Maybe have a vendor possibly realize they the goods your selling them are stolen based on their reputation with the person you stole from, and there actions could be tell the guards...and appear at court for it (I think they did the court system in Daggerfall).

Precisely. I shouldn't need a fence for some damn plates or carafes.

I agree for the most part. I've always played a thief and Oblivion's system where everything you stole could only be sold to a fence got rather annoying. I could understand more rare or recognizable items but if I'm selling some cheap silverware I pocketed, it shouldn't really be too unique to only fence.

I agree with Sphagne, except I really don't see the point in having a Red Flag for stolen items, toggleable or not. It always seemed like a useless feature that just made things more difficult for me in the game.

Also, as clarification to my own personal opinion, I just don't want psychic merchants. There is no way that Merchant A in City A should be able to recognize that some item I'm trying to sell him that I stole from Person B in City B is indeed stolen, unless it is a unique item. It's not like every single cup has a barcode and a serial code associated with it that can be tracked down through some vast series of... of tubes, or something. That's ridiculous.

You can sell it to a fence SAFELY, but you can sell it so any merchant in Skyrim, but if he/she realises thet your selling stolen goods he/shell inform the guards. And if you sell it in the city where you stole it from they will almost everytime realise thet.

Oh, and I don't want to be accused of stealing for picking up (externally, i.e. the "Z" key) a cup.

the people above have the right idea
to find the balance there should be the priority though,
i'v given you 3 my support.

They should make it like morrowind but keep the red tag so you know that item is stolen, the shop vendor doesn't know but you do. Also it would be nice to see who you stole it from so you don't accidentally sell it back to the person you stole it from :whistling:

Nice way of simulating the whole thing but, you have to make it simpler while still effective. Cut some rules.

This thread makes me wonder if the player would be able to steal from children? XD

Those rules are behind the scene, and when you play the game, you see that the further away you go from the crime scene the better priced items you can sell, and the more you hoard items for later sell, the more chance you have to sell better items to the same merchant. And you have to be careful if you want to wear stolen items near the crime scene. That's all.

You get the hang of it in no time, IF it ever get implemented this way, which has a chance of about 1% right now.

this

Agree with what is being said to the most part. Maybe if your not in the thieves guild it's members will pick pocket from you and/or break into your house. Then you have to report the crime to the guards.
It could be a bit annoying though, losing some good items.

I think it's fairly simple.

If you look at an item and think wow that looks rare... then most probably within a certain radius, NPC's will know that X item belonged to Y NPC. Therefore it should be more difficult (but not impossible) to sell to merchants close by. (i.e. you steal a common silver sword... no one could tell the difference unless it has particular markings on it which makes it more unique)

The further afield the easier it should become to sell.

Unless it's a truly unique item, in which case you need to go to a special merchant. IMO

I would also like to support Sphagne's points, which were well thought out.

But the mage's guild no doubt brings instant police reports with descriptions teleporting from town to town overnight. And if it doesn't - it should be, as it's the first resource that any good cop would use or at least daytime runs by guards on horses. Well maybe not in war torn Skyrim where guards may need to travel out of town in squads not alone, fences would be aplenty and corruption would run high.
It'll be just a matter of a few coins and a wink and nod to any low paid guard who would rather be at home guarding his own family to let you get away or even leave a door open for a cut of the stolen goods.

Food items stolen secretly from kitchens or raiding a garden for a tasty tomato in the middle of the night does not logically make sense to be tagged as stolen unless caught redhanded.
But they could throw in a randomized balancer for the theft of food. Such as: That food you stole last night was tainted and you lose half your strength for the day, unless you have high immunity points or drink an expensive antidote to balance that.

Further thinking about a civil war may mean you are on one side or the other in which case a stealthy thief could easily steal from either side to sell to the other with impunity regardless of tagging. In fact the leader of either faction could use a good thief to help fill the war coffers. But as a balancer have randomized snitches and blackmailers and after your thievery gets too grand a special secret force is formed especially to hunt you down and set to catch you with pre-planned lethal traps, drop cages and nets and even poisoned wines and fruits and tasty looking pastries that have a sign that says Improves Vigor or Eat Me invitingly iced on mouthwatering treats in secret DragonVoice code that could be the real thing and give you, temporarily, great powers

And if Beth doesn't do it modding can. And this time around please Beth, make DLC for the CS with frequent add-ons and fixes and updates THAT I WOULD HAPPILY PAY FOR even as a yearly subscription

I always thought it was funny that you couldn’t sell a stolen apple three cities away, but you could equip some priceless elven helm right in front of the guy you stole it from.

That would be great, so the faction relation of the merchant and the one whose items we are selling should affect the recognition percentage positively or negatively, so if they are enemy factions, the merchant would buy higher priced items.

Let's say he ignores the fact that they are stolen, or would not know about the fact as they communicate less with the other faction's members.

Well it depends the value of the item and if you were seen or not, if you were seen the news would spread and only Thieves guild members would but it but if not then anyone can buy it, and if it is a special item like rare armor or a really important item(Enchanted)then the person would not buy it

This is a brilliant idea, they've already experimented with special effects of putting certain items into someones inventory (poison apples in Oblivion and grenades in Fallout 3 and NV).

There is no totally innocent Bosmer in the world of Nirn. After adoring fan, I do not believe in such a thing.

Honestly, this is my favorite system by far. You SHOULD be able to talk your way out of small crimes where there is only one witness. Specchcraft and Personality would them become more important to a theif.

They just need a report system for theft similar to the system for bounty on the player. If you steal something it gets reported.

Depending on how expensive the item is, the "search" goes out a radius x price from where it was reported. If you sell the item within that radius to any honorable merchant, then you get caught. If you sell the item to someone outside that radius and/or someone who is shady enough not to report you (fence) then you don't get caught.

Badda-boom.

This.

I am not a programmer but I have an idea about scripts etc.

In my view something like this as a stand alone script on one NPC that involves checks including line of sight players recognition etc etc is fine.

But

What happens when you enter a bustling town with 20-30 NPC and they are all running these scripts and checks at the same time, plus all the other animation scripts and scripts that are allowing fire to look alive and water to flow, conversations to happen.

I suspect this would be just another feature that sounds great (and if it can be done I would want it done) but would cause to much slow down/ stutters with the systems and this would effect gameplay and enjoyment (which I dont want)

I voted something else.

I just thought of this idea. It's a bit silly that you are unable to sell any stolen items even outside the city it was taken from. So, what if selling/pricing is based on skill? If it's based on sneak, if your sneak skill is too low, then you cannot sell it. Example: A noob thief would be nervous trying to pawn off stolen merchandise. But once you're skill is so high, some balanced undetermined number (somewhere between 10 and 25?), then you are able to start selling, but at reduced value. Until you reach another skill value where you're comfortable offloading stolen goods to anyone (maybe 50 or higher?). But outside the city/town it was stolen from of course. (Assuming that lower population places, people tend to know everyone, and knows THAT item belongs to Bob)