Unite Skyrim Under One Banner – Become High King
Skyrim is fractured, weakened by civil war and left vulnerable to its true enemy—the Thalmor. In this mod, you will rise to claim the throne, bringing all of Skyrim under your rule as High King. But power is not simply given—it must be earned.

Features:
🔥 Claim the Throne: Prove your worth by gathering supporters, amassing wealth, and ensuring the Civil War is resolved—by diplomacy, marriage, or force.
🏰 Rule from Highreach Keep: A vast castle with barracks, forges, marketplaces, a throne room, an arena, a prison, a treasury, and even a captured dragon!
⚔️ Raise an Army & Form the Rangers: Recruit soldiers, heroes, and the elite Highreach Rangers to patrol Skyrim, defend its borders, and root out spies.
📜 Shape Skyrim’s Leadership: Appoint Jarls, a Lord Commander, a High Scholar, an Administrator, a High Wizard, and a personal council of five trusted advisors.
🛠️ Command & Enforce Your Rule: As High King, order arrests, execute criminals, imprison enemies, seize possessions, and even force loyalty through the Thu’um.
💍 Marry for Power or Love: Marry Ulfric, Elisif, or another spouse to cement your claim—or remove them to eliminate rivals. Fully custom wedding system for Elisif and Ulfric with vows, location, and unique dialogue.
👥 Populate Your Kingdom: Bring in citizens, nobles, traders, and followers to build Highreach into a thriving settlement.
📖 Eldis Companion Quest: Join a royal outcast in a fully voiced personal quest for justice, uncovering secret lineages, betrayal, and hidden documents that tie back to the Empire itself.
🧠 Immersive Roleplaying Powers: Summon your council, issue decrees, knight your followers, and wield new king-exclusive abilities.
🔮 Unique Spells & Items: Gain access to teleportation spells, legendary armor, enchanted gear, and ceremonial royal weapons.
🌊 Recover the Stormcrown: A new post-quest storyline sends you to the Sea of Ghosts to find a lost artifact tied to the fate of Skyrim's past rulers.
🤝 4 Fully Voiced, Custom Companions:
• Eldis – A noble-born exile with a sharp tongue, fierce heart, and a burning desire for justice. Uncover her past through a deeply personal questline.
• Kalel the Black Fox – A swashbuckling rogue from Hammerfell with charm, wit, and a sharp blade. Challenges you to duels and fights for coin—and for fun.
• Veldar Duskstrider – A disgraced Telvanni battlemage turned mercenary philosopher. Wields powerful destruction magic and offers cryptic, poetic wisdom.
• Surgus of the Black – Your first ally and loyal steward. A mysterious Argonian with a dark past, dry humor, and an unwavering belief in your destiny.
• 10-20 hours of new content with lots to explore and lots of good people to get to know.

Whether you rule with honor or tyranny is up to you. Skyrim’s fate is in your hands. Will you bring peace and unity—or rule with an iron fist?



Acknowledgments
This mod builds upon the incredible work of aysigago and Solarhamster, whose original "Become High King of Skyrim" laid the foundation for an ambitious and immersive experience.
Their vision brought to life the fantasy of ruling Skyrim, allowing players to wield real power over the land and its people. Their dedication, creativity, and effort made something truly special, and this expanded version is built with deep respect for their work.
This version expands upon their foundation while staying true to their original intent—offering more depth, new mechanics, and a richer experience without losing what made the original mod great. Skyrim still needs a High King. Will that be you?

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What’s New in This Version?
This expanded version of Become High King of Skyrim refines, enhances, and restructures the original mod while staying true to its core vision. Here’s what has changed:

🔊 Fully Voiced NPCs – Every NPC, from Surgus to the citizens of Highreach, are now fully voiced. No more silent subtitles—Skyrim’s rulers and subjects finally speak.
📜 A Rewritten Story & Dialogue Overhaul – Surgus has been completely rewritten to be lore-friendly, immersive, and persuasive. The throne is no longer a footnote—it’s the goal.
🏰 Highreach Keep, Reimagined – Overhauled exterior and interior, with new assets, architecture, waterfalls, bridges, and lore-based symbolism.
👥 A Living Highreach – Every NPC has a schedule, role, and purpose. Highreach is no longer a ghost town—it’s a political capital.
🛠️ Streamlined Features – Removed redundant mechanics like the assassination system. Rebalanced and repurposed existing NPCs to fit the mod’s new vision.
💒 Custom Marriage System – Fully functional ceremonies for Elisif and Ulfric, with vows, locations, AI behavior, and post-wedding dialogue.
⚓ Stormcrown Artifact Quest – Dive into the Sea of Ghosts to recover the lost crown of High Kings, unlocking mysteries from Skyrim’s forgotten history.
📚 New Quests and Branching Paths – Companion storylines like Eldis’ offer depth, emotion, and roleplay outcomes tied to your rule.

This version of Become High King of Skyrim is expansive yet refined, focusing on what matters: your journey to the throne, the people who serve and oppose you, and the world you shape. Rule well—or rule with an iron fist. The choice is yours.

What's New in Version 1.5?

• Highreach is now accessible from the beginning of the game AND with working map markers. You won't be able to access the castle or the Guild Hall until you are king.
• New quest start - a much more immersive start rather than my emergency fix. Quest requirements will stay the same so you must complete No One Escapes Cidna Mine and The Blessings of Nature. Once those are done - head to the Solitude Docks area and meet a Redguard woman named Lairah.
• A working court! - each councilor will now function (the Court Wizard never got built in 13 years of existing!) and all will have immersive AI packages.
• The King's Ledger! This book will track your staff assignments including the jarls. So you'll know what council position does what AND who's been assigned to that position.
• A redesign of the throne area. New thrones for the King, Grand Advisor AND spouse. 
• New banners - BHKS themed. No vanilla banners.
• New rooms for the Grand Advisor.
• The High Priest of Skyrim - appoint a priest and have them provide sermons in the church and give you a blessing.
• Priest and Scholar rooms. 
• The Master of Assassins will have a tutorial dialogue to explain how to use them.
• More, much more navmeshing for NPCs and followers.
• Citizen of Highreach AI packages - no more all moving at the same time and doing the same thing. Each citizen will have their own AI package.
• A new NPC/citizen.
• Neesei, Sonya, Artmoor, Tsabhi, Nahlotviing and Uramul revoiced in Elevenlabs for quality.
• Note - Nahlotviing will not speak to you unless you are king, weakling.
• Tsabhi and Uramul now are vendors of food and weapons, respectively.
• New dialogues for vanilla NPCs to reduce repeated lines.
• All this will be voiced.
• Stormcrown now fits humans and elfs WAY better. Still not great for BIG hairs and Argonians. Clips with Khajiit heads.
• Varfang and Stormrender's enchantments are fixed.
• New dialogue for Surgus that checks if Civil War is completed and then marks the stage done if not marking done on its own.
• Reworked the process for supporters to fix tracking logic.
• The quest Visit Highreach is no longer used, since you've had to have gone there to start the mod.
  

🧩 Compatibility

✅ City Overhauls:
This mod is fully compatible with all major city overhauls, including JK’s Skyrim, Dawn of Skyrim, and The Great Cities.
The only worldspace edit is a door placed along the Solitude Docks road. It has been tested and confirmed compatible with The Great City of Solitude.

If you use any other mods that expand or modify the docks, especially ones that overhaul the East Empire Company area, please report any conflicts—I won't be testing every variation, but I'm happy to log known issues from user reports.

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✅ Conquest of Skyrim:
Technically compatible—there are no bugs or crashes—but the two mods serve similar purposes and will completely break immersion. You’ll become High King twice, which obviously makes no sense narratively.
Use both if you like, but be warned: the storytelling will fall apart.

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✅ Civil War Mods:
Compatible with mods that change or extend the civil war—such as Open Civil War, Civil War Overhaul Redux, or CWES.
The only requirement is that they do not remove the CWOBJ quest or alter its key stage progression logic.

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✅ Wedding Mods:
Fully compatible with any mod that alters the vanilla marriage system or adds new eligible spouses.
This mod does not use or overwrite the RelationshipMarriage quest and should coexist cleanly with mods like Spouse Commentary Overhaul or expanded dialogue packs.

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KNOWN INCOMPATIBLITIES:
None except any mod that edits the Solitude Docks area that doesn't have a current patch.

Let me know if you'd like a dedicated Known Incompatibilities section for mod conflicts!

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Known Bugs

• The map marker to the Snorting Horker for Eldis' quest refuses to work. Read your journal to know where to go.
• The marriage ring may not equip visually on some characters due to vanilla slot limitations.
• Surgus MAY not speak the first time you meet him. Save - then reload and he should voice his lines.
• In rare cases, promoted Jarls may return to their original locations after long waits or cell unloads.
• Citizens may occasionally wander during judgment scenes—fix pending.
• Surgus has his back turned away from you in both wedding ceremony options.
• There may be old bugs still from the original. I'll work on quashing them as they are reported.
• You may have discolored faces for males in Highreach. That's because regenerating FaceGen Data in CK is causing CTDs. I don't know why. Use Face Discoloration Fix as I should be a staple in your load order anyways.
• Some users have reported that getting 40 supporters isn't changing the objective. use setstage aabecomekingskyrim 40
• Lairah may wander off to the north after meeting you and giving you the opening quest. Don't worry, she'll be fine.
  

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User tips:
From baneofcows: Appointed Mjoll the Lioness and a few other folks to be Heroes of Skyrim. When you're not using them, Heroes of Skyrim train at the dummies in front of the keep. So they're out there, swinging away. But because of his follow script, Aerin is also there. Just behind Mjoll. Near a bunch of people with two-handed weapons who are swinging them around not so carefully.

Aerin is not essential. I found this out when Uthgerd the Unbroken got a little overzealous with a power attack, missed the dummy entirely, and turned him into ground beef. And Mjoll, champ that she is, just kept on training.

Planned Releases

🔹 Version 2.0 (Fall 2025)
Our next big release has too much planned content to list here. Read the article for the roadmap.

🔸 Version 3.0 is now DLC 1: The Thalmor War
I can't reveal too much about this yet. But this will be like nothing that's ever been done before narratively with mods that I know of and completely different than the Thalmor War that was part of the original mod. The Thalmor War will be not be an update to BHKS-TNG. It will be an add-on, requiring V2 (think Sim Settlements 2). It won't be as big as V2, but it will be great. This also will set the format for future add-ons for BHKS-TNG, with DLC 2: Legacies planned.


From the Author
This is my first mod—and the result of hundreds of hours of work, learning, late nights, and trial-and-error with the Creation Kit, xEdit, scripting, and custom voice systems.

I’ve been modding Skyrim personally for years, but this is my first time releasing something to the public. I wanted to bring the original High King concept to life in a way that felt immersive, powerful, and worthy of a true King.

Every line of dialogue, every scene, every system was built with care, with love for the game and the community behind it. My goal was to give players the fantasy we all dreamed of: not just sitting on a throne, but ruling from it—with people, politics, allies, enemies, and legacy.

If you enjoy it, please consider endorsing the mod, sharing your screenshots, or just leaving a comment.
Your support means the world.

– WinterishClover

:: CREDITS ::
♦ Based on the original Become High King of Skyrim by Aysigago
♦ Voice work by ElevenLabs & XVASynth
♦ Scripting and implementation: xEdit, Papyrus, CK
♦ Special thanks to Darkfox127 and the Skyrim modding community
♦ Coldsun for his endless knowledge and advice.

Asset Contributors:
♦ avebrave – Skyring assets
♦ TheInquisitor – Weapons and bow assets
♦ LvxMagick – Dragon Shield assets
♦ ShasSaalLDred – Crown assets
♦ ElSopa, imnotfamous, and Xtudo – Statue models and textures
♦ KSHair and Botox for Skyrim.

Modder’s Resources Used:
♦ Blary – Books, food, containers
♦ Oaristys – Modder’s Resource Pack
♦ InsanitySorrow – Armor and decoration assets
♦ Tamira & Stroti – Furniture and environment assets
♦ Mathys - for like….everything else.

I want to also send a personal thanks to my wonderful team of helpers and creators. Take a moment to send them Kudos for helping:
Simdrew1993 - asset and texture creation
Krytpek - managing the Discord and Beta Testing

and my beta-testers:
BlazingSandwich
Xandermort95