History Literature / GuardsGuards

** In the long run, this is perhaps the only book where we get ''any'' time from Carrot's perspective. Once he outgrows his FishOutOfWater status, half the point of his character is how ''no-one'' knows if his DorkKnight tendencies are sincere or an elaborate joke.

** Vimes momentarily thinks Carrot has abandoned him to fight two Palace Guards on his own, but Carrot had simply taken Vimes' order to "charge these men" literally and had fallen back to give himself a good run-up. [[spoiler:Likewise, when Errol retreats from his duel with the King, Vimes assumes the little swamp dragon isn't coming back. Errol, once he's given himself distance for acceleration, returns at ''hypersonic speed'' and unleashing a sonic boom that knocks the big dragon out of the sky.]]

** Vimes being TheAlcoholic is established early on in the novel; later books would not only have him as TheTeetotaler, but establish that he is in a near-perpetual state of being 'knurd', a state beyond sobriety that requires drinking alcohol to become sober.

* WhereTheMagicWent: Dragons big enough to pose a threat to humanoids on the Disc seemingly went extinct ages ago, but in fact retreated to another dimension when the Disc's magic became too scarce and thin to support them.

* MouthOfSauron: What [[spoiler:the Dragon-King]] ultimately reduces its summoner [[spoiler:Lupine Wonse]] to: someone whose only job is to have is speak through him. The experience is ''extremely'' painful for him, bordering on MindRape.

* MouthOfSauron: What [[spoiler:the Dragon-King]] ultimately reduces her summoner [[spoiler:Lupine Wonse]] to: someone whose only job is to have her speak through him. The experience is ''extremely'' painful for him, bordering on MindRape.

** When they are told that they can have a reward, his men ask for a small raise, a new tea kettle, and a dartboard (being afraid that they went too far with the last one.)

* ChandelierSwing: A DiscussedTrope; the tales the Mr. Varneshi tells young Carrot about his ancestor's Watch career involve a lot of chandelier swinging, and later a group of guards ordered to arrest Sam Vimes worry that he'll turn out to be a swashbuckling hero and fight them all off while shouting "Ha!" and swinging from the chandelier. Vimes points out with bewilderment that there isn't even a chandelier in the room.

* CriticalStaffingShortage: The night watch, made virtually redundant by the legalizing of crime, is reduced to four men (Two incompetents and an idealist, commanded by an alcoholic) to police a city of a million by the time this book is set.

* {{Metaphorgotten}}: Immediately after isolating that the city is like a woman, a drunken Vimes digresses: "Roaring, ancient, centuries old," - before describing how it strings you along only to kick you in the teeth and so on.

** A [[InvokedTrope hilarious attempt at invocation]], where the Watch try to make the odds of [[AttackItsWeakPoint shooting a Dragon in its "voolnerables"]] exactly a million to one through various means such as blindfolding the archer, putting soot in his face and making him stand facing the wrong way on one leg while singing the Hedgehog Song -- but end up with some other, non-specified, incredibly low odds instead, which isn't improbable enough and thus predictably fails. Then played straight (and lampshaded by the narration) immediately after when the annoyed dragon retaliates: Their chances of surviving that turns out to be ''exactly'' a million to one.

They are joined by the newest recruit, Lance-Constable Carrot Ironfoundersson, who was raised by dwarfs in the mountains. A huge, powerful and highly moral and innocent young man, he immediately tries to arrest the head of the Thieves' Guild and clean up the Mended Drum pub - ''and succeeds''. Not only is he tough, he also has a strange... charisma.

* AWizardDidIt: The dragon is able to fly... because of Magic. Of course, in the Discworld, this is a perfectly legitimate explanation.

* YeOldeButcheredeEnglishe: The spellbook. And Vimes ''writes his notes'' like this - he doesn't speak that way. The joke is that people in Ancient Days used to speak like us, but write in YeOldeButcheredeEnglishe. ([[EarlyInstallmentWeirdness This was subsequently dropped in future books.]])

** Carrot cries "[[Franchise/TheThreeMusketeers All for one]]!" when he charges off to help save Lady Sybil, to Colon's and Nobby's puzzlement.

The eighth {{Literature/Discworld}} book and the first to feature the City Watch, one of the most popular of the major character groups/themes in Pratchett's creation, plus the first appearance of [[HonestJohnsDealership C.M.O.T. Dibbler]], though as a one-note gag character. It is also notable in that it is the first of the Discworld books in which Patrician Vetinari is the [[MagnificentBastard Magnificent]] [[TheChessmaster Bastard]] we all know and love, though he is notably more easily frustrated than [[TheStoic the stoic of later books]]. Up until this point Pterry was still working out the character, and aspects of the final product appeared in other books, but ''Guards! Guards!'' is the first book in which the character is recognisable as he exists now.

* AnimalEspionage: When imprisoned, Vetinari somehow manages to make an arrangement with the rats after being imprisoned. In return for him helping them, they bring him news as to what’s happening, both in terms of papers and gossip. It's implied that they have had their intelligence boosted by magical radiation from the Unseen University, which is how they are so useful.

* BizarreAlienLocomotion: [[spoiler:What Errol managed to come up with, by rearranging his entire system to shoot fire... backwards.]]

->''They may be called the Palace Guard, the City Guard, or the Patrol. Whatever the name, their purpose in any work of heroic fantasy is identical: it is, round about Chapter Three (or ten minutes into the film) to rush into the room, [[MookChivalry attack the hero one at a time]], and be slaughtered. No-one ever asks them if they wanted to.''\\

** Brother Dunnikin's contribution to the first set of magical items for dragon-summoning is an amulet that supposedly protects him from crocodile bites. The Supreme Grand Master sneers at buying such a thing in a temperate city. Later he misses a meeting of the Brethren because... he's been bitten by a crocodile. The Supreme Grand Master insists this is just a coincidence.

** The Patrician is presumbly quite well off, but lives ascetically; his personal quarters are barely furnished, and he considers a glass of water and a piece of dry toast to be a large meal.

* ByTheBookCop: Carrot. "The Book" in this case being ''The Laws and Ordinances of The Cities of Ankh and Morpork'', published some six generations previously. Carrot isn't just the only copper who follows the book, he's probably the only one who's ''read'' it. Deconstructed in that most of the laws the book covers have been overturned by the time Carrot gets there (mostly by Vetinari, presumably), so Carrot is ''violating'' the law in pursuit of it.

* ByTheBookCop: Carrot. "The Book" in this case being ''The Laws and Ordinances of The Cities of Ankh and Morpork'', published some six generations previously. Carrot isn't just the only copper who follows the book, he's probably the only one who's ''read'' it.

* ExcitedShowTitle: Double excited.