I mentioned these things in a topic about how stolen items should be dealt with, but it was kinda beyond the scope of it so I've decided to do a separate topic detailing what I think needs to be done regarding law enforcement in Skyrim in general.

Based on your bounty and/or notoriety-so committing a few minor crimes in one place will only get you in trouble with the guards in that location-and they might even forget about you after awhile (only if your bounty is exceptionally low). Committing a major crime like murder or stealing something particularly valuable will get you in big trouble in the place where the crime was committed and over time word will spread across Skyrim until eventually you're a wanted man/woman everywhere.

I can also imagine that once you rack up a high enough bounty you may even have mercenaries/vigilantes coming after you to collect the price on your head.

There still might be an option to remove bounties via special NPCs in the Thieves/Assassins guilds-although there could be limitations on that as well-perhaps based on how much "influence" the particular NPC has. You might also be able to "turn yourself in" to any guard anywhere, but again just talking to a guard in another city won't get you in trouble-you'd actually have to select the topic to turn yourself in rather than the guard automatically recognizing you as a criminal.

As far as stolen goods are concerned, there's been discussion about it in the thread I mentioned so I'll only cover it in terms of how it related to the guards. They shouldn't be able to recognize every little item you've stolen-so in terms of what they confiscate it may be limited to the following;

• The item(s) they saw you steal.
  
• Possibly any locally stolen item(s) past a certain value and after a certain period of time after you've stolen them (during which they were "reported" as stolen to the guards).
  
• Any unique or rare item(s) that clearly don't belong to you.

Any minor or common items that were stolen may not be confiscated. Also, if there's an element of "notoriety", the guards may be more suspicious-perhaps even to the point where they'll confiscate certain items you did not steal (or maybe not-I think it could be a nice little touch) that they think are suspicious. It's possible they might return them to you later or something. You can still retrieve your items by lockpicking the "evidence chest" .

I do have some hope that we'll be able to see at least some of this thanks to the Radiant Story system.

I suggest some kind of delayed effect of breaking the law.

if you kill someone, the guards wouldn't know right away, but after a few days (time to take for crime scene investigation) the guards will talk to you about going to jail when they see you, and there should be a chance that they just can't figure out who did it.

Make that a huge chance when it's either night, in a desolate place or place with no witnesses at all, a person that won't be missed by anyone, no physical evidence or a combination of these.

Lol!

Im all for it, especially being a notorious law breaker and having a guard say: 'I dont think a sword of this quality belongs to a low-life like you mate. Im taking it into evidence.'
"But.. thats really my sword officer, it was my dear ole mums."
'yeah, yeah..' *walks off with your stolen items and your dear ole mum's sword.*

But, I would always have to be able to steal it back from an evidence locker, and Id have to be able to clear the now legit stolen flag off my recovered sword, possibly by a fence.

There should be options to bribe certain guards, but if you try to bribe the wrong one, you might get an even larger bounty. You should be able to tell which guards you can't and can by the way they act and talk to you, indicating what type of guard they are. And possibly paying off guards for certain information that might be valuable to you.

I'd like if the player had to have a trial for more serious crimes, like murder. Your speechcraft skill would be the deciding factor, along with the degree of your crime, as to whether or not you go to jail. Obviously this would be annoying if it was implemented for every crime, so petty crimes should just warrant an on-the-spot fine.

I like your idea alot. I always though that if you stashed your stolen items some where for a while it would lose the stolen marker. I loved being a thief in OB but hated that i had to join the thieves guild to get a fence so i could sell my ill gotten goods (i may have also be a dumb dumb and never able to find a non-guild fence) so i was limited to stealing food/alchemist supplies, gold, and the like. but never the big stuff.
Of course it would not work on special unique items, and the time it it took for it to be forgotten would depend on how valuable it was and who you stole it from. Ex/ you break in and take all the armor out of a small rundown blacksmith you may only have to wait a few days to a week until you can sell it. Though if you nick off with a baroness jewelry box you may have to wait alot longer.

This, and it should be more local. I don't want to steal an apple in one town and get all of Skyrim after me.

[img]http://img830.imageshack.us/img830/9906/67828889.png[/img]

Sorry, had to post this as a picture, as this boards killed the layout of my text :whistling:

I would like to see some system where for minor crimes you are given a quest or Job to work off your crime (like forging 10 weapons for the guard if you are caught stealing or trespassing)

A bit like community service?

And I like the idea that if guards see you walking around late at night they might approach and start to question you, especially if you are a known criminal, and maybe even spy on you if they see you sneaking around.

I thought that Daggerfall had this kind of system. Need to check first.

Players in Daggerfall went to court and the judge decided the sentence of your crime. The factors that affected the sentencing depended upon reputation in that providence and the player's standing in the Dark Brotherhood if they belonged to the guild. I'm sure I missed something but I believe that covers the basics.

When your running away they should say:
"10-4 I'm in pursuit of a [insert description here] requesting backup on [inset location here]"
Then http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iISyPz5XRyI song plays...

ahahaha!

on topic - i really liked the 'regionally known' mod for morrowind, where only the guards in a certain zone know of your crimes

I really hope that they've fixed the crime & punishment system from Oblivion. I don't want a bounty on my head for killing someone in the middle of friggin' nowhere with no witnesses around!

I also think masks an other disguises can be added.

When wearing a mask to steal or murder someone and your wearing a mask, the gaurds cannot identify you if they spot you, unless you were to walk out in public with that same type of mask.

If you are wearing a mask at all some gaurds might get suspicious and keep an eye on you.


Also I think disguises should be in skyrim, lets say you knock out a gaurd and steal his uniform. Some gaurds might not notice but gaurd captains and higher ups will spot you out plainly and arrest you and also for whatever you did to the gaurd or his items.(even if it wasn't you)

I guess that is what you would call it.
I just felt it was pointless to have guards locking me up for acedently picking up a pair of scissers that did not belong to me

These are all cool ideas, and I like in particular DJ Gamer's suggestion that some vigilantes or someone would come after you to try to collect the bounty.

Since a civil war will be taking place in Skyrim, I hope we can see less of an omniscient, omnipresent, instantaneous police force. If I rack up a high bounty in a city controlled by one of the major factions, why should I become wanted in some other city far away that is at war with the first city?

Also, it would be nice to see perhaps some small outlaw faction which you can only join if you become wanted with a bounty of X, for example.

I like OOO's changes to the imperial soldiers, to make them still tough but not quite so invincible.

Seriously in vanilla Oblivion it was like, "You will pay with your blood!...(for that bowl you accidentally picked up)."

It should be very inconvenient, but it would be great if you can still at least sneak into a town to carry out some of your business even if you have a bounty on your head. maybe if you put on the guard's armor they won't attack you on sight, for example.

No, it needs to be http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r_2Jduxc2P8 song-it would fit better with the "lore".

You mean like http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkZUjXbTLqo? :teehee:

You should only be named a criminal if someone sees you commit a crime and tells the guards. If you kill everyone before that knows before word reaches the guard house you'll bbe safe.

I have to agree that "eliminating witnesses" would be a nice option to have as well. Having investigations could be interesting, although I'm not so sure how that would be pulled off effectively.

That was an entertaining read. Totally agree.