You shall not pass! Or, how to make orc guards more interesting

You're barred!

Perhaps the most common staple of dungeon adventures is the orc guard. Alert, sleeping or drunk on duty, alone or with a pack of peers, he's so often the first encounter for a party of adventurers. His quintessence, I think, is Russ Nicholson's marvellous illustration for The Warlock of Firetop Mountain:

Russ Nicholson's immortal (but sleeping) orc guard

Now, it's easy to scoff at the humanoid guardsman as a lazy trope that should be banished from any self-respecting GM's toolkit. But I think the orc guard has quite a bit to offer. Here are some ideas to help him add interest to an adventure.

First, make sure that the orc and his cohorts are actually guarding something. That automatically adds interest; if someone has hired orcs to guard an entrance, there must be something worth guarding beyond. It should be obvious, but rarely is. Why? Because, too often, the orc is guarding the whole complex in which the adventure is set. That was OK in The Warlock of Firetop Mountain, but it's a little tedious now.

Second, then, have orcs (or your humanoids of choice) guard a section of the dungeon. Picture a large cavern. Tunnels lead off to the north and west, but to the east, a natural staircase rises from the cavern floor, leading up to a reinforced tunnel above. At the top of the stair sit, squat and slouch at least a dozen orcs, well armed and equipped with horns to summon reinforcements. They may jeer and catcall as the PCs go by, but they won't fight unless they have to. And then of course, they'll blow their horns and shout for help while using higher ground and numbers to their advantage. Perhaps they have a bolt thrower or guard-wolves too. Whatever, the PCs aren't going to get past easily. But nor are they going to be harmed if they simply head to the north or west tunnels.

Third, an orc guard should be bored. It's a dreary business, this dungeon-guarding duty, especially when the grub's grim, the Higher-Ups don't tolerate slacking and your companions cheat at dice. So, while orc guards will put up a savage fight if you try to get past them, they might well be happy to talk with passers-by. They'll almost certainly be rude, and they'll definitely be uncouth, but they might have valuable information to exchange. Or they might know hidden routes to other parts of the dungeon. Or they might spin tall tales for their own amusement and to send the PCs in pursuit of wild geese.

Fourth, give your orcs personalities. Tolkien's weren't just grunting monsters: he gave us the brutal but efficient Ugluk, the cunning and well-informed Grishnakh, the loyal, vicious Shagrat and the treacherous, thieving Gorbag. And the whining, sceptical tracker and the unfortunate, orders-following uruk who accompanied him. A GM can use a much wider palette. Are there dreamers, schemers, liars, simpletons and practical jokers among orc-kind? Why not?

Fifth, change the guard. Remember that fat guard with the ratskin cap? The one who seemed a bit slow, and whom you got almost friendly with after you gave him that bag of coins in return for the route to the Red Door? Well, this time he's not there. There's a much fiercer-looking fellow with a brazen helmet and a broken fang, and he's eyeing you suspiciously.  Or, the fat chap's with some others, and he seems totally different with them around - pretending not to recognise you. Or, there's the fat fellow's head - on a spike, with the bag of coins in his mouth. And the new guards aren't talking.

Sixth, have comings and goings. If the orcs have blaring horns or marching songs or distinctive drums, let the PCs hear them - even much deeper in the dungeon - when the orcs are up to something. Perhaps a regular patrol is going deeper into the complex; perhaps the orcs' master is on his or her way out; or perhaps the noise simply signals the changing of the guard (your fat friend in the ratskin cap might be back on duty now).

Seventh, watch out for the orcs on the way back out. Noisms has just posted a typically interesting blog on "going in is easy but returning is not". Well, one way to make that the case in a dungeon adventure is to have the orcs guarding the eastern tunnel decide to close off all of the upper level, thus blocking the exit. They might drop portcullises, roll boulders or simply deploy more guards at the tunnels. They might cut down bridges or set areas on fire. Or they might open the hidden crypt to release the walking dead within, before scuttling back behind their own barricades to watch the fun. Alternatively, the orcs might take a much more aggressive interest in wounded adventurers returning from the depths with loot than in those same adventurers when they went in rude health and with nothing of value but their weapons.