UESP Forums

Is there a way to make stolen items clean? Or of identifying which of my inventory items are "stolen"? I find the whole concept of stolen items in all TES games an annoyance. How would a guard know that a piece of bread you took from an old basket in a hut a hundred miles away was stolen? In MW the issue is aggravated by not knowing when a theft is a theft, and what items are considered stolen. Picking garbage out of crates is fine some cities, in others it's a theft and the guards attack you.

The boring thing is having to strip my character of all items and stand naked before the guard when I'm paying a fine, to avoid finding some of my stuff missing after the shakedown. I wonder if selling something to a merchant and then buying it back might launder it? If yes then Creeper would be the perfect fence...

While on the subject of crimes, the most unspeakable of all seems to be trying to sleep in another's bed. Even killing someone doesn't seem to be so heinous. Just trying to innocently take a nap will bring everyone in reach (guards, servants, etc) crashing on you. "Your crime has been reported". Sheesh. And there's no way of knowing if you can use a bed except trying...

Another silly thing is: "I won't barter while you have that moon sugar". Fine so I slam it on the counter under the vendor's nose. "OK now what may I do for you?"

Morrowind always knows who owns an item and never forgets. You, on the other hand, have to guess at the owners and rely on your own memory to remember what you stole from whom. If using the PC version, you can use the console command "TFH" or "ToggleFullHelp" to see the list of owners and scripts attached to objects. Ownership can be removed from items if they become enchanted.

The uesp wiki is your friend.

In morrowind actually, i find it easier that stuff is not marked stolen. I usually steal stuff and sell it to some merchant without a problem. But if u steal stuff from a merchant and try to sell the same to him, he will realize it as his own stuff and charge u with crime. So u only need to be aware of what u steal and from whom. Also in morrowind, honest merchants seem to be wary of the law which persecutes smugglers of moon sugar (which is actually a drug) and so will not involve themselves with anyone who possesses moon sugar. The only place where I could sell moon sugar was the thieves guild.

Khajiit merchants buy it too, skooma as well. In Balmora you can sell your drugs to the Khajiit merchant on the main square and the alchemist in Mages Guild.

I compiled a post years ago on how to get rid of those annoying stolen tags. You can read it here. Note, this only works on the PC version of the game and only if you have the construction set installed. I don't even know if it's possible to remove them on the console version.