Skyrim talk:Helgen Keep

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Helgen Keep self-tested and confirmed as Safe Storage on 360[edit]

General Notes about Helgen Keep:
It's important to distinguish between Helgen and Helgen Keep when discussing this. Helgen is an exterior cell and resets after 10 days of inactivity. The 7 or so assorted Bandits who inhabit Helgen will respawn. Helgen Keep, however, is a separate and different cell from Helgen. Once the Bandits who inhabit the Keep's interior are slain, they are perma-corpses and do not respawn. Similarly, any bodies remaining from the Unbound mission are perma-corpses as well, as are the bodies of the Frostbite Spiders in the spider cavern of the Keep. In the final chamber of the Keep, where the player encounters his first Bear during Unbound, the Bear is gone and is replaced by a live Frostbite Spider. After this spider is slain, it too becomes a perma-corpse.

Testing Method:
I have tested every container object in Helgen Keep and can confirm that every container is Safe. I tested by completely stripping Helgen Keep of every clutter object, and placing 1 Iron Arrow and 1 Leather Strip inside every possible container object. After waiting 31 in-game days in another cell, (Dawnstar), I re-entered Helgen Keep and checked every container. None of the containers reset or lost the inventory I placed in them, and no clutter items respawned within the Keep. As far as resetting/respawning goes, Helgen Keep is 100% inert. After the first test, I moved some of the grab-able container items and placed them in different areas of the Keep to see if they would stay where they were dropped. Again, waited 31 in-game days in another cell, and re-entered Helgen Keep. Bodies and Skeletons will remain where they are dropped, and their inventory contents remain Safe. (Exploring Helgen Keep does not place a Cleared notation on the game Map, indicating that the Helgen exterior cell is on a 10 day reset schedule. I can confirm this. However, just to be extra cautious and safe, I used a 30+ day testing cycle for the Helgen Keep interior zone.)

Types of Containers available in Helgen Keep:
Your exact body count may differ, depending on which side you chose during the Unbound tutorial mission, and perhaps how you played through it. Also, there might be some small variability in the number or type of Bandits that inhabit Helgen Keep after Unbound is completed, possibly related to your character's level when you revisit Helgen Keep for the first time. (All container names are as they appear on-screen in the game I tested.)

Conventional Containers:

  • chest: 3
One of these chests, (a large ornate Boss-style chest in the "stone bridges" room) is not present during Unbound, but becomes available after the Bandits move into Helgen.
  • warden's chest
  • cupboard
  • barrel
  • large sack: 3
  • sack: 3
  • knapsack

Humanoid Perma-Corpse Containers:

  • Gunjar
  • Mage
  • Stormcloak Soldier: 12
  • Bandit Chief
  • Bandit Outlaw
  • Bandit: 6
  • skeleton: 5

Spider-related Containers:

  • Frostbite Spider: 6
5 of these Spiders are corpses from the Unbound tutorial. The 6th one replaces the Bear in the final cavern, and although it is a living beast when you first encounter it, it becomes a perma-corpse when slain.
  • egg sac: 7
  • web sac: 2
  • dessicated corpse

On the game I tested, this amounts to 56 Safe Storage Containers.

Movement and Placement of Containers:
The safety and location of player-placed containers was tested and confirmed by a 30+ day Wait period outside of Helgen Keep (in Dawnstar) after having moved containers from their scripted or as-found locations.

Certain containers can be grabbed and moved to different locations within the Keep:

  • Bodies/Corpses move very easily. They will stay where you dropped them after you exit and re-enter Helgen Keep, and their contents remain Safe. The caged Stormcloak or Imperial in the prisoner/torture area obviously can't be moved.
  • Skeltons seem to be very heavy, and can't be lifted off the ground the way corpses can. Consequently, they can only be dragged while in grab mode, and steep slopes, rocks and stairs are obstacles to dragging that cause the grab function to disengage. (If somebody wants to try shouting Skeletons uphill, go ahead.) Any moved Skeletons will remain where they are placed, and their inventory items remain Safe. There are 2 caged Skeletons that cannot be moved.
  • Frostbite Spider appendages can be toyed with while in grab mode, but the bodies themselves seem rooted to the floor, rendering Frostbite Spider corpses unmovable.
  • Web Sacs and the Dessicated Corpse are easily movable, but they seem to be scripted to appear at specific locations in the spider cavern. Once moved to a different location, they will relocate to the spider cavern when you re-enter Helgen Keep. In spite of being force-relocated by the game, their contents will remain Safe. There is an issue here, though. After one of these forced relocations during testing, the Dessicated Corpse disappeared from my game. Whether it dropped below a textured surface and is unreachable, or if it actually vanished is unknown to me. For this reason, I'd advise against moving the Web Sacs and the Dessicated Corpse from the spider cavern if you're going to use them as Safe Storage.
    Evil-i 15:25, 18 February 2012 (UTC)
On the PC, the bodies are not always safe storage. In my first run through, the bodies all disappeared after 2 days. Since then, I've always returned within 1 day, and they are all there (other than the bear).
As to other containers, the only one I've confirmed remains safe for many days at a time is the knapsack in the torturer chamber. Admittedly, I've not tested anything else.
DayDreamer 21:07, 1 March 2012 (UTC)
Looking in the Creation Kit, it doesn't look like all the containers are safe, or even that most of them are safe, but the testing method above seems to be appropriate. This should be re-tested by someone else to confirm. Robin Hoodtalk 06:04, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
The technical CK details are that the Helgen Keep cell (HelgenKeep01) has its encounter zone (XEZN field) set to HelgenZone. That encounter zone has the flag "Never Resets" set to true. It's the same flag that is used for the player's houses to prevent all of their contents from ever resetting. So none of the contents of Helgen Keep will ever respawn.
At some point soon, I want to go add some type of |respawn=never parameter to the Place Summary, and get the bot to autofill the parameter for all dungeons that have a never-resets encounter zone. At that point, the extra note on this page will be redundant -- the Place Summary will simply link to the section on Dungeons which states that some areas are non-respawning. --NepheleTalk 06:36, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
After you told me that about houses, I specifically went looking for it this time, but I was looking in the wrong place. Knowing what I was looking for after your comment, though, I found it, so next time, I'll know where to go. The parameter would be exceptionally useful. I'd suggest adding it now, but I suspect having the bot autofill will be easier if you don't have to deal with some people adding respawn=0, no, never, or whatever other creative parameter values they might think of :), so we're probably better off leaving it off for now. Robin Hoodtalk 06:43, 13 March 2012 (UTC)

A Couple Things[edit]

First of all, I'm on the PS3. When I went back to Helgen Keep there were absolutely NO corpses. The only thing left was the weapons enemies dropped that I didn't pick up, but their bodies HAD cleaned up. I think maybe the way it says all the corpses from Unbound will be there needs to be changed, unless I have some one-off glitch, but I don't think that's the case. Additionally, on the PS3 many times all the wood that is supposed to be just slightly glowing in small amounts due to the fires look like atomic orange french fries. What looks like is happening is that texture that has the hot inner cinders is actually two textures layered on top of each other, and the layer that is the burnt wood, not the still hot inner glowing wood, doesn't load up, leaving me with bright orange glowing wooden beams all over Helgen. This graphical glitch reminds me of the other one I get usually which makes a certain wood beam texture glow at full bright, even at night, making the buildings it's affecting look like a skeletal glow frames from far away. I don't know how else to explain it. My biggest point though is that Helgen cleans up the corpses after Unbound now, maybe it was something they fixed in a patch? --D. Gemini 19:38, 6 March 2012 (UTC)

I'm also on PS3, and it appears that the permanent pre-placed corpses (Gunjar, mage) remain even after Unbound. 151.47.137.143 00:56, 20 February 2013 (GMT)

Why Is This a Stub?[edit]

I believe that Helgen Keep should not be considered a Stub since the article gives a clear description of Helgen Keep. — Unsigned comment by Kitty1014 (talkcontribs) at 17:05 on 28 April 2013

Just look at the sections above for the amount of information absent from the page. This page is seriously lacking in the amount of detail that should be here, therefore it is a stub. Silence is GoldenBreak the Silence 17:08, 28 April 2013 (GMT)

reset?[edit]

I accidentally went with the hadvar so rather than kill stormcloaks I left him to die and ran through there using my emperor's voice power at the start of my game and every time I've been back the stormcloaks that spawned for me to kill(but i didn't) are still standing around in there. sometimes they're killing the bandits that spawn but I haven't seem them disappear yet. the corpses do but not the living npc at least not so far....anybody else have this happen? how long did it last if so? or did i only find a glitch in my save instead? Pseudoname (talk) 02:51, 3 October 2013 (GMT)

I get a similar result by simply avoiding all combat and running through the dungeon and out the cave as fast as I can. I then went to Riverwood, waited for 24 hours, and returned to Helgen. The town was empty, but all of the previously-hostile Imperial soldiers inside the keep were standing around and weren't hostile to me. The frostbite spiders were hostile, and the bear was gone, as well as the first few soldiers that were killed by Hadvar (I followed him into the keep). Seems that these soldiers are only scripted to be removed after they're killed.
BTW, what bandits are you referring to? The ones that spawn in the town? There shouldn't be any Stormcloaks outside the keep, except maybe a stray prisoner or 2 that broke free during Alduin's attack, and the article says, and my experience matches, that bandits only spawn outside the keep, not inside. --Xyzzy Talk 05:24, 3 October 2013 (GMT)
Bandits spawn inside the keep if you stay away long enough, I think it's 30 days. Pseudo's referring to the Stormcloaks that spawn inside; his/her PC was an Imperial, and used the Imperial racial power to stop them from attacking during Unbound. --Morrolan (talk) 05:52, 3 October 2013 (GMT)

State of Helgen Keep after Unbound[edit]

I haven't been to Whiterun yet, having explored a bit in the direction of Falkreath and Ivarstead. I've used the chests in Helgen Keep as a safe base to stash stuff for a few in-game weeks. I think I killed some bandits outside, but I don't see the third chest: only two chests at the foot of two beds, and the warden's chest. The path through the cave is blocked before the drawbridge, after the room with the streams and the small stone bridges. --Mendel (talk) 18:45, 2 February 2014 (GMT)

You have to let it respawn, which clearly isn't the case if you've used it for storage and keep returning to it. Silence is GoldenBreak the Silence 18:50, 2 February 2014 (GMT)
Not 100% sure, but I believe the Bandits spawn and the complete pathway through the interior gets opened up again after the Dragon Rising quest is completed. After Dragon Rising, the Boss Chest in the stone bridge room will appear.

I'm wondering, though, if the Bandit Chief in Helgen Keep is a possible Bounty Quest target for Riften's Jarl. If so, visiting Helgen Keep and killing the Bandit Chief before receiving the quest will render it unfinishable, seeing as how nothing in the Keep respawns/resets.Evil-i (talk) 16:27, 30 July 2014 (GMT)

Reconfirming some things[edit]

As a summary of other topics previously discussed (3-5 years ago) we are getting conflicting reports. Some are saying "No bodies disappear", other saying some bodies did get disabled. I think this depends on how soon after Unbound you re-visited Helgen Keep, and if referring to before or after the bandits appear.

Here is my experience (used Helgen Keep as a storage house from the start, so I re-visited often, while I did a bunch of Dawnguard quests, did not enter Whiterun yet, days passed =29, and had several other previous games where I witnessed pretty much the same thing):

  • While this area doesn't respawn and is considered safe for storage, if you immediately return here after completing Unbound, there may still be some Stormcloak/Imperial Soldiers (and the Captain) corpses from your battles during that quest that are still there. These corpses, the Torturer and his assistant, the Frostbite Spiders*, and the bear will be gone after a day or two, so they are not safe storage. Gunmar, the Mage, and the soldier in a cage who were already dead before you and Ralof/Hadvar got to them, and of course the skeletons will remain and are safe.

The bandits are said to remain, but I have not tested that. I will trust that they will remain, but since I haven't tested myself, I'm not going to state they are safe.

  • Someone said the Frostbite Spiders remained, but in my game they were gone (PS3), perhaps visiting Riverwood (and talking to Alvor/Gerdur) disables them?

The bandits take over after you visit Whiterun (marking it discovered on your map, you don't need to finish or even start Dragon Rising), you don't need to wait for a cell reset to trigger the first bandit occupation. Bamspeedy (talk) 21:32, 28 June 2017 (UTC)