For skooma bottles and fiddly little potion bottles you need to use the magnetic like attraction of the edge of the surface you want them on. Level the bottle up with the edge, go forward and wiggle gently (requires patience, not force) and they should flip up and sit on the top for you to move them around. So they did change something, because previously like the larger bottles all the things did was turn around and stick to the edge as soon as you got them near it.

What I usually do, as I love collecting and decorating, is that I dump everything I want to place on a table or in a display case on the floor, then leave the cell (I don't bother saving). Once I re enter the room I can put everything where I want them and they will stay in place, even if I save in the room and reload at a later point.

I have a huge pile of skulls, a huge pile of human hearts and an ever huger pile of ore, the table is littered with ingots and my display cases are stuffed full with gems and bugs. Up stairs I have a table full of skooma and all my necklaces and rings neatly arranged on the bedside table. No problem whatsoever!

It beggars belief! They have a trophy room with generic enemies that you kill hundreds of. No one wants that. We want to be able to put a statue of dibella on a dresser with no problem, or the DG paragons on a table. It's the unique or rare items that are of value when it comes to decorating, not Dwarven Spiders. Honestly this is the first thing they should have coded when making the physics engine.

Trying to put your items where you want them just kills the moment. The sad thing is when you build a shelf, it has something on it - why not give us the tools they used to put the goblet or whatever there themselves?

You would think Bethesda had that sort of rational logic.

Actually this wasn't a problem until a patch a few months ago. This CAN be fixed, but we all know it never will be

Well either a few months ago or last year, I could never arrange those pissy little bottles this well, so I am happy enough, it is improving slowly. The redwater skooma bottles unfortunately did not behave as the others, so it took a lot of patience and persistence to get them there.

http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j215/aussie500/Skyrim/BRdrinkscollection2.jpg
http://i81.photobucket.com/albums/j215/aussie500/Skyrim/BRdrinkscollection3b.jpg


Giving us the option to lock the item at a specific angle would be nice though, arranging lavender in a kettle is a pain.

What th... holy crap... I would never have the patience to arrange things in that manners of precisions... I don't try to put everything into my collection house, but just special miscellaneous stuff and other intriguing doodads.

But I haven't even started on the other two houses yet (including the family house), maybe I should test my patience and give that a try... Meanwhile, I don't like it so much that you put your stuff in the basemant, because you would have to go all the way down there to take a gander at your collection... know what I mean?

They just need to turn off, or tone down, the Physics in our houses. I am willing to have the cell that my house is in have no fancy physics, if I could just put things where I want them to be and they would stay there.

I miss Morrowind for displaying items. I had a house that had every weapon, potion, jewel, gem, easter egg and armor in the game on display. It was easy to place, in the position I wanted, and it stayed there. The only thing I could not do was stand things up if I wanted. I can live with that as a compromise.

Braggen has stuff all over most of his houses, I have not actually finished any house yet though, the enthusiasm for the new ones died a bit when everything came back and upset my first goes at house decorating. The only thing in that basemant that required patience was the redwater skooma and Surilie Brothers wine bottles, both of which were easy once you got them upright, everything else was easy and usually seemed to jump into the right place almost by itself. The wine bottles up the top only required patience because I am lousy at judging distance. But I have arranged the different sized wine bottles in a number of houses, so am slowly getting better at it. That was the first shelf big enough to put them all on though. Once you get used to starting out with most things being upside down, it is a lot easier now than previously to arrange things.

There are still the odd things you have to toss in place because the will not stay (Stormcloak officers helmet, and a few others like that) and a few things that wobble, some stuff especially the helmets will still not display on the mannequins and some weapons still fall through the display cases or do not sit properly on weapon racks and plaques. But I personally think the actual movement system has improved. With the latest improvement you can certainly have every potion on display, you just need to fence those rectangular shaped fat ones in to prevent them falling over. Probably a main game house would be better since we get free reign on what goes where in them. But a cellar could be claimed for potions if you leave stuff out to get all the shelving, you could leave the smelter and forge out and put in baskets and kettles for alchemy ingredients.

The cellar is handy because it has a shorter loading screen than the front door, and nothing is going to attack you going down to the cellar. Drop your stuff and rush off to the cellar, or do it the other way if you are doing the cellar. I usually do both at the same time. Also handy for farming armor from the mannequins while you are arranging your stuff. If the new houses behaved like normal player houses it would be great to claim all those shelves for our collections. But as it is you can claim everything you want from the house (pearls, wine, foodstuff and ingredients etc) and in 10 days (or possibly less) it will reappear for you to grab them all over again. Braggen needs nothing so would rather have the display space, but a character just starting out would do well from all those renewable extras, especially an alchemist.

Wow, that's pretty amazing. Nicely done.

Thanks.

Someone in another thread inspired that theme, they were disappointed we got no wine cellar. Braggen has an extensive drinks collection, and a food and beverage storeroom was born. The second character has all her alcoves empty and was looking at buckets last night, to see if that alcove can be used for anything useful. She will be scouring Skyrim for different buckets tonight and testing out an idea. Braggen usually prefers filling one cellar up with bones though, his main drinks display is at Hjerim, but he had no where near that amount of space for it.

Aussie was boring and did nothing with her first two cellars, which I am regretting now. She has just as good a beverage collection if not better. Mind you some unique things cannot be put on display, the bottles just refuse to stay put. Aussie finally managed to get that Stallion's potion last night, which is something that will not stay on a shelf, it does not have a unique bottle anyway. Aussie is a stormcloak and had to pickpocket the potion back while the imperials are all locked up in the Blue Place cellar, she went up there checking for firebrand wine with the idea of doing something with her last cellar, and Raerek was finally seated on the edge of the crowd.

You turned the shrine into a bar?? LOL. What sort of heathen is Braggen? That's amazing though, my Balmora Blue's still sitting in my inventory.

Just a question, how do you get all that skooma

I have no idea how Braggen collected so much skooma, but both characters have a lot of hours exploring Skyrim, and both are compulsive collectors, and now thieves, although Aussie started the thieving bit chasing a drink. The double distilled skooma is easy to get, although you have to steal it, Braggen has a lot of skooma, a stash at each house (even the new houses), both have had their skooma for ages. I am not sure if Aussie has the redwater skooma, will have to investigate that one. And I think only Braggen has the Balmora Blue, Aussie never bothers much with questlines. Nothing has stolen tags on them, everything stolen was cleared. The skooma bottles could not previously be set on display like that, so most of the collection just stayed in storage.

I tried the dragon's breath mead out on the shelf, still it will not stay put. The argonian ale is back at Hjerim on a shelf, as is the colovian brandy, this is just the extra's collection, since there was so much space, everything there was extra off escaped from storage. The rest will probably be getting on display in more of the houses now. It was a pain doing Braggen's drinks display at Hjerim, would be less trouble now.

Thanks, any specific locations?

Most likely that Riften warehouse, Braggen went there a few times after the quest for something, although it was more likely the moon sugar. There is also a bandit camp on one side of Whiterun that I think has skooma, just outside the walls under an overhang. There is a horse and cart there.

ty, I didn't realize the warehouse restocked

Also, if you didn't know, the khajiit caravans always sell skooma (they usually have five in stock, I think). It's not very expensive either.

This thread has certainly helped my need to collect lots of drugs/alcohol in skyrim

Unfortunately the addition of Hearthfire seemed to drastically slow down the respawn rate for Haelga's Bunkhouse in Riften, so you have to wait longer if you want a bottle of Falmer blood.

I have 3 of the bugs in a jar spaced evenly on my mantle, with a Statue of Dibella at each end, and they have stayed in place for quite awhile. Other two jars are on shelves above the kids' beds (luna moth makes a solid night light)

The problem with stock house clutter returning to it's location is easily solved. They do not 'respawn', rather they 'return'. Just don't try using that stuff to decorate. Any time I upgrade a room (even in the vanilla houses) the first thing I do is pick up every single piece of clutter that came along with it. Then just go dump all that stuff in a barrel or sell it to a vendor. It will never trouble you again.

Side note: DO NOT dump everything into the river at Markarth because it's funny (or, presumably, anywhere) as it will destroy your frame rate in that cell. I left the city and did several quests before discovering this, so I had to dive in and search the entire length of the river picking up every single piece again (before learning the water breathing enchant). Similar problem occurs if try to create a ball pit with gyros in a lowered area inside your home.

It does not matter if you dump the junk into a one way gate to Oblivion, as soon as you are absent from that house for 10 days everything respawns, makes no difference where you put the junk, you get more of it. Unless you decorated around the junk, your carefully arranged stuff is going to end up disarranged and scattered. None of my characters are going to be babysitting three houses all the time, they have other things to do. Aussie has all her houses rebuilt and furnished to better specifications, but I am probably not even going to decorate them for ages, she will be off working on her werewolf perk tree and the companion quest line shortly.

The stuff in the main game houses never respawn, so nothing is going to mysteriously return to haunt you.

Damn it, just checked and that's true. Guess I've never been away from the house I actually decorate longer than 10 days before. Do you know if making sure to stop by that often will prevent the clutter from respawning? I'm gonna stop bothering to decorate if not.

You stop by the house within the ten day limit, you home decoration work is safe, it will not respawn. But babysitting a house is a big responsibility, what if the next DLC takes you away from home for more than ten days? It is better to decorate around the junk, or leave some things out to get the space you need.

I have to admit I went a bit crazy with Braggen's first three houses, and was bitterly disappointed when all my hard work was trashed, I am still steamed a bit about it, but will make do. Would have been nice if the designers had not been quiet so enthusiastic about filling nearly every shelf up with junk we might not want. Aussie as the second character never did much with most of her main game homes, so now some things are a bit easier to arrange, she has gone off to decorate the homes she already has. And I am testing out a few things for when the new ones reset, so all will be vacant for 10 days while Aussie is squirreling up decorating supplies and practising elsewhere.

I have found that objects only go out of whack 1 time after i place them but when i place them again they stay put. Also, you have to be sure to grab the item and move it without actually putting it in your inventory the 2nd time around or it just does it all over again.

So if i have items to set i just drop them on the floor near where i plan to set them, reload the zone and set them in place. Works for me but it seems that everyone has the same bugs yet they all behave a little differently.