Skyrim:The Shill Job

Place an item as evidence inside a wealthy home. Quest Giver: Vex Location(s): The Ragged Flagon Reward: Leveled Gold ID: TGRDU

"Get in, plant the goods and get out. Quiet and neat."

Quick Walkthrough

1. Talk to Vex in The Ragged Flagon about shill jobs and receive the evidence.
2. Enter the house and put the item into the targeted chest.
3. Report back to Vex for your reward.

Detailed Walkthrough

A View to a Shill

After you are a full member of the Thieves Guild, you will want to start thieving for fun and profit. By now, you will have met Vex. She handles all the burglary, shill, sweep and heist jobs. In order to earn some gold and help Vex with her goal of restoring the Guild to its former glory, ask her for a shill job. She will inform you that a client has requested someone be taken out. Unlike the Dark Brotherhood, the guild does this by planting evidence in their home and tipping off the guard.

The Plant

Vex will give you a stolen item that needs to be placed as evidence. The item is a randomly-selected gem or unenchanted piece of jewelry (circlet, necklace, or ring); see Leveled Lists for full details. The item is identical to a standard item, except that "Stolen" has been added to its name.

The quest can send you to any wealthy house, which amounts to twenty-nine possible houses. You may be assigned the same location more than once.

Markarth	Riften	Solitude	Whiterun	Windhelm
Nepos's House Ogmund's House Smelter Overseer's House The Treasury House	Aerin's House Bolli's House Marise Aravel's House Romlyn Dreth's House Snow-Shod Manor Valindor's House	Addvar's House Bryling's House Evette San's House Hall of the Dead Jala's House Vittoria Vici's House	Amren's House Carlotta Valentia's House Heimskr's House (See Bugs) House of Clan Battle-Born House Gray-Mane Uthgerd's House Ysolda's House	Atheron Residence Belyn Hlaalu's House Brunwulf Free-Winter's House House of Clan Cruel-Sea House of Clan Shatter-Shield Viola Giordano's House

You need to enter the selected house undetected and find the designated chest. Open the chest and place the stolen item in it. Although there may be multiple containers in the house, only the chest indicated by your quest marker will work; if you attempt to put the stolen item into the wrong container, you will be told that you can't remove the item from your inventory. If you are sent to jail while the quest is active, for any reason, you will fail the quest. Getting caught in the house or killing anyone living in the house will also result in failing the quest. You are not responsible for tipping off the guards after placing the evidence.

Once you have planted the evidence, return to Vex for a leveled gold reward.

Reward

Levels	Reward
1-5	50
6-10	100
11-15	150
16-20	200
21-26	250
27-31	300
32-36	350
37-41	400
42+	500

Notes

• Even if you complete the job successfully, there are no obvious repercussions for the person you have framed. They do not go to jail or otherwise become inaccessible.
• If one of the house's occupants dies for any reason while the quest is active (even if you are not responsible), you will fail the quest.
• Despite the Stolen indication in the item's name, the item given to you will not be flagged as stolen.

Bugs

• If you have already participated in the quest Battle for Whiterun it becomes impossible to enter some homes in Whiterun, namely Heimskr's House and Severio Pelagia's House. However, they can still be assigned as a possible quest destination.
  • The Unofficial Skyrim Patch, version 1.1, fixes this bug.
  • Quit the job and retake it for another location (you can load a previous save to avoid a failed quest if you wish).
  • You can use the console command coc, followed by the editor id of the house.
• The chest you must plant the Stolen Flawless Ruby in Uthgerd's home may already contain a Flawless Ruby. If you steal the contents before planting the Stolen Flawless Ruby and already have a stolen flawless ruby in your inventory, it does not register that you have planted the one given to you by Vex. Placing the ruby in the chest that is labeled Stolen Flawless Ruby does nothing in regards to completing the quest objective, and taking it back out simply adds it to your already existing inventory of flawless rubies. If you autosave on travel, just reload the Uthgerd's House save and place your current flawless ruby inventory into another container or drop on the ground.
• The "stolen item" might disappear from your inventory for no obvious reasons and you'll be unable to complete the quest.
  • To fix this, use setstage tgrdu 10 in the console and it will take the quest back to the stage that Vex gave your character the item.
  • Quit the job and retake it for another location (you can load a previous save to avoid a failed quest if you wish). This will give you a different item as evidence.
  • The item disappearing may be due to the item being a gem, and the stolen gem being used to smith a piece of jewelry.

Quest Stages

The Shill Job (TGRDU)
Stage	Finishes Quest	Journal Entry
10		Objective 10: Plant the <Alias=Evidence> in <Alias=WealthyHome> in <Alias=City>
20		I've been told to plant the <Alias=Evidence> in <Alias=WealthyHome> in <Alias=City>. I need to complete this job without killing any of the location's residents or getting caught and spending time in jail.
		I've planted the <Alias=Evidence> in <Alias=WealthyHome> in <Alias=City>.
200	Finishes quest	I've successfully completed the job and received my share of the pay.
250	Fails quest	By killing a resident at the task's location, I've failed this job and was forced to forfeit my share of the pay.
	Fails quest	During the course of this task, I was arrested and sent to the local jail. I've therefore failed the job and was forced to forfeit my share of the pay.
	Fails quest	Before the task could be completed, I decided to quit. I've therefore failed the job and forfeited any pay I might have received.
Unknown		Objective 20: Return to Vex

Notes

• Any text displayed in angle brackets (e.g., <Alias=LocationHold>) is dynamically set by the Radiant Quest system, and will be filled in with the appropriate word(s) when seen in game.
• Not all Journal Entries may appear in your journal; which entries appear and which entries do not depends on the manner in which the quest is done.
• Stages are not always in order of progress. This is usually the case with quests that have multiple possible outcomes or quests where certain tasks may be done in any order. Some stages may therefore repeat objectives seen in other stages.
• If an entry is marked as "Finishes Quest" it means the quest disappears from the Active Quest list, but you may still receive new entries for that quest.
• On the PC, it is possible to use the console to advance through the quest by entering setstage TGRDU stage, where stage is the number of the stage you wish to complete. It is not possible to un-complete (i.e. go back) quest stages, but it is possible to clear all stages of the quest using resetquest TGRDU.