So I finally found poor Meeko all alone out in the woods hoping his master would wake up again. I was moved by the loyalty and sad story so I had to take the guy with me. I really want to give him a new home, my wife and housecarl could take care of him (I'm a thief, he makes too much noise to bring with me everywhere but I might take him hunting or something). But if I ask him to wait at my home I know he'll go back to that run down old shack and have to fend for himself in the cold, and it's dangerous with all the brigands and dragons all around.

Is there any way to make him recognize my house in Solitude as his new home and that we'll take care of him? I have a soft spot for dogs and don't really want to think about him all alone in that shack.

I was thinking this too. He's way too weak to take out in the world with you, but I just feel the need to take care of stray dogs.

after he finds you on the road and leads you back to come help his dead master I got a little choked up I have to admit, I read the story in the journal and actually felt a little watery eyed, with Meeko looking up at you really sad, it's hard not to want to reach down and scratch his ears and say "It's okay boy, I'll take you home and we'll take care of you, you can rest in front of a nice fire and we'll feed you good and you can meet my wife and play with the kids in town and you'll never be alone again"

Yep.... I'm a svcker for a stray....

Give the modders time?

Slightly too lazy to go test this myself now, but would it be possible to take him to your house and use the "tai" (disable ai command in console) on him and make him stay put that way? Assuming you play the PC version of course. Then you can just toggle him back on whenever you need him.

Have to say i like Meeko and the Stray Dog for the first few levels but yes, not very survivable for very long

If you take him to your house and tell him to wait he will stay put for a few days game time. So long as you go back to your house, tell him to follow you then immediately after tell him to stay he'll stay at your house indefinitely. Alternatively you can find a nice house with some kids and leave him there.

I have to say, with only three dogs in the game, you'd figure they would have givin you the option to send them to one of your homes like they do with your spouse. Unfortunetly for me, as a 360 player, Ill nver be able to change this. I try to avoid getting the dogs for this reason,cause I dont want to have to drag em around with me and babysit them since followers are super weak in this game.

Agreed, though there is some logic in having Meeko and Vigilance return to their "Spawn Points".. it's extremely illogical that the stray dog goes back to the point you first met him/her. It would have been great if they added an extra command for dogs like: This your home now .. So when they're send back home.. they will go to the assigned ...eh home.

The dog should have been made a hell of a lot tougher like the Fallout dogs, in my opinion. I had to set Meeko to essential on the PC because I couldn't stand to have a dog die every battle. He was basically useless. I can't imagine using one of the dogs on a console version, so the feature needs some work to be viable. Hopefully the health of the dogs is improved with DLC, kind of like how Broken Steel greatly improved Dogmeat in Fallout 3.

I guess I'll set him as essential and then let him go back to his shack until modders make something that allows him to stay home.

Poor poor Meeko

do dogs level up with the player? if i get a dog at lvl 100 will he be more powerful?

I haven't wandered across Meeko but I'd have to agree ... if you have lost dogs, orphans, whatever in an RPG there should be a method to find them a new home should you desire.

Yeah, I don't even like kids that much (especially with how antagonistic most of the ones in Skyrim are) but when I got to the orphanage in Riften I thought, why can't I adopt one of these kids? It'd be better than staying in the orphanage.