Question from the Bestiary about Skeletons


Rules Discussion

Sovereign Court

It doesn't seem like some of the monsters are always using all of their attack/weapon properties. For instance, the Skeleton Guard has +2 Str and +4 Dex. His Claw attack is listed as Agile and Finesse, but it has the same +6 attack bonus as his Scimitar attack. Now there are plenty of other monsters that have Claw attacks, including the Skeletal Champion, that don't list Claws as Finesse weapons, only Agile. Should the Skeleton Guard's claw loose the Finesse quality, or should we make it a +8 attack?


If it were an NPC built on a PC chassis, then it might be an error.
It's not, so it's likely okay, especially since the attack bonuses match.
A common pattern w/ monsters is to give them a secondary, agile attack at the same attack bonus as the main attack, but at one die type smaller (though other adjustments could also occur, like having no poison).

These agile attacks make for some odd patterns if you try to reverse engineer stats, but Paizo often engineers top down, not bottom up like a PC.
They wanted a level -1 creature to have an attack balanced a bit higher on attack bonus and a bit lower on damage, meeting level -1 standards as a whole re: average damage. The base stats were secondary.
If they'd given the skeleton a greatsword, they'd have had to lower the attack to balance.
If you increase its attack, the claw might be better than the scimitar, better than a level -1 creature should have (though that's not saying much).

Also, if one presumes the skeleton has a higher proficiency with the scimitar, which isn't agile, then the numbers work out. Because even when Paizo builds backward, it's nice when the numbers work forward too.

OT: The scimitar means the skeleton should likely switch targets on a miss or attack the same one on a hit due to Sweep & Forceful respectively.


The numbers listed for monsters should be assumed to be correct (until they get errata, at least).

The listing of the finesse trait on the claws cues in that anything affecting the skeleton's dex score could impact that attack.

And agile doesn't matter for figuring out the non-penalized attack roll modifier, so that's not relevant to the attack numbers listed in the first place.

Community / Forums / Pathfinder / Pathfinder Second Edition / Rules Discussion / Question from the Bestiary about Skeletons All Messageboards

Want to post a reply? Sign in.