Skeletons
| Skeletons | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
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| Kill Icon | |||||||||
| Basic Information | |||||||||
| Health: | Normal: 50 Small: 50 King: 1000 Mobster: 130 Salmann: 200 Scarecrow: 500 Toastmaster: 5000 | ||||||||
| Damage Done: | King: 100 Normal: 30 Small: 20 | ||||||||
| Affected By: |
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| Found On: | Bloodwater, Brimstone, Cauldron, Erebus, Farmageddon, Ghoulpit, Gorge Event, Gravestone, Graveyard, Hassle Castle, Hellstone, Helltower, Los Muertos, Precipice, Sinthetic, Slasher, Slime, Spineyard, Terror
From spells only: Monster Bash, Moonshine Event, Pit of Death | ||||||||
| “ | The Skeleton King! Oh... gravelpits, you are in for it now!
Click to listen
— Redmond Mann
|
” |
Skeletons are AI-controlled entities that are found in Halloween maps. Originally introduced in Helltower, they often spawn when a point is captured in Payload or Control Points. They can also be spawned using console commands with sv_cheats enabled.
There are two types of Skeletons that can spawn: team-colored and green. Team-colored Skeletons can only attack and receive damage from the opposite team, and are only spawned by players on the server using a Rare Summon Skeletons Magic Spell. Green Skeletons can attack or receive damage from either team and can spawn naturally on many Halloween maps.
There are 3 different sizes of Skeletons: Small (or "Babies"), Normal (or Medium), and crown-wearing Kings. Normal Skeletons spawn individually or in groups, while Small Skeletons only spawn from the shattered bones of destroyed Normal Skeletons. Singular Skeleton Kings, much larger with a greater pool of health, usually spawn accompanying a number of Normal Skeletons.
When destroyed, Normal Skeletons drop three glowing skulls, which then sprout into three Small Skeletons that then attack until destroyed.
The Skeleton King drops a Rare Magic Spell when it is destroyed by players; however, they do not drop any Magic Spells when they are destroyed by an environmental hazard or the Payload cart.
- Maps with Skeletons
- Bloodwater (Skeleton King only)
- Brimstone
- Cauldron
- Erebus
- Farmageddon (as scarecrows)
- Ghoulpit
- Gorge Event
- Gravestone
- Graveyard (rare magic spell only)
- Hassle Castle
- Hellstone
- Helltower
- Los Muertos
- Monster Bash (rare magic spells only)
- Moonshine Event (rare magic spells only)
- Precipice
- Pit of Death (rare magic spells only)
- Sinthetic (Toastmaster only)
- Slasher
- Slime (reskinned as Salmann)
- Spineyard
- Terror
Contents
Stats
All Skeletons move at a speed of 300 Hammer units per second (same speed as the Pyro, Engineer, and Sniper) when navigating the map, and attack at about once per second.
- Small Skeletons spawn with 50 health and do 20 damage on hit.
- Normal Skeletons also spawn with 50 health but do 30 damage per hit.
- Skeleton Kings spawn with 1000 health and do 100 damage on hit.
Skeleton King attacks have strong knockback; Normal and Small Skeletons have successively weaker knockback.
Skeletons are not affected by damage falloff, status ailments (such as Mad Milk or bleeding), on-hit effects (such as Rage-building or the Blutsauger's on-hit healing), knockback, or airblasts. Neither are Skeletons subject to headshots. They are, however, otherwise affected by Critical hits.
Kill Taunts generally have no effect on Skeletons, doing no damage to them; however, some taunt attacks do some damage to Skeletons:
- The Execution still fires the normal Scorch Shot round as part of the taunt, which does do normal Scorch Shot damage to Skeletons and, so, can destroy multiple Small and Normal Skeletons in two shots, albeit at a rate much slower than normal shooting.
- The Grenade taunt does do limited splash damage to all Skeletons that are close enough, and enough damage to destroy any nearby Small and Normal Skeletons, but it is a slow taunt.
The scarecrows in Farmageddon are reskins of the Normal Skeleton, but with 350 health instead of 50, and do not spawn Small Skeletons.
The Toastmaster, a unique boss in Sinthetic, is a reskin of the Skeleton King, but with 5000 health instead of the usual 1000.
The Salmann of Slime are a reskin of the Normal Skeletons, but they do not spawn small skeletons on death. They have four times as much health as a regular Normal Skeleton, at 200 health, and can soak players in slime to mark them for death for 5 seconds.
In Spineyard, the skeletons have 130 health, more than double the health of a regular Normal Skeleton. They are also armed with submachine guns, being able to hit players from a distance and deal much more damage per second. They do not spawn Small Skeletons when defeated, but they drop a Magic Spell each.
Behavior
Skeletons spring from the ground at the spawn points. Normal Skeletons and Skeleton Kings spawn with recognizable sound cues that vary between maps (for example, chiming bells or Merasmus's incantations).
Once spawned, they run towards players, maneuvering around obstacles. They are unable to jump or crouch.
Once they are close enough to a player, they start to melee attack them. Upon destroying a Normal skeleton, 3 glowing skulls are scattered to the immediate surrounding area. These spawn Small skeletons, which then continue attacking players. Once the target is killed, or has gotten to an inaccessible point (such as a roof in which there are no solid pathway connections), the Skeletons move on to the next nearest player. Should no players be present to target, all Skeletons stop in place and stand still. All types of Skeleton gib on the spot after being on the playing field for an extended period of time without being destroyed.
Skeletons target all bots that take up player slots, such as TFBots or puppet bots, but do not target any Engineer buildings or bosses such as the Horseless Headless Horsemann, Merasmus, or MONOCULUS. All TFBots, Sentry Guns, and team-allied MONOCULUS target the Skeletons, however. Skeletons created with a Magic spell have the same stats and navigation, but attack both the opposing team and other Skeletons that are not on the team of the summoner.
Strategy
Related achievements
Bereavements
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Console commands
In order to enable the spawning of Skeletons on a non-Halloween map, the server must be running Halloween mode. The server administrator can manually enable this mode by using the command tf_forced_holiday 2. The server is also required to have cheats (sv_cheats 1) enabled, which disables obtaining achievements. TF Zombie entities can also be manually spawned with the command ent_create tf_zombie.
| Command | Description |
|---|---|
tf_halloween_zombie_mob_enabled
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If non-zero, enables skeleton spawning.
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tf_halloween_zombie_mob_spawn_count
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Determines the total number of skeletons to spawn each wave.
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tf_halloween_zombie_mob_spawn_interval
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Determines the time between consecutive skeleton waves.
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tf_halloween_zombie_damage
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The amount of damage a skeleton hit does. This command no longer works as of Scream Fortress 2013.
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tf_halloween_zombie_speed
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The speed at which the skeletons move at. This command was removed as of Scream Fortress 2013, so skeletons always move at the same speed.
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tf_max_active_zombie
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Sets the maximum skeletons allowed to exist at once. If the limit is exceeded, the new skeletons instantly gib.
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Update history
- Fixed laggy animations on Halloween bosses, skeletons, ghosts and other ghoul-like beings.
- Updated
tf_zombie_spawnerentity to support setting team numbers for the zombies (defaults to the original behavior if no team is set).
Unused content
- There exists 3 unused skeletons in the game's files: a plain skeleton that does not glow any specific color, a skeleton that glows an orange color, and a skeleton that glows a purple color.
Bugs
- The Skeletons are able to hit players through certain walls, ceilings, or other obstructions, if players stand within their normal reach. Particular examples include King and Normal skeletons reaching through the windowed wall in front of the team spawns in Helltower and The King reaching players standing above him on some of the balconies.
- On rare occasions, the Skeletons summoned by either team freeze and do not move or attack, rendering them useless. They can still receive damage as normal. This often occurs when skeletons are spawned in areas that lack a navigation mesh.
- Skeletons do not spawn on AI-noded maps if there are no players on both teams, even with bots present.
Notes
- If spawned through the console using the command
ent_create tf_zombiebefore the Scream Fortress Fifth Annual Helloween Special, the Skeleton would be a random class wearing a Voodoo-Cursed Soul, with an invisible melee weapon. - Skeletons use modified Sniper animations while moving and attacking, in a similar vein as Merasmus.
Trivia
- The Skeleton King wears Prince Tavish's Crown (with RED gems).
- Skeletons use the Flying Guillotine's hitsounds when spawned from a skull (e.g. when spawned from a spell or after killing a medium-sized skeleton).
Gallery
The Green Skeletons
The Skeleton King
The RED team skeleton
The BLU team skeleton
The unused plain skeleton
The unused orange skeleton
The unused purple skeleton
The scarecrow from Farmageddon
The Toastmaster from Sinthetic
The mobster skeleton from Spineyard
The Salmann from Slime
