgana with all her heart but in the end she learnt that magic corrupted her and that Morgana turned evil. Why should she think that Merlin was above that and that he was the good one?'''

You're argument seems to be built up on the assumption that Merlin never returned to Camelot, this is not nescessarily the case. He was not at the coronation, but that could simply be because he could not face the idea of someone else taking Arthur's throne.

If he did not return, Gaius could still explain exactly what Merlin did for her and Camelot, she knows Gaius well and would know if he was lying, she trusts and respects him as she trusts and respects Merlin, she has seen his bravery, selflessness and goodness first hand. Also the thing that makes Merlin different from Morgana is that she could see the change in Morgana and knew the reasons she had to despise Uther and Arthur. Merlin had no such problems and was a good friend to her and Camelot long before the battle.

Now that's assuming he completely vanishes off the face of the earth, it's likely he would at least send a letter of some sort explaining why he could not return if he did decide to leave Camelot forever and that would help assure Gwen that Merlin was a friend of Camelot and Magic was a force for good as well as evil.

Should he return he could explain why he had to give Arthur the funeral at the Lake and exactly what has happened and what he has done, I personally think he took his time to grieve, maybe returned to Ealdor, then took his place in Camelot as an advisor to the Queen, helping finish Arthur's work.

It wasn't actually Arthur and gwen's victory but Merlin's. All would have been lost if "Dragoon" hadn't killed the soldiers of the saxon's and Morgana.

'''Gwen was indeed a great person most of the time but that doesn't mean that other nobles/royals would have accepted her. If that was the case, any soldier who achieved great things could have become a noble. Instead, commoners stayed commoners, no matter how good, brave and clever they are. Gaius was made a free citizen by Uther, yet he wasn't made a noble man.'''

There is no debating that "Dragoon" is the reason Camelot were able to force back the Saxons, but calling it Merlin's victory seems very unfair to me, without Arthur's plan to meet the forces of Morgana rather than wait for them, hundreds if not thousands of lives were spared, he made a brave decision, also if he had waited in Camelot Merlin would not have the advantage of higher ground, without that he would not have been able to wipe out nearly as many Saxons and would have had to face Morgana on equal ground.

Moving on, Guinevere was not unpopular as a Queen, she was a symbol to the commoners, and perhaps the nobility might have misgivings about her, but the peasantry would love her. Many nobles would have also come to know and respect her whilst she has been Queen, they would also trust Arthur's judgement, I know the nobles would not all love her, but I expect a fair few would support her, and as i've mentioned earlier her allies would stand by her.

And Gaius has been a member of the Royal Court and a key advisor to both Uther and Arthur. And Gaius is not alone in his support of Guinevere, Leon would stand by her and he was in a way Arthur's right hand man when it came to military matters, he was also a knight of noble birth which would give him some influence.

'''The damage that Kilgharrah caused could never compete with the damage that three wars with Morgana, Cenred and Morgause caused in season three and four, plus the loss of thousands of soldiers during the search for Morgana in season three, plus the battle at Camlann. It's simply impossible to replace the lost soldiers, no matter what the show told us. How many soldiers do they have in stock? A million?'''

Well look at each war seperately, starting with the search for Morgana, I can't imagine thousands of soldiers were lost in the search for her, a couple of hundreds at the very most. After all during this search the only threat they had to deal with was bandits and raiders (along with Morgause's servants)

Onto the Great Battle of Camelot, they were warned a day in advance, the battle ended by the end of the night. They had 12,000 men garrisoned in the castle and despite the combined assaults of an army twice their size with the assistance of an undead garrison within their walls, they endured. This is because the Knights of Camelot are a force to be reckoned with. They lost plenty of men that day, but they had enough to keep control over the city, and even then, the only soldiers at risk were those already within the city.

During the attack of the Immortal Army, it's hard to explain how any soldiers at all survived, what we can assume is that either Uther surrendered rather than lose his men to an unbeatable opponent, the Knights fled into the woods and returned after Arthur saved Camelot, or that the city received new troops to protect it.

The Dorocha attacks of the next Season would have had little effect on the Knights who tended to carry around torches, they were more of an issue for the people in general.

Then, the Southron attacks of the Season 4 finale, these would have been in my opinion the most crippling blow to the armies of Camelot, a single military force, marching in, slaughtering soldiers and killing anyone who got in their way, few would have escaped the citadel. However, once again we must remember that the city is not all there is to Camelot.

The events leading up to and including the Battle of Camlann lost a great many troops and there is little I can give in argument here, this would have left Camelot at a disadvantage.

Now looking on the army as a whole, it has suffered heavy losses this much is not in dispute, but let's look at it like this. First of all, we can assume that in the time between "the Last Dragonlord" and "Diamond of the Day" new knights have been trained, this would add a few needed numbers to the military. Also, Camelot has it's allies, another addition to the military. Then there is the likely raising of bans on magic, that would give them a fighting force that no other kingdom can match, a magical fighting force.

Also, Camelot does not survive off numbers, Camelot endures because it has effective troops (hailed as the greatest knights in the Five Kingdoms), skilled tacticians, sturdy fortresses and are even in small numbers, formidable. Let's not forget Cenred, who even when Camelot had an insane leader, feared to risk his own men (who doubled Camelot's in number) as he saw the keep as being impregnible, and was afraid of the Knights. Finally, Guinevere is a commoner queen and is therefore likely to like the idea of equality between commoners and nobles. For that reason she may have a few peasants serving to aide the army.

'''The crusaders already caused mayhem in Great Britain before they went to other countries. Those who didn't submit to Christianity were being killed. And if Camelot had fallen, it wouldn't have destroyed Albion/Great Britain either but only the Camelot as we know it. If Morgana or any other king had conquered Camelot and taken over, either them or someone else in the future could have united Great Britain/Albion as well. Uther was already on his way of uniting Albion, so if he could have done it, had he not died, any other could have done it too. It was about legalising magic, so when considering this, Albion has always been in a time of need, especially during the crusades when Christianity took over and when the church forbid and persecuted witchcraft.''' Arthur did not just unite the lands of Albion though, that is his most famous deed of course, but what we must remember is that Arthur was one of the first kings to fight for equality. He also showed courage and taught others how a truly great king should act, never showing fear against his enemies and helping all regardless of who they are. He believed in fairness and goodness above all else, this along with creating a state of peace in the Five Kingdoms, is why Arthur should be remembered.

'''Merlin was most of all told in the fisrt season to protect Arthur until he is king. Then Arthur became king but nothing changed. Merlin protected Arthur way beyond the prophecy he heard the first time, and this should have made him suspicious.''' I'm not entirely sure what you mean by this point, but I don't think Merlin purely followed Arthur because it was his destiny, I think he followed Arthur because he believed in him, if the Great Dragon told him that he had fufilled his destiny, he would still likely have continued to serve him. And things did change slightly when Arthur became king, there were common knights at the heart of Camelot for example! However he only had to watch and see all of the the changes Arthur made, for good and bad.

We were told that Camelot was prosperous in the time gap between season four and five, but that was rubbish in regard to the previous seasons.

That's what the time gaps were for (I don't like the idea of time gaps, but meh) during these spaces between series, the kingdom would repair itself and rebuild, the biggest amount of damage to the kingdom as a whole was done at the finales of seasons 3 and 4, when the Immortal Army take Camelot, Morgana is in power for barely a week, she could not do much damage to the kingdom in that time. Now the Southron attacks would have been a major blow on top of the Immortal armies, but a seven year gap was done between Seasons 4 and 5, plenty of time to rebuild the kingdom and become the prosperous nation it once was.

'''Morgana was imprisoned by Sarrum which was the reason why there wasn't war. There was only war with Camelot in the previous seasons because Morgana attacked Camelot, it wasn't Uther or Arthur's doing. On the contrary, under Uther's reign, Camelot was known as a kingdom of peace and propsperity, as Gaius told Merlin and as could be seen during the seasons. He didn't go to war with other kingdoms but wanted to unite them and succeeded in uniting the Five Kingdoms. Arthur still banned magic and still persecuted sorcerers, so aside from knighting commoners and marrying a serving girl, nothing had changed. There was no real Golden Age.'''

First of all, Uther had alot of enemies, you can say what you like about uniting the Five Kingdoms but he could not have done it without Merlin and Arthur. Take them out of the picture and he would have been defeated by Bayard, or Nimueh (probably Nimueh) or Morgause, or one of his countless other enemies, he made too many enemies for himself, and although he did unite the Five Kingdoms (a very unstable unity I might add) he would not have got anywhere near close enough to do so without Arthur and Merlin.

And there was a great change when Arthur became king and major change as he worked towards becoming king, Odin's Kingdom, Nemeth and Caerleon were three major opponents of Uther (Rodor not so much but they were in dispute), yet in Arthur's time he made peace with all three of them. He also eliminated a number of key opponents of Camelot such as Helios, Cenred and Hengist.

Also, for the peasants this could be seen as a Golden Age as it was a time when, there was peace in all of Camelot, a time when the people lived safe and happy and it was a time when the people of Camelot were becoming less like peasants and nobles and more like equals.

Also, Arthur was much more sympathetic to sorcerers, he did maintain the ban on magic but he became much more lenient with the druid people, who made up a major part of the magical community, particularly of those who could not choose who they were.