My view of why I find PK, as a stand alone facet of CF, to be boring, is a bit more flushed out in posts below. Again, the types of games I enjoy aren't the FPS type where it's just a kill or be killed type competition. I enjoy the RP, and PK only as it relates to the RP environment. But say CF existed where you could log in at 51, all skills at 100%, and everyone has a default set of hero gear, and they just ran around playing a king of the hill or capture the flag style game. I'd never play it for very long because it's just not interesting to me. Others may find that exhilarating and that's perfectly fine. But I enjoy the ability to immerse into CF, not just the aspect of can I kill character X with my character Y.
But here is something to consider, that ties in to some of the video stuff I see above.
Take your orc example. The orc may have a variety of tactics which require you, in playing the orc, to figure out how to optimize them against a given opponent. That's fun for you. However, once you've figured that out for a given opponent, 90% of the time you're using that same pattern, because it is the most effective. Now to some extent circumstances may alter this, but in general, where bash is effective as an orc, you're spamming bash, to the exclusion of maybe the 30 other commands you could enter. So once you know what to use against my char (be it from fighting me or similar chars) reliably all I will see from your char is that script. Will this force me to alter my methods from what I've found to be optimal, to a less optimal strategy? Not at all. I'll still use what I've discerned as the most effective tactic as my disposal.
Just because you don't feel your fights are scripted does not mean your opponent does not feel they are. Fire giant sword spec, is there really anything besides bash and flurry? True, some build have diversity, but in the end, they fall into predictable patterns. I'll say Flaayin was clever in maximizing his build, however every single time I fought him was literally the exact same. Knockout, clean out inventory, mind control, set traps and so on. I have never known a single character to attempt to utilize sub optimal tactics because they would make a fight more interesting. They'll go with whatever grants the greatest chance of winning, which almost always follows the same exact script every time you encounter them.
This has held true almost universally across CF for me. Having 30 skills is meaningless when one is optimal above the other 29, and most people in CF by now know what the optimal skill is in a given situation.
Group Pk varies this to a degree, but I see more and more CF being a game of single rather than group combat, which makes the flaws in the PK system way more apparent to me, hence the scripted feel. The chaos of a 4 v. 4 is fun because there are a lot of variables both sides are trying to adjust for, and that requires attention and thought. In 1 v. 1, or 2 v.1, this is simply lacking to a very large degree so as to render the interaction boring to me.
Now, maybe as the player of the orc this is engaging because you vary based on opponent, but from the POV of the person you fight, you'll use the same thing every time, because you've determined it to be the most effective. Once you play CF long enough, there are very few surprises, and you know what works. So in that sense, for me, every encounter with an orc feels scripted. I would generally say 99% of all orcs I ever fought in CF used three commands. Bash, fallback, spinebreak (and maybe trample to wake up someone). If things go south maybe they flee and chug blood, or quaff. And that's it. Sure they have lots of unique and interesting things they can do. But who cares if they're rarely if ever actually utilized.
I could script I'd say 90% of any 1 v. 1 fight I would have as a bard vs. most any char in the mud.
Yes, playing a non-bard might change my perception for a bit, but it would be temporary and I'd still wager tactics would not vary all that much on a general level.