Are there items that when sold to merchants, will stay in their inventory forever (aside from Dragon Claws)?
This answer in the question, "Can you rebuy things from fences if they don't sell that item in skyrim?" states that:
Unique items (e.g. Dragon Claws) remain in the inventory of the storekeepers indefinitely. However items such as armour, whilst they will remain for a day or so, are liable to be lost permanently when the storekeeper's merchandise chest resets.
Aside from Dragon Claws, are there other "unique" items which will stay in a merchant's inventory forever? What determines if an item is considered "unique"?
I would like to know as I regularly sell items I don't need to merchants, so they can be "deleted" in the game when the merchants have their inventory reset. I am not sure which items will indeed be removed with a merchant inventory reset.
Solution 1:
I've had several items stay far, far, longer than a day in a vendor's shop before. I am not sure if they stay indefinitely, though they seem to take a lot of time to go away.
The UESP wiki lists two distinct types of permanent items:
Type 1 - Permanent (fully)
- Keep their RefID number, when dropped into the world
- Do not lose any of their persistent traits when dropped into the world
Type 2 - Permanent (until dropped)
- May keep or lose their RefID number, when dropped into the world
- Lose any or all of their persistent traits when first dropped into the world.
List of permanent items
The following items were found to be fully permanent:
- Aetherial Crown [DG]
- Ebony Blade
- The Gauldur Amulet
- Zephyr [DG]
The following items were found to be permanent until dropped (or placed on a weapon plaque):
- Calcelmo's Ring
- Declaration of War [DB]
- Eduj
- Emerald Dragon Claw
- Halldir's Staff - the one you get from Halldir's ash pile, not the one which drops near it
- Ironhand Gauntlets - looted from Hajvarr Iron-Hand
- Iron Dragon Claw
- Journals of Ralys Sedaris [DB] - all volumes
- Klimmek's Supplies
- Letter from a Friend - all instances
- Okin
- Ruby Dragon Claw
- Saerek's Skull Key - only if you do not use it to awaken Otar the Mad (awaken him with shout or rune spell instead)
- Staff of Hag's Wrath
- The Aetherium Wars [DG] - only the first copy, obtained before or during associated quest
- Torsten's Skull Key - only if you do not use it to awaken Otar the Mad (awaken him with shout or rune spell instead)
- Whiterun guard's armor, shield, helmet, gloves and boots - looted from Mirmulnir
Note: Permanent weapons may fail to prevent corpses from disappearing, although they will remain in respawning containers.