Way to know if a NPC will respawn by its ID

the-elder-scrolls-v-skyrim

Being a vampire encouraged me to just slay whatever just to feed.

I'm a bit wary though, because I wouldn't want to kill an NPC, having it not respawn and render a quest or whatever unavailable, and I wouldn't even know.

Is there any console command that I could run on specific NPCs to check it right before I kill them? I explored some actor values (AV) but couldn't find anything relevant.
If not, is there any online resource where I could enter the NPC ID to check?

Best Answer

Can you use look at the REF ID and find whether or not that NPC respanws?

No, you cannot look at a REFID and find whether or not that person respawns
The REF ID is meant to do what its name tells it to, to act as a Reference ID. This is so you can do subesquent actions, scripts or console commands on that REF ID and be insured that it will affect only THAT object with THAT REF ID.

It's kinda like asking whether or not someone likes to eat donuts just by looking at their name. Their name is used so you can identify that specific person, and does not give any information on whether or not that person likes to eat donuts.

The only real way of Using the REF ID is to see if that NPC even has one. If it does not have a REF ID, chances are they do respawn, as this indicates they are NPC's such as Guards and Bandits and should respawn after some time

There is no console command to either toggle NPC to respawn, or check if they do respawn on death. You can only force respawn yourself with the command:

Resurrect <#>

Where you would change has to:

  • 1 to resurrect with all current items intact.
  • 0 to have the corpse removed & a new copy spawned

You will need to activate the NPC first to run this code. This can be done through typing this in the consolce command:

Prid <#>

Where you would replace # with the NPC's REF ID

How to get REF ID

Skip if you already have the NPC's Ref ID
There are three main ways to get the REF ID of a NPC. The first and third option works for mods that add NPC

  1. Activate the console, and click on that NPC. This should list the REF-ID on the right-hand side, along with other pieces of useful info. If clicking on the NPC does not bring up any info, look at the other steps
  2. Look at the UESP Wiki: Skyrim-NPC, which lists all vanilla NPC and their info, including REF ID. Just search for the NPC's name. This will NOT work for NPC that are added by mods

  3. If you cannot locate the NPC, or clicking does not bring up the info (happens sometimes), then simply type this into the console.

    save funclist 1

    This will save your game at that point, and open a .txt file with all REF ID's inside your save. Simply search for the name of that NPC, and the .txt file will tell you that NPC's REF ID.

So what can you do?

  1. You can get their REF ID and search it on UESP Wiki, which will display whether or not the NPC is respawnable. You could search either with their name, BASE ID or REF ID. An example is the page UESP Wiki: Rifted Guards. It says that they do respawn

  2. You can check if that NPC does not have a Ref ID. If they don't have a REF ID, then it is most likely that they do respawn. Check with other ways to be sure.

  3. You can open that specific character in the Creation Kit (CK) and see if they have "respawn" checked in their actor dialogue box. Use the REF ID to find the specific actor to look at

  4. You can use the mod NPC All Respawn to make all NPC respawn, except for:

    • Guards
    • NPC's specifically assigned a Main quest code in front of their name
    • Creatures
    • Ghosts
    • Encounters
    • Leveled
    • Corpses
    • Followers

  5. Use some common sense. Any NPC that has a generic name (Such as Guard) will respawn after some time. Any NPC that has a proper name (Such as Ysolda) should not respawn unless a quest affects it.

Sources:

UESP Wiki
NPC All Respawn
Console Commands (Skyrim Wiki)
UESP Wiki: Riften Guards
UESP Wiki: Skyrim-NPC
Is there a way to get an NPC's RefID in game?: Arcade StackExchange
Personal Experience

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