Skyrim is a game full of diverse factions that the player is able to join and some factions that the player is unfortunately not able to join. A lot of these factions have different purposes, such as acting as an assassin organization or as an official college where the player can learn magic.
The Dragonborn is able to gain a bunch of different things from each of these factions, which makes it a desirable choice to join them. However, some of the factions in the game don't make a lot of sense and are overall very strange because of the things that they do or certain things that take place during their questlines.
10 The Companions
The Companions are a group of mercenaries in the land of Skyrim that take up any jobs that the citizens have ready for them. The Companions reside in Whiterun, and there are a select few among this mercenary group that are werewolves.
What's strange about The Companions is that after the Dragonborn joins them, they are quickly indoctrinated into their inner circle and allow the player to become a werewolf, which doesn't make much sense because, at the time of the Dragonborn's initiation, the player will have only completed a few quests for The Companions.
9 The Volkihar Vampires
The Volkihar Vampires are an interesting faction since they are the most powerful group of vampires in Skyrim, and they also possess an extraordinary ability that allows them to transform into the vampire lord form.
The Volkihar Vampires may be powerful; however, they are also extremely weird. The leader of this faction of vampires is Lord Harkon and his wife decided to lock their daughter away for hundreds of years so that he couldn't get ahold of her or an Elder Scroll. Everything about this interaction is strange since it could have been handled in so many other ways, including fleeing to High Rock.
8 The Morag Tong
The Morag Tong is one of the lesser-known factions in Skyrim, and it is only present on Solstheim. This group is made of assassins, similar to the Dark Brotherhood, however different in the sense that they aren't nearly as organized in Skyrim.
The Morag Tong doesn't attempt to recruit the Dragonborn under any circumstances, which is weird since most of the other factions in the game try to. What really makes them unusual is the fact that they are located on Solstheim without a clear goal, and although they do try to assassinate a few characters, they seem to act more like raiders than assassins.
7 The Blades
The Blades are encountered during the main questline of Skyrim, and they help the Dragonborn defeat Alduin and save the world. The Blades are at odds with the Greybeards and actively dislike their culture.
For such a heroic group, players would expect The Blades to be nobler and understanding of nuanced pasts of important characters. However, they are adamant that the Dragonborn must slay Paarthurnax for his past crimes, which doesn't make any sense or match up with their teachings since Paarthurnax isn't causing any harm now.
6 The Dark Brotherhood
The Dark Brotherhood is the primary group of assassins in the game, and they are very weak when the Dragonborn first encounters them. The player can help them rise back to prominence during the questline that will take the player all over the land to assassinate political targets.
The Dark Brotherhood has some of the weirdest characters in the game, including Cicero, the jester assassin. A lot of things don't make sense about this group, such as the fact that Astrid recruits the Dragonborn without any real test of loyalty; this mistake gives the player a choice to destroy the Dark Brotherhood instead of joining them. If the Dragonborn decides to destroy the faction, then it is partly Astrid's fault.
5 The Orc Strongholds
The Orc Strongholds of Skyrim are much more tribalistic than the other cities and groups in the game. The reason for this is clear; they prefer other Orcs to humans for the most part.
Even though the Orcs want to live specifically among other Orcs, that doesn't change the fact that it would be advantageous for them to allow outsiders to help them with things and also trade with outsiders more often for important supplies. However, this rarely ever takes place, and they mostly keep to themselves. In the harsh land of Skyrim, the Orc's tribalistic philosophy doesn't make any sense.
4 The Guards Of Skyrim
The Guards of Skyrim are a well-known faction because of their funny dialogue, of which they all repeat time after time. The player will certainly hear this dialogue a ton during their adventures in Skyrim.
This dialogue is what makes the Guards so weird because they all have the same stories to tell. The Guards talk about taking an arrow in the knee, for example, and every Guard in the game stands by this story. It is unclear whether some of these lines of dialogue are true in any way or if every Guard just happens to tell the same false story.
3 The Vigilants Of Stendarr
The Vigilants Of Stendarr are a religious faction that is known for fighting the likes of monsters, including vampires and Daedra, among others. There are not a lot of these Vigilants in Skyrim; however, they can be found occasionally throughout the land.
The thing that really doesn't make any sense about this faction is that they don't aid the Dragonborn or Dawnguard during the course crisis. Instead of joining up with the Dawnguard in mass, they instead hide away and do nothing to stop Harkon.
2 The College Of Winterhold
The College of Winterhold has a reputation for not making sense because its storyline was rushed for time constraints. A lot of players consider it to be their least favorite faction for this reason alone.
One fact about the College that is very strange is the tendency they have to cause the town of Winterhold a lot of trouble through magical experiments. Players would imagine that if they have such a bad reputation that they would stop conducting such explosive experiments that cause trouble for the entire town, but they don't.
1 The Stormcloaks
The Stormcloaks and the Imperials are at odds immediately after the Dragonborn enters Skyrim. After crossing the border, the player gets to choose which faction they want to join during the Civil War questline so that they can shape the land of Skyrim in their image.
Most players believe that the Imperials and the Thalmor are being unfair to the Stormcloaks. However, the way that Ulfric Stormcloak goes about gaining support doesn't make any sense since he is alienating a lot of the other races that call Skyrim home. Unfortunately, Ulfric and the other Stormcloaks often use language that is bigoted, and instead of gaining support from all of the other citizens of Skyrim, including the Argonians and Dark Elves, they completely alienate them.