Fixing the Bound Sword Crash

Does the game crash when you cast Bound Sword? If so, look here for a quick, easy, and tested fix for the crash.

Thanks to the Skyrim players on the Skyrim Forum for finding and posting the fix for this.

4-16-2013 Updated how to get Item IDs for quest items to make it simpler.

12-4-2014 Edited the guides grammar and step names for a more professional and easy to understand guide.

2-27-2026 Gave my 13 year old guide yet another grammar pass. Thank you for over a decade of thanks and community awards!

The Problem

Hello! Thanks for taking the time to read my guide, whether as a sufferer of this bug, or simply a random passerby reading for the heck of it. Fixing the Bound Sword crash will require some minor console usage and should take no more than 5 minutes. After performing the fixes your inventory will be completely cleared and reset (sans a set of iron armor and basic potions, which I assume Bethesda uses as a base character template, you can keep or discard them as desired.)

This glitch/crash mostly occurs if you have subscribed to a Steam Workshop item, or mod from another platform, and then remove the mod from your game. Despite the items no longer appearing, they exist still as invisible, weightless items in your inventory. This causes conflicts with the mechanics of the Bound Weapon spells.

Store Everything

The steps to fix the bug are quite simple, merely follow the steps below and you're already almost done!

• Go to your home, or wherever a chest/container may be. (Your home is still the better option for safety)
  
• SAVE YOUR GAME
  
• Deposit all items you have into your container.

Your inventory should be bare of items, quest items excluded. You can find the item ID's of them by typing "player.showinventory" into console which is required to continue. (I'll provide example IDs in the next section if you are unfamiliar)

Preserving Quest Items

For all of the quest items you have, you need to make a copy of them before you move on, otherwise they will be lost.

Open up your console (the ` key) and type "player.drop itemID #" then press ENTER. The itemID being the varyingly long string of digits, and the # being the amount of said item you need.

To see the ID for your quest items type into the console player.showinventory

When you spawn in items, the game will spawn them in based on where your cursor is currently pointing, best to be aiming at the floor nearby.

In this example, since it is a VERY common item for players to have, I had acquired 3 of the Unusual Gems (Stones of Barenziah), so I typed "player.drop 9dfbb 3" followed by pressing ENTER.

Then, I had a Meridia's Beacon, so I typed "player.drop 0004e4e6 1" and press ENTER again.

Repeat this step for every quest item in your inventory. But do not pick these items up yet. Failure to do so will result in you losing them, so double check everything before moving on.

The Final Step

Having completed the previous steps correctly, all of your inventory should now be in a chest, and all quest items should be on the floor in front of you.


The last step now is to type "player.resetinventory" into console.

You're inventory has now been completely cleared of all items glitched and otherwise, and has been replaced by a "Starter" set. You should have a full set of iron armor and a few potions now. You can do with this what you will, the only thing you have to do is pick up your quest items off the floor and remove your items from the chest.

All of your spells, spent perks, unspent perk points, experience and levels will remain untouched.

Now equip the "Bound Sword" spell and cast it and it should work as intended without crashing the game.

Questions, Problems, Feedback

If everything went well, you should now be able to cast Bound Weapon without any issues, bugs, or crashes!

If you encounter any problems/glitches/or have any questions, please leave a comment below. I appreciate them greatly.

Thank you and enjoy!

[xenocraft1212]

Thank you! I used player.resetinventory before managing my inventory to see if it would fix bound sword for me. Not only did it fix it, it also left my inventory completely intact! The only noticeable change is that I equipped iron armor from nowhere and a great sword I already had. I recommend making a save and trying player.resetinventory to see if you really need to store stuff. Might save you time like it did me.

[Layla Spellwind]

Thank you, this helped a ton. Was driving me mad. <3

[Gchan]

Working in my case. (Spanish keyboard uses ªº to open the console)
If you have the items of the Goldenhill farm as me, don't spawn them, no issues if you delete the items.

If you spawn some item accidentally and you want to delete it from the screen use the following command:

recycleactor and use your mouse to point and click the item.


I hope this reset won't affect the rest of my adventure :(

[Hot Rod Magazine]

this works just fine on 1.6.1170 with 486 mods, feels weird when a vanilla bug breaks through all that

[RealDeadGamer85]

You're awesome, thank you for fixing my game!

[Redem]

Thank you so much. It totally worked for me

[mitzmike]

worked like magic, thanks friend

[Zamisay]

Thank you so very much, You Absolute Legend, You!

The mod Native EditorID Fix puts names on the item IDs, so you will have a better idea of what items you are fooling around with.

I would not recommend dropping the outbuildings from Goldenhills Plantation, they are rather... life sized, instead make careful note if their item IDs (Why are they in your inventory?! So mysterious)

[Big Hoshiguma]

@ToferNaut Dupe first, on the floor, then delete.

[ToferNaut]

SOMONE PLEASE HELP!! Ive ben trying to figure out how to do this on my own, but theres some part that isnt specified. do i just delete everything in my inventory and then just give myself back the quest items? or am i somehow supposed to duplicate them and then delete the others?