I murdered this one lady in a town and her shopkeeper husband sent three thugs out on a bounty for my head.

Sounds reasonable, except when I killed her, nobody saw me do so. Right after I killed those thugs and collected the contracts, I went back to the guy who ordered the hit. He acted like nothing happened and I sold him one of his own contracts just to get any attention. That didn't work, so I caved and backstabbed him to death.

one of the chickens must of saw you...

this is how AI in elder scrolls works

@Lunar_Aura said:

I murdered this one lady in a town and her shopkeeper husband sent three thugs out on a bounty for my head.

Sounds reasonable, except when I killed her, nobody saw me do so. Right after I killed those thugs and collected the contracts, I went back to the guy who ordered the hit. He acted like nothing happened and I sold him one of his own contracts just to get any attention. That didn't work, so I caved and backstabbed him to death.

I ran into three thugs trying to "teach me a lesson" too. I didn't kill anyone with anyone else finding out. However, the note they had with them mentioned that I was a thief bastard.

yeah a hit was ordered on me too because I stole stuff however nobody saw me and it was really early in the game so the thugs just kept killing me. Eventually I just ran away but later when I exited a random house they showed up again. i haven't seen them since then but i have leveled up a lot in the mean time and should be able to kill them now.

a buddy of mine had a hit called on him after he killed some wicken in the woods. but the hit was called on him by the dead lady. we were confused

@HODGEY3000: Not much different from actual I in the real world :-/

What happens is if you do a lot of crimes that don't increase your bounty, there's still going to be assassin's etc sent after you. You'll have a reputation, but it can't be proven, so they take the law into their own hands. Makes sense and it's a small balance to your horrible exploits.

There was a guy in the first village who's in a relationship with a girl, but there's an elf who's edging in on the girl too and he asks you to deliver a letter to make the elf look bad. I told the elf, and did the reverse (made the guy look bad). After a while, three guys tried to kill me and I found a note saying the guy's MOTHER sent them after me...

Now, I love that this happened but like OP I feel it's a bit weird she knew.

Btw, I thanked the mother for her kind gesture by putting an arrow in her back while she was sleeping. Bitch.

@AhmadMetallic: It was night time at her doorstep when just as she was about to go inside I crouched behind her undetected and slit her throat. Since nobody saw me, the city didn't impose a bounty on my arrest. Thugs came after me maybe after three or four in-game days.

I got this, bounty notice said for stealing cabbages! Harsh as fuck!

I haven't had any thugs come after me (my character is a doughy eyed do-gooder) but I did have an attempt on my head from the Dark Brotherhood. Has anyone else had this happen? I'm wondering if it's a natural thing to happen during normal play or if I did something to piss someone off.

@Lunar_Aura said:

I murdered this one lady in a town and her shopkeeper husband sent three thugs out on a bounty for my head.

right theres your answer

@GreenBeret3 said:

@Lunar_Aura said:

I murdered this one lady in a town and her shopkeeper husband sent three thugs out on a bounty for my head.

Sounds reasonable, except when I killed her, nobody saw me do so. Right after I killed those thugs and collected the contracts, I went back to the guy who ordered the hit. He acted like nothing happened and I sold him one of his own contracts just to get any attention. That didn't work, so I caved and backstabbed him to death.

I ran into three thugs trying to "teach me a lesson" too. I didn't kill anyone with anyone else finding out. However, the note they had with them mentioned that I was a thief bastard.

you get these for doing the thieves guild jobs. i just had the same thing from a guy i had stolen some jewels from in a burgulary job

I haven't had any thugs come after me (my character is a doughy eyed do-gooder) but I did have an attempt on my head from the Dark Brotherhood. Has anyone else had this happen? I'm wondering if it's a natural thing to happen during normal play or if I did something to piss someone off.

I had a cat lady trying to kill me in a sewer, I think she was from the Dark Brotherhood.

the city didn't impose a bounty on my arrest. 

Man I wish I could go into other people's games and collect the bounties on them

Got a hit on me for stealing potions in the temple at Whiterun. Y'know the one with people groaning in pain. So I probably deserved it.

This seems like basically a more nuanced version of Fallout 3's system where you'd have Talon Company assassins or Regulators randomly appear every several days, depending on your karma and once your reputation was high enough.

Man I wish I could go into other people's games and collect the bounties on them

@Xeiphyer said:

@Commisar123 said:

Man I wish I could go into other people's games and collect the bounties on them

You should play Dark Souls then. =P

I never got far enough to do that XD and I doubt I would be able to collect them

@mano521 said:

a buddy of mine had a hit called on him after he killed some wicken in the woods. but the hit was called on him by the dead lady. we were confused

I got this one too. I stole a bunch of her shit, which caused her to attack me. I then killed her and stuffed her under the bed. I got to town, and two days later some contracted killers came after me (tough sons of bitches too). In the time between her discovering me in her basement, and me killing her, she must have whipped out her phone and sent out an order for a hitman pretty fucking quick. Is there an app for that?

@AhmadMetallic said:

@Lunar_Aura said:

the city didn't impose a bounty on my arrest.

What's that all about? How are you notified of being wanted? How does it go away?

Usually a prompt would tell you if you have a bounty, but if you really want to check, look at the "crime" section in the stats menu. It goes away when you pay the bounty or serve time in jail.

@Lunar_Aura: A lot of murders don't get seen while they do it, and they still get caught, only explanation CSI: Skyrim

These are the types of little things in this game that area t the same time awesome and frustrating. I wish they would iron it all out so not only is it fun, but that it makes sense too. If you kill someone without anyone around you shouldn't get a bounty.

@Commisar123 said:

Man I wish I could go into other people's games and collect the bounties on them

This would be amazing. Especially if you could have canned dialogue that you could yell at the player before you but an arrow through his head!

@Lunar_Aura said:

I murdered this one lady in a town and her shopkeeper husband sent three thugs out on a bounty for my head.

Sounds reasonable, except when I killed her, nobody saw me do so. Right after I killed those thugs and collected the contracts, I went back to the guy who ordered the hit. He acted like nothing happened and I sold him one of his own contracts just to get any attention. That didn't work, so I caved and backstabbed him to death.

You forgot to put a bucket over her head first. ( and over the heads of any chickens passing by).