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1) If you don't appoint your Housecarl from that Hold as your Steward for that house, does the Housecarl also move into the house? So you end up with two NPCs automatically living in the house even before you start recruiting other staff members or having a family?

2) Which house is "safest" to raise a family/have lots of servants in? Lakeview Manor in Falkreath is right by Pinewatch, and seems to spawn bears, Frostbite Spiders, and bandits on a regular basis. Windstad Manor in Hjaalmarch is between two Ancient Nord ruins, and the pond where my fish hatchery is has dead Draugr floating in it. And Heljarchen Hall in the Pale is right next to a Giant camp!

I take it that kids are still immortal, but I'd rather like my spouse and staff not to be randomly slain!

3) I wanted to make Erik the Slayer my Steward, but after hiring him and taking him to the house, he didn't have any steward options. It says on his wiki page "The dialog option to become a steward may never appear." Anyone know what causes this and if there's any way round it (on Xbox)? I wondered if maybe I needed to hire and adventure with him several times before he'd be happy to settle down .

Both Housecarls and Stewards will "live" on the property they belong to, and will make use of the home interiors. However, they don't "Take" anything that you have stored there, so your possessions are safe. Your Servants will simply engage in scripted animations, such as sleeping in a bed or cooking a meal at the fire.

There are some light bugs, or peculiar behaviour, related to certain NPC Servants. Valdimar, Windstad's Housecarl, never goes indoors, and spends his days wandering far and wide. I've met him as far away from home as Labyrinthian. In my game, Gregor, Heljarchen's Housecarl, never goes indoors either and is also prone to wandering. I've found him in Riverwood several times. This must be a random glitch in my case, as other people have reported that Gregor behaves normally for them. It might be a glitch related to the Heljarchen property itself, rather than to Gregor, because my Heljarchen Steward also tends to go on long cross-country hikes, although she does go indoors frequently on the rare occasions when she's at home. Rayya from Lakeview is the only Housecarl in my game who I can count on to be on the property when I visit. If you hire a Bard, he/she seems to stay indoors exclusively, while the Carriage Driver spends eternity outdoors, nursing his hemorrhoids on that hard wooden carriage seat.

Personally, I don't use the Housecarls as Stewards. Let the Housecarls be Housecarls; it's their job. A word of caution about appointing Followers as Stewards: It's possible (and easy) to appoint a Follower as Steward for more than one property. Suppose you've made a Follower the Steward of properties A, B and C, in that order. Trouble arises when you tell the Follower to become a Steward again, like when you want to purchase a replacement Cow or Horse after a Bandit Raid. The Follower will fill the Steward role only in the last property they were hired, which is property "C" in this case. Properties A and B are effectively left without the services of a Steward, eventhough an NPC is assigned to that role. Existing Stewards can be replaced by other NPC Followers only when the original Steward dies. Stewards will wear their "default" Armour when you toggle them from Follower to Steward, so you can't fortify them in that manner when they're in Steward mode. They will, however, use better Weapons that you give them, and will also continue to wear enchanted jewellery. I also give them some healing Food and Potions. In this way, they stand a better fighting chance of survival for those times when you aren't around to save the day.

As for the relative safety of the different properties, I don't think the proximity of neighbouring Map Locations has any effect on the lives of your family members. These locations pose more of a danger to your character when you're careless about the route you take to get home, but your family should be fine. Some people have reported that certain properties are more prone to certain types of attacks than others, but I think these things are generated at random, and no one location is inherently more dangerous than any other. It all comes down to the randomness of randomness, which is another way of saying "luck". One thing that does affect the frequency of random attacks is Fast Travel. The less you use it, the friendlier your gameworld is.

Heh. He was asleep on one of the single beds when I wandered into the house at 3.30 am game time today. But on the dot of 6 am, he sprang out of bed and went outside in the snowstorm, dressed only in that leather bandit-like armour that leaves lots of skin exposed. Nords!


Ah. I'd seen this mentioned before, but thanks for the clear explanation. I'm planning on simply appointing certain followers as stewards. Though I already regret appointing Sven - all he does is talk incessantly, repeating the same four lines of dialogue.


I'd noticed the weapons, but didn't know about the jewellery. Okay, I'm off to make some Fortify Health/Fortify Light (or Heavy) Armor jewellery .


Oh, tell me about it. Especially as one of my characters is possessed by the fast travel bug that happened with one of the older patches. When she fast travels, random collections of creatures may turn up spontaneously, sometimes completely in the wrong areas for where they'd normally be spawned.

Thanks! I still need to figure out what's wrong with Erik the Slayer and why he won't generate the steward phrases. Though I only tried making him a steward at one location - perhaps I should try the other houses as well?

Erik's Wiki page lists several Bugs connected with his Stewardship, but no real solutions. Sorry.

Persisting in using him will simply result in you getting Skyrimmed.

EDIT: I noticed that Erik is a "Hireling", and that he'll charge you 500 Gold for each hiring, even as a Steward. It might be that his "hiring script" is conflicting with his Stewardship script. (Regular Follower-Stewards accept the post without asking for compensation.) But that's just pure speculation.