The Guards Must Be Crazy: Difference between revisions

[[File:Extra Credit AI Guard.png|link=Extra Credits|400px|thumb|Elite security]]

 

 

 

'''Common issues are:'''

* [[Insecurity Camera|When a security camera stops working]], ignoring it instead of sounding the alarm, or at the very least getting a maintenance team onto it ASAP with accompanying guards.

* Never questioning or getting confirmation about that mysterious "surprise inspection".

 

The trope name is a pun on the film ''[[The Gods Must Be Crazy]]''.

* In ''[[Naruto]]'', the nameless ninja mooks are usually dumb brutes, masked and, in a world filled with powerful techniques, normally attack with kunai rather than, you know, throw a massive fireball or do any other flashy attack to blow the opponent to dust! Worse is that even the [[Red Shirt]]s can be defeated by a single attacker and barely fight using any jutsu. It seems like that only the main characters, villain or hero, are trained in anything other than holding a kunai against the opponent who can pick one technique of his ARSENAL and shoot fire hotter than the sun, create tornadoes, open the ground beneath them and bury them, or throw rocks the size of buildings at them...etc. Yeah. That's the guy you want to try and take prisoner with your dinky little knife.

* In ''[[Windaria]]'' the key to Lunara's floodgates are guarded by an old man that sleeps most of the day in a guardhouse without a door. At the start of the film, a spy walks in there, takes the keys, and no one realizes anything until he opens the flood gates. Considering this could have flooded the entire city it merges with [[Too Dumb to Live]].

 

** A not so old issue of ''[[Ultimate Fantastic Four]]'' uses the same idea, only it was evil zombie versions of the entire team in one cell together, and the Reed Richards counterparts prepared the trick by claiming he had built a teleporter from a ballpoint pen and a string of hair. Zombie Susan even lampshades how amazed she is that the guards were tricked by the Invisible Woman.. turning invisible. This one is especially pathetic, given that even if the teleporter claim had been true, there would still have been no earthly reason to open the doors.

* In ''[[Asterix]] the Gladiator'', Asterix and Obelix find a guard who works at the prison where they are holding Cacophonix prisoner. Asterix tells Obelix that they have to ask him some "clever questions" to find out his exact location. Obelix, to Asterix's astonishment, simply asks "Hey you! Where is Cacophonix imprisoned?". The (overly tired) guard replies in detail adding "but it's a secret" while Asterix sits there befuddled.

* The guards at the ''[[Batman]]''-verse [[Bedlam House|Arkham Asylum]]. Whether it's letting the Joker substitute all their real guns for popguns, allowing him access to janitorial chemicals that let him mix together some Joker Venom, or constructing a ''hot air balloon that allows him to fly over the walls'', the increasingly ridiculous, contrived and unbelievable ways that the Joker and the other Bat-villains escape from Arkham would be construed as painfully bad in any other franchise. For the ''[[Batman]]'' comics, on the other hand, it's par for the course.

** Justified in-setting: no one with the slightest amount of sense will voluntarily take a job at Arkham Asylum if they can find work anywhere else. Arkham's staff is all there because they are too incompetent or crazy to be employable by any reputable establishment.

* In an early ''[[Johan and Peewit]]'' story, a bunch of guards abandon all common sense for a barrel of mead, leaving the guard room empty (and allowing Johan to sabotage the drawbridge).

 

== Fan Works ==

* Parodied in ''[[Yu-Gi-Oh!: The Abridged Series]]'' when Tristan is sneaking up on a guard in a suit of armor. "CLUNK CLUNK CLUNK." "Must be the wind." "CLUNK CLUNK CLUNK." "Yeah, that's definitely the sound that wind makes."

* [[Legolas By Laura|legolas by laura]] features a scene described thus by a sporker, caused by sheer incoherence:

{{quote|"Looks like Legolas has just asked the guards – sorry, the ''gards'' to keep an eye on Laura's room while the orcs are kidnapping her, and... it all gets a bit confused."

"And by that time, the orcs have apparently already returned to Mordor. I think we can safely assume that all the characters have gone insane." }}

 

* The ultimate and truly memorable subversion in ''[[Titan A.E.]]'': Preed, Stith, and Korso are trying to free Akima from a slave prison. They see a large, brutish guard around a corner, and Stith offers to take him out. Preed refuses, saying, "This requires cunning and deception." They then walk up to the guard, and Preed spins a tale that he and Stith are traders, and that Korso is his slave. After delivering his story, the guard says these exact things: "You're ''lying''. ''He's'' [Korso] not a slave and ''you're'' not traders. Look at the way he ''stands''. He doesn't ''carry'' himself like a slave. Probably ''ex-military''." (Korso is a former Earth [[Space Marine]].) "Akrennians [like Preed] always threaten before asking a favor, ''it's tradition''." (Which Preed apparently ''completely'' forgot.) "And ''your'' [Stith] robes are made out of ''bedspreads!''" Preed then asks if they have a Plan B. Stith promptly reverts to her Plan A by kicking the crap out of the guard.

{{quote|'''Preed:''' An intelligent guard! Didn't see that one coming.}}

** The commentary reveals this is one of the very few complete relics of [[Joss Whedon]]'s pass at the script.

* Double subversion in ''[[Monsters vs. Aliens]]''. The heroes (who consist of an amorphous blob, a fish-man and a human/cockroach hybrid) adopt [[Paper-Thin Disguise|Paper Thin Disguises]] to bluff their way past an alien clone. He recognises the fake clone as "defective beyond repair"... and immediately orders the other two to dispose of him. And gives them a key card. And a gun.

** Not to mention that the same thief was able to walk up to the palace and meet the King and Queen face to face.

* The guards in ''[[The Incredibles]]'' fall prey to a few of these. They're decent enough at their jobs when they're in action, but it's the boring surveillance part of the day that always slips them up. At one point in the movie, they ''all'' leave their posts to check on a colleague who's just collapsed. Later, they don't notice Helen when she's right behind them. She even talks. Later still, nobody is paying attention to the security cameras and are all partying in the background. Only [[Punch Clock Villain|Mirage]] notices the escapees that don't even bother to avoid the security cameras. Most notably, though, is later in the same scene where it gets absurd enough that Bob [[Lampshade Hanging|lampshades]] it. They enter a large room with no one in it and he absently wonders, "Where are all the guards?"

* Consistent in all the ''[[Austin Powers]]'' movies. One even manages to fall into the lava flow when he's outwitted by Felicity Shagwell's boobs.

* In ''[[Mom and Dad Save The World]]'', a guard, despite being from a planet of idiots, ''doesn't'' assume Dad is a guard just because he's wearing a uniform... however, she unquestioningly accepts the laughable answers he provides in response to her questioning and lets him go on his way.

* The security guards on the Death Star in ''[[Star Wars]]: A New Hope''. Ben uses a ''[[Jedi Mind Trick]]'' version of this after turning the tractor beam off. This is actually an inversion of [[It's Probably Nothing]]. Presumably, Ben made the guards think they heard something off in the distance, and like intelligent guards they go to investigate. Unfortunately for them, it really was nothing.

** ''Truly'' intelligent guards would have called in to say they were investigating possible contact and ''then'' left to investigate, but we can forgive people under Jedi Mind Trick influence for not thinking of everything.

* Justified in ''[[THX 1138]]'', in that, though the guards are glaringly incompetent, the general population (with the sole exceptions of the hero and his girlfriend) are too stupid/strung out to notice. For example, the guards routinely leave the doors to a high security prison unlocked, but none of the prisoners had ever bothered to check.

* ''[[Race for the Yankee Zephyr]]'' (1981). A mook standing on the edge of a cliff catches the hero sneaking up, intent on braining him with a lump of wood. Instead of grabbing his rifle the mook begins waving his arms about and howling in a highly exaggerated martial arts style. The hero gapes in astonishment then, as the mook turns to deliver a spinning kick, boots him down the mountainside.

* ''[[Idiocracy]]'' "Hey, uh... I'm actually supposed to be getting out of jail, not going back in..."

* ''[[Goldfinger]]''. Played straight with the foolish guard who enters the cell alone while [[James Bond (film)|James Bond]] is performing a [[Ceiling Cling]] and subverted by later multiple guards who's more watchful such as staying in the same cell with one having a pistol trained on Bond at all times.

 

== Literature ==

* The ''[[Discworld]]'' books have a lot of fun with this.

** However, just a few pages later the rest of the guards in the prison are fooled by Max writing "out of order" with a piece of chalk on a death ray!

** Actually it's just that the guard really enjoys his job. Including the whole throw people out of the airlock part.

* The guards at the "best guarded keep of the stoutest castle" in ''[[The Wind in the Willows]]'' apparently can't tell the difference between a washerwoman they see every day and is the sister or sister-in-law of the chief warden, and their main prisoner, who is an anthropomorphic toad.

* ''[[John Carter of Mars]]''. Dear GOD, if a strange man climbs up to the roof you're guarding, tells you what a difficult and dangerous climb he had, and invites you to take a look at how precariously his rope is dangling off the edge, DON'T DO IT!

* Subverted in the novel ''[[Where Eagles Dare]]''. The German soldiers searching for the commandos don't check the ladies toilet where they're hiding. When one commando mentions how stupid that is, his superior points out the soldiers were eager to think up excuses to avoid searching places where desperate men might empty a submachine gun into them.

* In ''Syren'', the fifth book of the ''[[Septimus Heap]]'' series, Septimus gets past a guard in the Trading Post by claiming that he is someone important.

 

== Live-Action TV ==

* ''[[Doctor Who]]'':

{{quote|'''Spandrell:''' Well done, Hilred. An antiquated capsule, for which you get adequate early warning, transducts on the very steps of the Capital. You are warned that the occupant is a known criminal, therefore you allow him to escape and conceal himself in a building a mere 53 stories high. A clever stratagem, Hildred. You're trying to confuse him, I take it? }}

* ''[[The A-Team]]''. Many a villain has been laid low by not paying attention to machine sounds after [[Locking MacGyver in the Store Cupboard]]. There was a particularly [[Egregious]] instance where Hannibal and Face are arrested. Hannibal seems to have escaped, so the sheriff unlocks his cell and checks inside, then both he and ''the other officer in the building'' leave to find him... when Hannibal turns out to be hiding under the bed and promptly lets Face out and escapes.

* ''[[Hogan's Heroes]]'' is pretty much entirely built around this trope.

* ''[[Merlin (TV series)|Merlin]]''

** In the first episode, two guards go chasing off after some enchanted dice.

* Subverted in ''[[Dark Angel]]'' when Max tries to distract a guard with a rock, but he isn't fooled. She laments, "Why did I get the smart one?"

* ''[[Star Trek]]''

*** Possibly averted in that at the time Khan is being guarded by only one security officer, he is not a prisoner and he's also in the hospital. It's actually more security than Trek average to keep the distressed castaway you just pulled out of a cryo-capsule under a full-time security escort. Of course, the instant Khan proves himself to be hostile by attacking his escort the next step involves the aforementioned squad of guys pointing phasers at him.

* ''[[Star Trek: Voyager]]''

** In "The Killing Game," two guards find Harry Kim suspicious and stop him to for questioning. He convinces them to let him go with this line: "All right! You'd better call the bridge. Tell your superior I'm going to be late, that I'm working under your orders now, not his. Go ahead, make the call. I don't want to take the blame for this."

** Standard procedure for security personnel on ''Voyager'' is to stand in the formal "at-ease" position, looking straight ahead (not at the person they're guarding) so they can be knocked unconscious at a suitably plot-related moment.

{{quote|"...to say nothing of the guards' color codes, which include [[Red Alert|Red Standby Alert]] (apparently meaning stand around and do nothing), Red Mobilisation (wander around outside the house), and Blue Mobilisation (allow the President and his daughter to escape in a vintage car accompanied by two terrorists)."}}

* Averted in ''[[Buffy the Vampire Slayer]]'': ''"Why do I always get the smart ones?"''

* In season 3 of ''[[Lost]]'', Sawyer tries the whole "prisoners making out" thing to get the guards to come over when he kisses Kate, then overpowers them and takes their gun. It doesn't work, though.

* In the ''[[Babylon 5]]'' episode "Between the Darkness and the Light", Garibaldi plays on his recent media fame in capturing Sheridan to break him out again. This gets him past the outer guard, but the cell guards aren't so impressed.

{{quote|'''Guard:''' I don't watch TV. It's a cultural wasteland filled with inappropriate metaphors and an unrealistic portrayal of life created by the liberal media elite.}}

** Of course, he's also working for a regime that's anything ''but'' liberal and, by that point, all media in the Earth Alliance is government-controlled (except for the Voice of the Resistance).

* The team on ''[[Leverage]]'' regularly talk their way past security but they usually have fake IDs and the guards are standard office building rent-a-cops. However, in one episode Hardison talks his way past security to get into an airport's control tower. He has an employee ID but it is for a female employee so he makes a big deal of how he is in the middle of a sex change and the guards are too embarrassed to pursue this further. The danger of their negligence becomes apparent when Hardison almost causes a plane to crash. There is a reason why security at airports is supposed to be very tight. Also, the man in charge of the tower, apparently, doesn't know who's supposed to be working for him.

* Played straight in episode 6.21 of ''[[Supernatural (TV series)|Supernatural]]''. The mooks who guarded {{spoiler|Lisa and Ben}} heard fighting noises outside the room, and went there one by one.

 

== Tabletop Games ==

* Most classes that would traditionally be used as guards in ''[[Dungeons & Dragons]]'' don't have Spot, Listen or Sense Motive as class skills. This essentially makes them partially blind, hearing impaired, and incredibly gullible.

** Depends on the DM. Most play the trope straight because guards tend not to be treated as more than minor enemies. Those skills are mainly intended to counteract Hide, Move Silently, and Bluff. In addition, those skills are not infallible unless the DM hands NPCs the [[Idiot Ball]]. For example, no matter what your Hide skill is, if you walk in front of a guard without some form of cover, he sees you, no matter what.

** In 3.5 Scouts used as guards can avert this trope hard. The class is much like Rogue in this regard (Spot, Listen and Sense Motive as class skills, 8 base skill points per level; Hide and Move Silently are class skills, so they can stand guard without being readily visible), but better in head-on melee if there is some room to move around as Skirmish ability still works when Sneak Attack doesn't, has better hit die, and more combat and mobility improvements, starting with initiative bonus at 2nd level.

* ''Time Lord'' RPG (based on ''[[Doctor Who]]'') main rules, "Curse of the Cyclops" adventure. If the entire [[PC]] party is captured and there is no one to rescue them, the guards will demonstrate their usual stupidity and allow the prisoners to fool them and escape.

** In the ''Journies'' supplement, a captured [[PC]] could use "The Daft Guard Effect" to distract any guards present so the prisoner(s) can escape.

 

== Video Games ==

* ''Very'' heavily averted by the guards in 1998's ''Robin Hood'' game by Red Ant. The guards were extremely clever. They even noticed if one of their partners was missing. Basically, the way it worked was that the guards would walk in a predetermined path, and if they did not meet up with their partner after a few laps, then they got frustrated and would go looking for their friends. If they did not find them, then they would curse loudly, and tell their immediate superior. If the Lieutenant got at least three "My mate's vanished!" reports, then a man would be sent to ring the alarm bell. On top of that, If a group of guards spotted you, some would stay while one or two ran off to set off the alarm. On top of that, these guards would often surround you and your men, and while one held you, the other would stab into you repeatedly, often resulting in death. They fought dirty, they played dirty, and if you were spotted just once, patrols would be sent out to find you. Pretty amazing for a game made in 1998, huh?

** Going on "Alert" mode if they spot a dead fellow.

** Ring the alarm bells if they spot you.

* Another aversion comes with the Guard Dogs in ''[[King's Quest VI]]''. Alex has to get creative, either by magic or by using his small build and what amounts to a [[wikipedia:Burqa|burqa]] to get past. Even then, he'd better not get busted. Saladin, true to his namesake, is not an idiot.

* Another aversion from Sierra: most of the ''[[Space Quest]]'' games. In the third, the Scumsoft guards have their eyes locked on Roger, waiting for a screw-up. If Roger passes a wastebasket without cleaning it, the gig's up. The Puckoids in the fifth are trigger-happy and extremely nasty, and only screw up by leaving their engineering section under light guard - but justified as the they totally were not expecting anyone to {{spoiler|break in ''through'' the hull}}. The Sequel Police in the fourth (or 10th and 12th) vary wildly between straight and aversion, as they leave a time pod unguarded at one point, but are very dogged in hunting Roger down, and shoot on sight, leaving Roger to get creative in dodging them. Another line-straddler is the opening scene of the first game. Roger needs to go a lot of dodging to get past the Sariens that have ''brutally massacred'' everyone else on the Arcada. Still, they do forget to check obvious hiding places.

* Played completely straight in ''[[Metal Gear Solid]]'', where you can take out guards one by one trigger alarms as often as you want, but after 90 seconds everything is back to normal, with dead guards not being replaced.

** Starting with ''[[Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty]]'', however, it gets averted very hard. When guards notice something odd, they will call in immediately before going to investigate. If they don't report back in time, more guards will be dispatched to look for them. And even when everything is clear, guards are required to report in every few minutes, or a search team is dispatched to investigate. And when full alarm is triggered, it takes just a few seconds for reinforcements to arrive [[There Is No Kill Like Overkill|with riot shields, shotguns, and grenades]]. Unless there's an opportunity for an [[Air Vent Passageway]] escape nearby, you can prepare to load an old save by that point.

*** The famous "they can't see you if you put a bucket on their head" [[Good Bad Bug]].

*** [http://cheezburger.com/8793861120 Trying to arrest some fish].

* In ''[[Beyond Good & Evil (video game)|Beyond Good and Evil]]'', the heroine can shoot a projectile into a guard's air tank—and unless she's in plain sight or really unlucky, the other guards present will just fix the tank, then declare "false alarm" and get back to their business.

** And even if she is seen, she can just run around a corner where they can't see her, and after a few seconds they'll do the same thing. Repeatedly.

** In many areas, but particularly notable in one guard-riddled passage in Alpha Sections HQ (roughly 6 guards in a 50-foot stretch of open balcony, plus about 4 more immediately above and below it), the guards will look around everywhere except entrance points. In the referenced area, one guard faces in a direction no attack could possibly come from, and if he stayed in place but turned around the mission would be impossible.

** Even if their [[Apathy Killed the Cat|suicidal lack of curiosity]] didn't earn them a Darwin Award, their general behaviour would. They spend most of their guarding time walking or turning in slow circles or standing in one place ''facing a wall''. And their commanders aren't any more intelligent. One happily reports to his superior that all intruders in the area have been captured... while one stands in the middle of an empty room in his direct line of view.

** The smartest one in the game is an automated statue that spits lasers at you with alarming accuracy (well, alarming when you account for the fact that they're only about a second slow, and in real life, that would be close enough to scare the crap out of most anyone. Certainly a twelve-year-old like Link).

** One of the most blatant examples is the Gerudo Fortress section in ''Ocarina of Time''. For some reason, even after the 20th time you escape, they still can't be bothered to take away your hookshot...

** Speaking of ''Majora's Mask'', the guards are ''very'' diligent about keeping children from wandering out of town to the 'dangerous' wilds, to the point that they will do nothing to stop a little old lady from getting robbed in plain sight, by a thief who makes no attempt to conceal his identity. Even assuming there was some pressing issue preventing them from stopping the robbery, there's no reason they wouldn't recognize him when he walks back into town the very next day to sell the stolen goods to the curio shop next door.

** [[Phantom Hourglass|The Phantom Guardians]], as [[Animated Armor|cool as they might look]], are not even the tiniest bit smarter than any other kind of guard in the series. They ''fail'' to realize that a kid just took refuge in the Safe Zones, even though they chased it right until it did. They ''fail'' to dodge any eventual trap that Link sets up for them. They ''fail'' to realize that one of the collegues [[Spirit Tracks|has just]] [[Demonic Possession|been possessed]] [[Our Ghosts Are Different|with what is]] [[Princesses Prefer Pink|quite obviously a female (and over the top girly) ghost.]]

* Vaan has to infiltrate Rabanastre palace early on in ''[[Final Fantasy XII]]''. In advance it sounds like an annoying [[Stealth-Based Mission]]. Then you get there and the guards are apparently blind, as they never notice you unless you bump into them or yell at them.

** This is actually justified: Vayne wants to ''lure'' the [[La Résistance|Resistance]] in his palace in order to defeat them here and now, and certainly told the guards to let suspicious characters go inside the palace: it is not the incompetence from the guards, it is the [[Magnificent Bastard]] playing chess until [[Spanner in the Works|Vaan jumped on the board]], epic quest [[Gambit Pileup|Good old fashioned Ivalice-style politics]] and [[Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?|"Undying gods" being slayed]] ensue.

*** Because he doesn't want to get mauled by your dragon/wolf/devil dog/tame metal [[SCP Foundation|SCP-682]].

** Wes and Michael have brassier balls than the other protagonists by far as a result of the methods Cipher includes in its peon training. They are trained with good Pokemon regularly, a larger variety is made available, some are armed with Shadow Pokemon, they ignore the tripwire mentality, [[Memetic Mutation|Ceiling Peon is watching you infiltrate]], they disguise themselves as civvies on occasion, they come in groups... need I go on?

* The guards in the ''[[Tenchu]]'' series are not the brightest folk in medieval Japan. While they will look around for you for a while if they spot your shadow or see you moving just out of clear sight, the fact that a dead guard causes no more than a few minutes searching, and no call for backup, seems to indicate that broken necks and gaping sword wounds weren't considered too unusual in an average night's work.

** Although, to be fair, in the ''Tenchu'' universe, it's sort of implied that this happens ''all the time.''

** Also in the later games, any alarm raised on a level will cause all of the guards in the level to be more alert, jumpy, and trigger-happy. They'll also whip out the bullet-proof vests (who knows why they weren't wearing them in the first place?).

** In ''Conviction'' the guards are better and worse in a sense. When they know Fisher is in the area they'll scout the area, but other times they'll wait in the same position facing the same direction. Usually this is when they have a chokepoint, but other times if you've been killing them they'll wait you out rather than run into close quarters. A smart move if they didn't leave their flanks unprotected.

** In the original ''[[Castle Wolfenstein]]'', you could steal a uniform and wear it; the regular guards would generally ignore you, but the SS would find you out.

* Guards in ''[[GoldenEye 007 (1997 video game)|Golden Eye 1997]]'' must be blind and extremely nearsighted, because a patrolling guard will not bother to investigate the sound of gunfire even if you are using the loudest weaponry and they don't seem to notice you until you're almost right in front of you.

** You can also shoot their hats off their heads without getting a response.

** The worst part in all of this is that the Majestic 12 armored troops will notice said colleagues' bodies... so it's not an engine limitation. Other guards are just * that* stupid.

** The AI has improved significantly in the ''[[Deus Ex: Human Revolution|third game]]''. The game still plays with the trope though with some guards being programmed to be incompetent. For example, there are a number of guards that are easy to sneak up on because they are talking, watching TV, smoking, napping, or engaging in some other activity that is distracting them.

* The guards in ''[[Perfect Dark]] 64'' are pretty smart. Blast a couple, the survivors will run for the alarm button. Snipe one, his buddy will run up and yell in despair (at which point you slay him also). But the good guy guards aren't always the smartest. You can tranq a stewardess for Air Force One (!) with a crossbow bolt (huge, works if it goes in her brain) and steal her uniform. Nobody checks your ID, even though your guard detail is long gone. In an earlier level, helicopter pilots will shoot through their (female) colleagues to get to you.

** Even funnier, if you shoot a guard who is not aware of you, they will occasionally say in a curious tone "Was that a bullet?"

* In ''[[Ōkami|Okami]]'', the Imp guards outside the main part of the [[Disc One Final Dungeon|Moon Cave]] dismiss Amaterasu as a normal wolf (perfectly reasonable though, in that only a few can see her [[Facial Markings|markings]]), but when she comes back wearing a ''[[Paper-Thin Disguise|piece of paper over her face]]'', they immediately let Ammy through, telling her to "Get back to [her] post!"

* The military in ''[[Prototype (video game)|Prototype]]'' takes this to ridiculous extremes. Random Marine jumping off a skyscraper, flying into the base, landing hard enough to make an impact crater, and proceeding to run up the walls? When it's well-known that your highest-priority target is a [[Voluntary Shapeshifter]]? Perfectly normal, apparently.

** Need to get rid of a soldier, but he and a buddy have covering fields of vision so you can't stealth kill either of them? If you disguise yourself as a soldier and bump into one enough, he'll turn toward you and shove you away, then ''remain facing that direction''. Even if there's just a wall right in front of his face.

** You can also use a combination of the "Patsy" power and the "stealth consume" to stealth-kill an entire combat base full of Marines and Blackwatch personnel. This causes much humor when you realize that ''an entire base full of heavily armed guards'' is slowly disappearing and ''nobody notices''. Even if it's just you and another guard left. But whatever you do, don't try Patsy on him. Because only then will he think something is wrong.

** The infiltrating agents showcase an unusual variant of this. Locked doors are understandably much more interesting to them than an unlocked door. However, the end result is that if you lower the security level on the door an agent is trying to break through, they will usually lose interest immediately and wander off.

** Also, the kings in ''[[Super Mario Bros 3]]''. They have, in the entirety of the royal castles, one guard for each king in each country, and being as that guard is a Toad, said guard gets instantly knocked out by a Koopaling just charging at it.

** On the other side of the conflict, the Koopa guards in ''[[Paper Mario (franchise)|Paper Mario]]'' are also pretty pathetic. If they catch Peach sneaking around the castle, they'll usually just escort her back to her room and go back to whatever they were doing beforehand without ever questioning how she keeps getting out. At one point, they decide not to take her back, because they're about to hold a quiz show and still need one more contestant.

* Subverted in ''Sanity: Aiken's Artifact''. The main guard blocks you pretty well, until you {{spoiler|read the guard's mind to find out the employee password.}}

* According to some playthroughs, the AI in ''[[Civilization]] IV'' will occasionally [[Artificial Stupidity|remove defending units from its capital city which you are currently besieging]]. [[Sarcasm Mode|You weren't actually going to attack, right?]]

* In ''[[Dragon Quest IX]]'', Your character is imprisoned some time into the game. At first glance, you would think this was averted. However, press Y and open your equipment menu... This results in a few funny instances, such as guards bossing someone in full plate armor and carrying a sword that shoots fire.

* The ''[[Fable (video game series)|Fable]]'' series has quite a bit of this. In ''[[Fable (video game)|Fable I]]'', should you break a window, someone nearby will tell the guards, which they will charge after you and proceed to hack you into little bits should you decide not to pay them. Same thing if you just committed total genocide on a village, but should you apologize to the guards, they immediately forgive you and continue on their merry way.

** In ''[[Fable II]]'', should you accidentally or on purpose, murder ONE villager, the guards will then constantly say, "I won't let you murder anyone else!"

** Spire guards will too proceed to be dumb as wood, never mind the fact that this guy (or girl) {{spoiler|broke out of an unbreakable collar, probably killed about 50 of your mates with powerful spells, just hacked them to pieces or shot their [[Groin Attack|balls off]]}}. Charge to certain death! {{spoiler|Doubly so after the most powerful will user on the planet gets his powers back.}}

** The Dwarf Commoner origin of Dragon Age has a sequence where both you and your NPC ally are left in prison cells, with one guard to watch you. This guard can be easily baited to approach within arm's reach of the bars while the key to your cell is openly hanging on his belt. At this point you can a) pretend to be sick, which will cause him to (of course) enter the cell to check on you, b) pickpocket him for the key (if you have the right skill) or c) grab him by the collar and pull his face into the bars hard enough to crack his skull (if you have a high enough strength score). Apparently the idea of not having the guard carry the key openly on his belt, training him not to go too close to the bars, not caring if a prisoner already scheduled to be executed in the next couple of hours dies a little sooner, or just having ''two'' guards watch the high-value prisoners was entirely beyond the mental capacities of anyone in the Carta.

** ''[[Dragon Age II]]'''s Mark of the Assassin DLC includes a [[Stealth-Based Mission]] in which Hawke must sneak past the guards of the Orlesian Chateau Haine. Fortunately, the guards are easily convinced by whatever ridiculous story Hawke can come up with, are highly susceptible to distraction by thrown pebbles, apparently have very poor night vision, and are remarkably unconcerned about waking up on the floor in the middle of their patrol after being [[Tap on the Head|tapped on the back of the head]]: "Damned blackouts..."

* At one point in the 1989 computer RPG ''Dragon Wars'', the party gets captured and thrown into a jail cell (for the second time) and this trope comes into play, as the guards seemingly ''forget to lock your cell door!'' It turns out to be a subversion when you enter the next room, where the guards happen to be waiting for you. It seems these guards got into a lot of trouble for beating prisoners in their cells. But if the prisoners were ''trying to escape...''

* Marines in the 2010 ''[[Alien vs. Predator]]'' are remarkably blasé about having all their mates disappear one-by-one only to show up again as scattered corpses lacking in skulls/spines, or with a rather telling hole in their head. They also decide to check out on strange distorted verbal taunts originating from nearby isolated corners alone, without bringing backup, and will stand around with their backs turned mumbling "I'm sure it came from over here..." for a good few minutes. [[Too Dumb to Live|Even if said isolated corner already contains three to four corpses of previously mentioned dead marines with their skulls missing]].

** Oh and the general stupidity. Step one, flick the lights off. Step two, strangle the guard as he comes to switch them back on. Step three, wait for guard to find body. Repeat.

** Anyone also notice that, except for a few rare occasions, they never do something like, say, call for backup? Dial 999 even? Granted the leader of the Triads living in his remote mountain castle is hardly going to put a call into the police (even if they were in his pocket) but when the guards find 6 bodies littering the lobby at the casino? Nope...

** And they down upon contact with water. Even if they were just swimming in it earlier.

* In ''[[Pirates of the Caribbean]]: Dead Man's Chest'', the guards everywhere are very nice about only attacking you one at a time and not noticing what's going on around them.

* In ''[[Dubloon]]'', a map important to finding a sea serpent is on an island tightly guarded by the Navi, so what does the player's crew do? Why, send in their [[Team Pet]] that guards don't even suspect for ''anything''. One of them even ''tells'' him the location of where the key to the house is hidden.

* In the first ''[[Commandos]]'' game some of the levels had prisons. If one of your men was spotted then he would be held at gunpoint, and as long as he didn't move or perform an offensive action then he would eventually be marched off to the jail where his buddies could later break him out (or, more likely, you could just [[Save Scumming|reload]]). However, in maps with no jail the lone guards would [[Artificial Stupidity|never, ever fire]] on one of your men as long as he remained perfectly still, and only the arrival of a patrol would cause them to shoot. If there were no patrols nearby then you have a man crawl to a chosen spot and then suddenly stand up, ensuring that a guard spotted him and stood there with his cone of vision fixated on the one spot. Any other guards that could see the commando or another alerted guard would join in, potentially causing a chain reaction where dozens of enemies would converge and look towards one point. If your squad's brave volunteer was carefully positioned then it was fairly trivial for another squad member to then methodically stab everyone whilst they were distracted. This troper called this the 'Sniper tactic', since the Sniper was the most [[What Kind of Lame Power Is Heart, Anyway?|useless squad member]], making him an ideal candidate for the job.

 

== Web Comics ==

* This is a running gag in ''[[Exiern]]'', starting from [http://www.exiern.com/?p=23 here] and getting [http://www.exiern.com/?p=56 worse], with the various guardsmen falling for almost every single trick listed above at some point throughout the strip.

[[Beat Panel]]

** PTTAPUTASF guards have open windows - with lights on, various dangerous magic toys and things like a huge diamond lying in the open like in a museum, but without as much as a working alarm, and react only when a fight breaks in the storage. Might or might not have been mentally manipulated, though.

* The Guardbots in ''[[Gunnerkrigg Court]]'' were apparently designed to keep obedient robots in line. Hence, they're at a complete loss when Antimony ''runs away''. Similarly, Doorbot is supposed to insure that only robots enter one entrance. Annie convinces him to let her pass by [[Paper-Thin Disguise|wearing antennae]] and [[Most Definitely Not a Villain|repeatedly pointing out that she's obviously a robot]].

** Of course she's a robot. [[Circular Reasoning|She says that she is, and robots never lie.]]

* Averted in ''[[Goblins]]'' [http://www.goblinscomic.com/11272006/ here]: the titular goblins try to sneak into the city and ''random low level town guards'' have enough sense to both check where the rock came from and summon help, resulting in a city riot about an army of goblins hiding in the sewers.

** In the prequel book ''On the Origin of PCs'', Haley breaks in to a building to steal a large diamond. She accidentally wakes the guard up, but he buys her story that she is just a rather Freudian dream.

{{quote|'''Guard:''' You look hot in leather, Mom...}}

* ''[[Minions At Work]]'': [http://www.minionsatwork.com/2006/05/minions-4-watch-your-back.html Letting him keep something from his mother].

* The sleeping [http://bobadventures.comicgenesis.com/d/20080603.html peanut butter factory guard] and the slow and clumsy [http://bobadventures.comicgenesis.com/d/20090829.html guard-bot] in ''[[The Inexplicable Adventures of Bob]]''.

* Guards at the castle in ''[[Girl Genius]]'' show a [http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20081105 deplorable underreaction] when someone claiming he's that [[Overlord, Jr.|son and heir of their boss]] who [[One-Man Army|stopped a little armored army single-handedly]] on the whole city's eyes right before these guys' shift "asked ''nice''" to enter. That he leads a crowd, brandishes an unknown device and [[Cheshire Cat Grin|maniacally grins]] didn't spur their brains to work faster either. To be fair the guards weren't really listening. In fact, if you follow that elegant and finely-crafted link above, you'll notice that about one panel later he says, "[[Double Take|Wait, you're who?]]"

** [http://www.girlgeniusonline.com/comic.php?date=20120113 Later], Gilgamesh discovers that all but one of his father's guards consider the fact that he's wearing an [[Nice Hat|extremely impressive hat]] with his name written on it (''misspelled'') to constitute definitive proof of his identity. He promises the one who didn't a promotion.

* In ''[[Get Medieval]]'', Torquel Hane pulled free of his chains (by [[Badass|dislocating his thumbs]]); when a guard came to investigate his cry of pain, Torquel distracted him by pointing his obviously unchained hand and saying ''another'' prisoner had escaped. The guard [[Too Dumb to Live|turned to look]], and CLUNK!

* ''[[Vexxarr]]'' got [http://www.vexxarr.com/archive.php?seldate=080112 enforcement drones] on the ship of robot scavengers/pirates.

 

== Web Original ==

* The LifesBlood Labs goons in ''[[LG15: the resistance]]'' are pretty incompetent. The "Mace in Yo Face!" and "Done Dirt Cheap" incidents are particularly shameful.

** Although the "Mace in Yo Face" incident is justified because {{spoiler|those weren't real LBL henchmen}}.

* The [[Evil Overlord List]] has all sorts of tips on how to turn the guards from this sort of behaviour and turn them into a ruthless fighting force prepared to guard anything anytime.

* In ''[[Clear Skies]] 2'', the team are able to spring an informant from a prison outpost (admittedly, a very backwater one) by posing as guards for a prisoner transfer. It works, despite their credentials being stolen and very, ''very'' out of date, because the local guard was expecting a prisoner transfer at around that time. He gets chewed out later.

 

== Western Animation ==

* Used, played with, subverted and lampshaded frequently in ''[[The Venture Brothers]]'', most often through the misadventures of Number 21 and Number 24, [[Those Two Guys|two guards]] who [[Mauve Shirt|somehow manage to survive the carnage of the series]], and give plausible voice to the wit and social skills necessary for career henchmen.

* Subverted in the ''[[Gummi Bears]]'' episode when trolls are holding the Gummi hostage in Gummi Glen, to force the colony to recover a treasure hidden in a tree they uprooted and put in Castle Dunwin. Unfortunately, when Gummis get to the tree they find it empty, because the castle guards were apparently smart enough to discover the treasure and moved it to the castle treasury.

* The Trope was played with in ''[[Stroker and Hoop]]'', when Stroker has to knock a guard out to get deeper into a complex. After [[Dressing as the Enemy|dressing as the guard]], he gets into the next room where the guard is seemingly fooled by Stroker holding a clipboard over his face and using a bad falsetto... until he starts to continue, at which point the guard asks him if he thinks he's an idiot, and that he was on the monitor. To which Stroker asks if he's even supposed to be watching the monitors.

* In the ''[[Earthworm Jim (animation)|Earthworm Jim]]'' episode "Conqueror Worm", Jim, Peter, and Snot have to get Jim's supersuit back from the labs where it was put after Jim was arrested, ([[It Makes Sense in Context]]) but first have to get past the security guards!... Which they stroll right past. The sight of a giant worm, talking dog, and living booger spurs only one reaction from the guards.

** There's a bit of [[Fridge Horror]] regarding how Sokka was able to get alone time with Suki. She almost seems like she was ''expecting'' a random guard to come in and try kissing her. Maybe the male guards don't date the female ones because [[Prison Rape|they can get satisfaction somewhere else...]]

* Parodied in ''[[Family Guy]]'', where one of Peter's [[Manatee Gag]]s has him claiming it is easier to escape from Canada's Alcatraz. Cue the scene where an inmate simply walks up to a guard and asks if he can leave through this door. The guard simply says sure, just be back before bedtime, and letting the inmate leave.

 

== Real Life ==

** To say nothing of [[It Only Works Once]]...

** The Guards were also relying on San Francisco bay's freezing, and [[Everything's Even Worse with Sharks|Great White]] ''infested'', water doing the hard work for them. Which may have happened.

* [[Truth in Television]]: A convict in a US prison was able to escape by dressing up as a guard, because the guards were more familiar with the prisoners than each other.

** There has also been at least one case where an accomplice faxed realistic-looking release papers from a nearby McDonald's fax machine, resulting in a convict walking out scot-free, without anyone thinking about double-checking even the clearly visible fax-number.

** During the [[Cold War]] a couple of East Germans made their own uniforms mimicking those of the East German Guards and simply saluted the guards on duty, then walked through the checkpoint to West Berlin.

* There is a [[Ninja]] technique, the name of which translates as "throwing the toothpick", to distract guards. To be fair, if it's done properly, the guards never see ''anything'', they just hear a sound.

* In 1982, [[wikipedia:Michael Fagan incident|an unhinged man climbed the wall of Buckingham palace.]] Someone saw him and reported it, but by the time guards came to look, he was gone and they decided he must have left already; they raised no alarm. When he went through a window, the security system alerted a policeman on duty, who assumed it was a malfunction and '''silenced the alarm twice in a row'''. Wandering through the halls, he passed a housekeeper, who '''greeted him'''. He eventually made it to the Queen's chamber, where she was sleeping unguarded, woke her up, and chatted to her as she tried to get help by two different methods (a button and the phone); nobody came for ten minutes. As Hollywood writer [[William Goldman]] said it, if you would put this in a movie, people probably would throw rotten eggs at the screen for breaking their [[Suspension of Disbelief]].

** [[Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking|He also got cigarettes upon request.]]

** Even better, they only crime he was charged with was stealing a bottle of cheap wine, because, at the time, trespassing was a civil offense rather than a criminal one. The charge was dropped when he was committed to a mental hospital.

* Gilber Galvan escaped an American prison by waiting in a rec area until the guards left for coffee, then using a pool cue to open the drawer of their desk and fish out the keys. He later went on to be known as Canada's "Phantom Bandit".

* [[wikipedia:Mas Selamat bin Kastari|Mas Selamat bin Kastari]], one of the most influential terrorists in Southeast Asia escaped Singapore's most well-guarded prison by going to the toilet, changing quickly, and climbing out the window. When he was recaptured more than a year later, it was revealed that he climbed into the storm drains, went 20+ kilometers north in 3 days, created improvised flotation devices from trash, and swam across from Singapore to Malaysia and met up with other operatives. Apparently, it was so unexpected, that theories ranged from his escape a cover for the fact that he had died in detention, he used black magic to get out, or he was allowed to escape so that he could lead authorities to other terrorists.

* A notable aversion [http://sports.yahoo.com/nfl/blog/shutdown_corner/post/Packers-linebacker-forgets-ID-can-t-get-into-Wh?urn=nfl-wp5018 when the Green Bay Packers went to the White House to be congratulated] on their [[Super Bowl]] Victory in 2011. Linebacker Desmond Bishop lost his photo ID on the plane and was thus denied entry to the White House. Before you say "But he was on national television in the Super Bowl! He was with his team! How could they deny him entry?!!?", remember how often in fiction the "lost my ID" ruse works - and it works in [[Real Life]] too, due to this trope - and obviously no place should have better security than than the headquarters. So good job, guards!

** In one regard, he was either brilliant or very lucky: his aircraft was so small that radar registered him as a helicopter.

** He was incredibly lucky several times; one air-defense battery asked for permission to shoot him down but bureaucratic delays left them with no answer until he'd already vanished off their scopes, another one mistook him for a Soviet air force training flight, and a third mistook him for one of several rescue helicopters responding to a forest fire.

 

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Insecurity System]]

[[Category:Older Than Print]]

{{DEFAULTSORT:Guards Must Be Crazy, The}}