I was starting to head out of Whiterun while two Alik'r were examining a http://s12.postimg.org/6lpkeykgs/Slain_Guard.jpg that had died during a vampire attack at night. Another Whiterun guard comes running up and inspecting the same corpse. Then turns around and asks my character if http://s7.postimg.org/ummbadqfu/Did_you_see_anything.jpg Well, I knew the guard was slain fighting off vampires, but there was no dialogue option for it. Only dialogue options I got were http://s4.postimg.org/je29m8cbw/Framed_Dialogue.jpg. I found if I chose, "I'm not sure what happened" the guard would mention to come let them know if I learn anything about it. The other dialogue choice led to my player getting arrested with 100 gold bounty.

I find this strange as I've only come across it once before when the Whiterun Stable owner's body was lingering around for a while having also been killed by a vampire attack. The first time I shrugged it off. Happening again now though, I'm curious if this is the start of another quest or something or if anyone else in these forums has additional info on these dialogue options and where they stem from or what they lead to? Or if anyone else has come across this before? Doing a quick check on google or the UESP wiki page, I couldn't find any info.

I don't think this is to do with the In My Time Of Need quest.

AFAIK, it's related only to having DG installed. Nothing I've ever seen in the vanila game's In My Time of Need quest has this happening. Now.... if you don't have the Dawnguard DLC installed....

Well, then! That's really really strange.

I actually do have Dawnguard. Is this to start a quest or is it just some extra content added by DG to frame the player for NPCs that vampires kill?

Wow, I've never had that happen, and never heard of it either, so I'm no help!

I couldn't say. I have DG only for the Aetherium Forge questline and some mods I want to use that require all three DLCs. I don't play vampires or werewolves, and I don't appreciate developers' need to write them into perfectly-good-without-them games. I'm also not interested in joining the Companions' Circle for that reason (I play them only far enough to get the second Fire Breath word), nor do I want to play DG to wipe out the vampires. I installed a mod last night to fix the random vamps being attacked by townies, though so far I've only had them a couple of times in Riverwood when I'm trying to buy lumber for my house....

My guess is that it's just "adding flavor". Others who've really got into DG will probably have a better feel for which it is. If you don't have a quest that popped into your log after though, I'd doubt it's a quest starter.

The vampire town attacks do get quite annoying as they almost happen every night in Whiterun. I do like the DG DLC for a lot of the added content, including vampire boots and gloves.

This is a World Encounter like those listed on UESP here: http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:World_Interactions

This specific one isn't listed on that page for some reason, but it is listed in the Official Skyrim Guide Book as follows:

Given that these encounters are random in when they occur, where they occur, and what NPCs they involve in a scene it's impossible to say exactly how they'll play out for different players and in different games. It happening at night during a Vampire attack may have lead some of the normal people that would fill the "residents talking about you" part of the quest to not appear or be out of the scene range. If you're playing on a PC with mods they could also affect scenes like this. Both the When Vampires Attack and Interesting NPCs are mods I can think of that could possibly affect a scene like this directly. I don't know why this encounter isn't listed on the wiki page, guess it just got missed. Feel free to add it yourself if you're into editing wikis.

I've seen it myself and vampires certainly weren't involved as it was a random corpse in broad daylight. I think it might be occuring with vampire attacks in your game is because there is so little reason for townsfolk to die normally that when they are killed its automatically assumed the player is responsible i.e. if you assasinated someone and then someone notices the corpse. The fact that vamps did the killing instead is essentially an oversight i.e. the consequences of vampire attacks wasn't considered when the original game concepts were being developed.

(thumbsup) Thanks for the info. The two times that I've come across this, both times it was in Whiterun

If no major reward or anything else comes of it other than being thrown in jail, then I might as well just ignore this encounter. I thought maybe there was something more to it. I could edit the wiki page, but I don't know enough about this scenario, nor do I really want to take the time to do so.

Perhaps. I do know for sure this guard died by vampire though, witnessing it and trying to put down the vampires after coming out of Jorvasker. After a couple of missions, I came back, did some more business in Whiterun and then on my way out, that scene triggered. Interesting enough, those two Alik'r showed up too even after I've already done the In My Time of Need quest. Ah well, hopefully they will help me guard Whiterun against vampires.

Thanks for sharing that, Urtho! I had no idea what schmoe was talking about as I do not recall ever encountering that scenario, unless Markarth and Margaret count, though no dialogue from the guards pops up. Now I can rest easy

Scenes like this are essentially mini-quests that don't add journal entries. You have to meet the prerequisite for the quest to fire, be in a valid location and then also be lucky with the random story manager for this radiant quest to be picked or the opportunity just passes on by. The incident you mention in Markarth is part of an actual official side quest with full journal entries and is unrelated to this encounter. That quest has it's own script for dealing with the guards and dead bodies, it's not random as it will only ever occur in Markarth the one time.

Oh and you and schmoe are welcome for the information.