And now the conclusion!
Year 11369
Aragorn has just been crowned High King of Gondor and Arnor. The lands to the North are integrated into his new Kingdom, and now there is finally money and resources to actually colonize it in his lifetime! :
His new vassals also seem to like him, and due to his own very high martial (24), and a Marshall with 28 (!) skill, Gondor's military potential is almost fully
twice as high as it was under Denethor! (Vassal opinions are too high though, yes, he's the King Returned, but he has some items which we will need to nerf
when it comes to relationship opinion bonuses).
The line of Stewards keep the lands of West Osgiliath that they held in defense for so long:
A player-Steward cannot refuse the Return of the King, but he can secretly decide that he is not welcome, and then he gets a claim on E_Gondor which may or
may not be used to plot against Aragorn (But why is his heir not Faramir, and instead some new 7-year old son? Weird...) .
Up in the North, it seems the Bardings led by King Brand's son, Bard, are attempting a revolt against their new overlords, perhaps heartened by the news of Gondor's victory? Alas, it looks like it is being crushed.
Year 11370
After a few weeks, and having getting settled in, Aragorn's thoughts turn to Frodo. He must still be hiding somewhere and unable to get into Mordor, because Sauron isn't destroyed, and nor has he gotten his ring back!
Aragorn decides to make a gamble (this is actually the most dangerous part, I think there is 15-20% chance of Sauron getting the ring, even now):
You can also at this point decide to not risk Frodo getting caught, and go looking for him, bringing him back to Minas Tirith for safe-keeping indefinitely.
For Frodo... :
(The Rohirrim are also invited to join the assault on Mordor)
Of course, whenever someone attacks Mordor and Sauron is alive, he calls in all his allies amongst the easterlings and southrons:
Let's hope this distraction is enough for Frodo to sneak into Mordor and finally destroy that ring...
Aaaand it was!
Sauron is destroyed, and Mordor splits into bickering realms. Mordor is now run by... Dark Lord Gazfimbul? Well good luck trying to hang on to that title,
you've got some big shoes to fill!
And thus ends our tale of Aragorn, last heir of the Kings of Men, and the War of the Ring.
PS: Aragorn's first act as King was to raise taxes. Re-building the North Realm is going to be expensive, after all, and you gotta spend your political capital while you still have it...
As you can see, there are some balance-of-forces issues here and there, but these are easy enough to tweak until we get it right! The mod is functional now, at least,
the gameplay dynamics can be worked out as needed.