Medieval Lego River Fort

I just recently took apart my Lego British Royal Navy fort, since I had had it out for a while, and I wanted to use the gray blocks for something else.  I turned it into a fort that guarded a river from Scandinavian (Viking) raids.

I built two towers, one for each side, and on the lowest platform in the middle I put four entirely wooden spears at even intervals that pointed down.  In between the spears I put three shields that had lion faces on them, the one in the middle bigger than the other two on each side.  Then behind them I put the defenders, two out of the three in the front with additional shields.  I put two defenders in the second row, where I could have squeezed in three defenders; but that way I have enough armor and weapons left so that if any of the defenders were injured or killed, I could replace them with another fully armed soldier and not have to take weapons and armor from another soldier.       

On the right tower I had one rank of one archer and one crossbowmen.  (I couldn't fit any more archers on the same tower without the second rank having to shoot straight through the first, and I was also clean out of bows and crossbows.)                                                         

On the other tower (which I'm pretty proud of) I built I giant crossbow somewhat like the Mangler all on my own.  (The Mangler is the giant crossbow fixed on the prow of the Heron, which is Hal's ship in The Brotherband Chronicles.)  I made it out of three sticks with clips on the end that stuck up in a triangle.  The back two sticks in the triangle held up two horizontal sticks attached to make one stick, a chain attached to each end of the extra long stick.  The two chains connected on the other end, and you could stick a spear made out of all wood into the two chain ends, rest the middle of the spear on the connecter for the two sticks, clipping the end of the spear onto the stick at the point of the triangle.  I put two 2x2 brown bricks in the middle of the triangle so that the Mangler 2.0 didn't look as flimsy as it was.  I also had a barrel behind it with three of the spear-projectiles sticking out of it, and a guy in a plain gray cuirass manning it.                                                                                                                      

I also made banks along the river out of silt and dirt, in other words tan, dark tan, and brown bricks, with the classic green oval with three leaves coming out of it all over the sides of the bank.  I attached a green platform to each bank which I put trees on so that it looked like the river was below the normal level of the ground, which was actually there, not just like, "Yup, this is the edge of the river, the bank goes up... and then the bank stops and there isn't much beyond that." 

For the Scandinavian longship, I took the seats and flag out of a pirate rowboat, keeping the cutlass that had been thrust upside down through the part in front of the boat where a round block size opening was, so that they could cut other ships in half.  Now I had a Scandinavian shortship, and all I had to do was man it with four berserkers, three of which with Lego Ron hair, which by the way works really well for Scandinavians, or anyone with red beards for that matter.  The other one had a Scandinavian helmet, with the horns taken out.  Whoever made those Scandinavians must not have done their research, since Scandinavians never had horned helmets.  Some Russian opera writer had written a play that depicted female Scandinavians with helmet that had feathers sticking out, so for the male Scandinavians to match he gave them horns on their helmets, and it stuck, resulting in the Lego Scandinavians with the un-historically accurate horns that we have today.  

Overall I think I did a pretty good job arming and armoring both sides, and the fort is now officially ready for battle.