Black Skeleton

Black Skeleton

General Information

Item	Value
Location	Shrine of Storms: 4-1, 4-2
Description	Dual-katana Black Skeleton
Souls1	White: ??	Neutral: 1227-3897	Black: 5846
HP2	White: ??	Neutral: 255-396	Black: ??
Attack	Melee	Physical
Special Attack	Jump	Lunging slash attack with knockdown
Weakness	Fire

Debatably the hardest type of Skeletons, these enemies make themselves formidable being armor clad and wielding two Katanas dealing huge, quick damage. Nothing can really penetrate their tough armor; even blunt damage is lacking. Luckily their health bars are rather puny, and are slow to turn around making them extremely vulnerable to backstabs. They are the only source of Pure Bladestone in the game.

Attack Patterns

• Horizontal slashes.
• Right handed piercing thrust.
• Dual katanas slash attack.
• Lunging dual slash attack with knockdown.

Strategy

All kinds of ranged strategies work well, be it magic or arrows. Damage will be mediocre but eventually they usually go down without a fight. Flame Toss works well on the first playthrough of the game, combined with Thief's Ring. On the rare occasion that they run towards you, Warding or Second Chance are very helpful. They ignore stun from most weapons, particularly small ones, though Dragon Bone Smasher is a weapon that works particularly well, as do large hammers like Meat Cleaver and Bramd , if you can weather the damage.

Parrying tends to be pretty straightforward - wait until they make any kind of attacking movement, there isn't too much timing involved. Occasionally they do attacks that take longer to come out, and you have to be up close to parry, which can be difficult due to their massive range. Backstabs are usually the most effective methods of takedown, even if they hit you chances are you can still stab them from behind. From there, you can constantly hit them in the back, or even wait between attacks and use another backstab to finish them off. Their turning around is so terribly slow they can't make a comeback from there.

As for melee tactics, using Soul Remains to distract them and then going for a critical hit and finish with several quick strikes works very well on the early Black Skeletons. The best way to do this is as follows: stand back some distance, but within lock-on range. Then run towards them, forcing them to jump and make a killing strike. If you roll at the moment they jump or just run past them while they are in the air, they will miss, and you can turn around for a quick back stab. It's best not to wear the Thief's Ring or use a spell that hides you, because then you have to be closer to make them jump. If this strategy does not work the first time, just back up and try again. Any fast hitting weapon, like a Dagger, soaked in Turpentine or Black Turpentine will work very, very well.

Using a Shield to block his attacks will cause him to get pushed back, at this moment you can hit him once or twice and repeat with another block. This is perhaps the most fail-proof and simple strategy against them.

Enemy Variety	Item Drops
All	Soul Remains Shard of Bladestone Uchigatana (Rare)
4-2	Chunk of Bladestone (Rare) Pure Bladestone (Very Rare)
Black Phantom	Chunk of Bladestone (Rare) Pure Bladestone (Very Rare)

Enemy ID and Stats

The information below reflects the game's hard programmed values for enemy stats and values. However, these values don't always align precisely with values seen in game. This is due to Special Effect Multipliers (similar to NPCs) and World Tendency Multipliers.

Name	ID	Location	HP	Souls	Defense						Resistance
					Physical	Slash	Blunt	Thrust	Magic	Fire	Poison	Plague	Bleed
Black Skeleton	402200	4-1	189	1227	416	416	366	441	210	129	999	999	999
Black Skeleton	402230	4-2	189	3897	416	416	366	441	210	129	999	999	999
Black Skeleton (Black Phantom)	402231	4-2	189	8594	416	416	366	441	210	129	999	999	999

Special Effect Multipliers

Special Effect Multipliers are blanket multipliers that are applied to NPCs, including Black Phantoms. For example, if the HP multiplier is "x2", the NPC will have twice the health that the player would have if they had identical stats and equipment. The NPC's attack multipliers are applied before the damage is affected by the player's defenses and resistances. Damage received by the NPC is slightly more complicated. When the player does damage to the NPC, the raw damage is put into a formula and computed against the NPC's resistances. These resistances are multiplied by the values in the Physical/Magic/Fire Defense columns before calculation. Afterward, the remaining damage is reduced by resistances, it is then multiplied by the Damage reduction multipliers in the Physical/Magic/Fire Reduction columns. The output damage remaining is the dealt to the NPC.

Enemy	Location	HP	Stamina Damage	Attack			Damage Reduction			Defense			Resistance
				Physical	Magic	Fire	Physical	Magic	Fire	Physical	Magic	Fire	Poison	Plague	Bleed
Black Skeleton	4-1	x1.35	x1.19	x1.52	x1.52	x1.52	-	-	-	x1.15	x1.15	x1.15	Immune	Immune	Immune
Black Skeleton (Sword)	4-2	x1.55	x1.3	x1.75	x1.75	x1.75	-	-	-	x1.25	x1.25	x1.25	Immune	Immune	Immune
Black Skeleton (Black Phantom)	4-2	3.1	x1.875	x2.625	x2.625	x2.625	-	-	-	x1.875	x1.875	x1.875	Immune	Immune	Immune

Footnotes

1. Souls gained are from the first run through of the game, white, neutral and black World Tendency without any modifiers
2. HP totals are from the first run through of the game, white, neutral, and black World Tendency