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Oblivion Remastered lets you wipe out entire taverns of NPCs with ease, and I don't know how I missed this playing the original RPG for 19 years

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By Anna Koselke published 7 May 2025

The Dark Brotherhood questline should've taught me better

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Oblivion Remastered
(Image credit: Bethesda Game Studios)
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The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Remastered has been out for over a week now, meaning skilled fans have been hard at work discovering secrets and tricks in Bethesda Game Studios' remade RPG – including one that sees entire taverns of NPCs wiped out with ease.

You don't need magic or a strong sword to clear a room full of unsuspecting NPCs, after all. You just need an inventory full of poisoned apples and one very sneaky character, it seems. As highlighted in a recent video on YouTube from user RedDeadRagdolls, you can replace every food and drink-related item in a building, in this case a tavern, with a poisoned apple – then, you just have to sit back and watch the chaos unfold.

This requires every edible item to have been removed, however, including those on an NPC's person, meaning you might have to pickpocket while you're at it. Once all of the available food has been cleared and replaced by poisoned apples, people will start dropping dead one by one and be none the wiser. It's an amusing sight to behold – two NPCs talking, and one suddenly dies, so the other moves on to converse with others.

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Replacing Food with Poisoned Apples instead.. #oblivion #elderscrolls #npc #tesiv - YouTube Replacing Food with Poisoned Apples instead.. #oblivion #elderscrolls #npc #tesiv - YouTube
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The cycle continues from there, and as hilarious as it all is, I'm only mad I never knew I could do this myself in nearly two decades of playing the original Oblivion. The Purification quest that comes up during the Dark Brotherhood storyline lets you employ a similar tactic to kill your targets, but it's one of those tricks you might not ever think to use outside of game-driven situations – or, at least, I certainly never did myself.

It seems I'm not alone in this, either. Comments under RedDeadRagdolls' video prove as much, with one person exclaiming that they "didn't even know one could do this" and calling the YouTuber an "evil genius" for figuring it out. Another says it's "crazy to see all the ideas I saw in YouTube Oblivion videos back in 2008-09 being done again 16 odd years later in the remaster," confirming the tactic has indeed been around since the OG game.

Here's everything you need to know about The Elder Scrolls 6 after replaying Oblivion.

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The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Remastered The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion
Anna Koselke
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Staff Writer

After spending years with her head in various fantastical realms' clouds, Anna studied English Literature and then Medieval History at the University of Edinburgh, going on to specialize in narrative design and video game journalism as a writer. She has written for various publications since her postgraduate studies, including Dexerto, Fanbyte, GameSpot, IGN, PCGamesN, and more. When she's not frantically trying to form words into coherent sentences, she's probably daydreaming about becoming a fairy druid and befriending every animal or she's spending a thousand (more) hours traversing the Underdark in Baldur's Gate 3. If you spot her away from her PC, you'll always find Anna with a fantasy book, a handheld video game console of some sort, and a Tamagotchi or two on hand.

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