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Grover

Castle Palisade

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The Tales of Lady Gwenllian

 

10. Castle Palisade

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Concurrent with the temporary palisade around the town, a small palisade was built on the castle grounds. 

Temporary defenses for the castle grounds differed from the town because of the shallow bedrock that the castle would be built upon.  This bedrock, and the location at the top of the rock outcropping precluded a surrounding ditch.  The logs for the wooden palisade were placed directly on the shallow bedrock, and the wooden wall was shored up with rock and dirt at the base.  The logs were staggered and reinforced with wooden rails for strength.

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Care was taken with these logs so they could eventually be reused for the castle timbers, since wood was in short supply due to limited logging rights in the Enchanted Forest (minimizing impact on the forest and pleasing their elven trading partners).  To further reduce demand on timber, only the temporary housing for Lady Gwenllian's household was enclosed by the palisade, no guard towers were built, and only one large gate was constructed.

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Like the gates on the temporary town wall palisade, the gate was rudimentary, with two swinging doors, but unlike the town wall, this gate had a defended platform above for an extra layer of security.  A wooden framed rock staircase provided access from one side, and the logs were raised along this side to provide cover to soldiers climbing the stairs.

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Outside of the palisade, Lady Gwenllian had begun training Gisela how to use a weapon.  While some of the guards looked on from the wall and Mohatu stood close at hand, the women sparred with wooden swords and some spare shields Lady Gwenllian had grabbed from her armory.

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Gisela's father Staffen had sent word that their family had located the assassin who had made the attempt on Gisela's brother Bernaldo's life, and that retribution to the Varlyrian family responsible was at hand.  Gisela of course, wanted to be part of the retribution for her brother, so she had obtained leave from Lady Gwenllian to temporarily return to Varlyrio.  Lady Gwenllian had agreed on the condition that she take Mohatu and a small contingent of her own Avalonian guard for her protection.  She was not keen on losing her new ambassador.  She had further suggested that Gisela learn to defend herself, despite her ever-present and formidable bodyguard Mohatu watching over her.

Never a shrinking violet, Gisela had readily agreed, although now in the heat of the summer sun, fighting the skilled and powerful Lady Gwenllian, she wondered if she had bitten off a little too much.  Lady Gwenllian did not hold back and hit Gisela with the force of a kicking horse, numbing her arm with several hits to the shield.  Gisela grit her teeth to push down the pain, ignoring her sweat soaked clothing and numerous bruises, focusing her anger at her family's dishonor on becoming skilled with a sword.
 

Spoiler

This is the military entry for HSS.  One more to go and Prenmôr is on the map!  Sorry for the poor cropping.  I was short on time for pics and didn't get ones I could crop properly.

I am a little surprised how quickly this build came together for me, since I started it after the challenge.  I played with the stairs a while and came up with this design that is meant to be a wooden box around a stone/gravel filled stairs.  It's one of the better parts of the build, I think.  The staggered palisade I stole from this Ideas design, as I thought it was clever and let less light through when built.

I was also surprised as how many of my reddish brown pieces broke.  In particular, I broke about 20 of my 1x1 cylinders among others.  I used all of my remaining cylinders in reddish brown in this build, so I'll have to order some more on B&P.

The story is a bit of a prequel to Challenge V, since it is before Staffen is assassinated, and is meant to give a little more background to Gisela and her interactions with Lady Gwenllian.

Not anything super special, but I did have some fun with the end log tiles and getting some of the gate structure to look right, so all in all, I'm satisfied with it.  C&C welcome, as usual!

Spoiler

 

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The Avalonian Crown Lily (lilium avaloniflora) is native to the coastal areas of Avalonia, particularly in the mystic isles.  Its occurrence is uncommon in most areas, but it is cultivated and traded around Historica, so is a common ornamental potted plant.  It gets its name from the large white bowl shaped flowers ending in spikes like a crown and is noted for the pollen covered pistils, usually golden yellow, that protrude from the flowers.

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The common seagull (larus historicus) is native to all the coasts of Historica and is a common sight there.  These gulls flock in large number, particularly around sources of food, and are somewhat of a nuisance in coastal urban areas, making a mess wherever they are found.  These birds are noted for their white color with grey and black wing markings.

 

 

Edited by Grover

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Both the micro and the larger build are great.  I love the different water tones in the micro, and the rubble around the base of the full size version!  Great attention to detail too with the diagonal plates, that looks really nice.

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I like the micorscale moc, the landscaping looks great. I also like the palisaide technique used on the second moc and the plant and animal descriptions are a nice touch too. Both builds here look nice and I agree with @Kai NRG that the rubble looke awesome especially in the last photo.

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5 hours ago, Kai NRG said:

Both the micro and the larger build are great.  I love the different water tones in the micro, and the rubble around the base of the full size version!  Great attention to detail too with the diagonal plates, that looks really nice.

Thanks!  This is the evolving microbuild that keeps showing up and changing a little each time I do another Prenmôr build.  I am hoping it is interesting to follow along as we go!  I was happy with the way the diagonal staggered fence came out and glad you liked the plates holding them together!

2 hours ago, Eoin Wallace said:

I like the micorscale moc, the landscaping looks great. I also like the palisaide technique used on the second moc and the plant and animal descriptions are a nice touch too. Both builds here look nice and I agree with @Kai NRG that the rubble looke awesome especially in the last photo.

Thank you!  I have to credit @Aurore for the plant and animal descriptions.  I think it will be fun to try and fill in some of the flora and fauna of the lands with little entries like these.  Glad you liked the rubble!  It's funny, I didn't think much about it, just mixed some plates and cheese slopes together and dumped them along the base, but it seems to have come out well!

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11 hours ago, Grover said:

This is the evolving microbuild that keeps showing up and changing a little each time I do another Prenmôr build.

Ah I see.  Of course I saw that it looked similar but I didn't realize it was the same + the palisade.  Neat idea to do a microscale version to mark the progress of your city!

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1 hour ago, Kai NRG said:

Ah I see.  Of course I saw that it looked similar but I didn't realize it was the same + the palisade.  Neat idea to do a microscale version to mark the progress of your city!

I'll have to do a thread that's just the progression of the castle over the builds when it's all done.  More than just the palisade, this reduces the vegetation, and you can see the transformation of the rocks as they are dug out as well.  The ramp leading to the castle gate has begun too!

Edited by Grover

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Love the miniature, makes the environment more clear and really like the light grey profile bricks in the staircase!

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Love that Palisade and Gate and the Micro build is a great way to present the setting of the castle!

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It's really great to see Micro-Prenmôr evolving with each new minifig-scale build. The palisade does look great, temporary but sturdy. 

PS : I added the crown lily and seagull to the flora thread! Next step : updating the wiki...

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On 7/5/2020 at 2:48 AM, (Luc)ky Luke said:

Love the miniature, makes the environment more clear and really like the light grey profile bricks in the staircase!

Thanks!  I had some fun with the staircase.  Getting it SNOTted to make the masonry profile was easy, but getting it to turn the corner and actually frame all the bricks without a lot of gaps was tricky!

On 7/5/2020 at 6:33 AM, Legonaut said:

Love that Palisade and Gate and the Micro build is a great way to present the setting of the castle!

Thank you!  Keep your eyes peeled for future editions!

6 hours ago, Aurore said:

It's really great to see Micro-Prenmôr evolving with each new minifig-scale build. The palisade does look great, temporary but sturdy. 

PS : I added the crown lily and seagull to the flora thread! Next step : updating the wiki...

Thanks!  I'm glad the palisade doesn't look flimsy.  I was hoping to give it the look that you described.

Glad to see the lily and seagull making it onto the flora thread!  I'll keep writing up some small features with my future builds!

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