Skeletons

Skeletons
Elixir Cost	1
Rarity	Common
Type	Troop
Arena	Bone Pit
Release Date	4 January 2016

For the evolution of the Skeletons, click the Wild Shard.

“Three fast, very weak melee fighters. Surround your enemies with this pile of bones!”

The Skeletons is a Common card that is unlocked from the Bone Pit (Arena 2). It spawns three fast, single-target, ground-targeting, melee, ground troops with very low hitpoints and very low damage. Their deployment is in a triangle formation. They appear as small skeletons with a skull that lacks a lower jaw and wield some short swords. They are also the same as those spawned by the Witch, Tombstone, Skeleton Barrel, Skeleton Army, Graveyard, and the Super Witch. A Skeletons card costs 1 Elixir to deploy.

Strategy

For Battle Decks with this card, click here.

• The Skeletons are most effectively used as a disposable distraction for medium to high-hitpoint units, such as the Prince, Inferno Dragon, P.E.K.K.A., Mighty Miner, Sparky, and Mini P.E.K.KA., since they can stop charged up abilities and distract enemies. Against building-targeting troops unable to fight them, they provide a high amount of damage per second for 1 Elixir, and they can stall single-targeting troops for a relatively long time considering their Elixir cost. Although they will often not counter units by themselves, the support and time they provide for other units is valuable. However, they will quickly be defeated by ranged area damage units like the Wizard, Bowler, Executioner, Witch, and Bomber, so the player should try to defeat or distract these types of units beforehand.
• Generally, it is risky to use a spell on Skeletons, as their 1 Elixir cost means any spell will be a negative Elixir trade. Plus, even a Level 1 Crown Tower can fully take them down without taking any damage. However, if the opponent is relying on Skeletons in order to defend, a quick spell can allow for major damage to the opposing Crown Tower. If the player knows that the opponent will use Skeletons against a remaining Prince, they can use a Zap spell as soon as they see the Skeletons, potentially allowing the Prince to deal damage it would not have done otherwise or forcing the opponent to use another card, making up for the Elixir deficit.
• The Skeletons can be used to counter a lone Princess. If played just after the Princess fires, the Skeletons will eliminate her quickly. Be careful, as if they are deployed with bad timing, the Princess will easily eliminate the Skeletons with one hit. The Princess player may also quickly react with a spell on the Skeletons, allowing her to continue firing at the Tower, so be prepared to follow up if necessary.
• With the help of a Crown Tower, Skeletons can counter medium-health troops like the Musketeer, Night Witch, Hunter, Miner, Bandit, Executioner, Goblin Brawler, and Mini P.E.K.K.A.. Against single-targeting ranged troops, one should place the Skeletons on top of the troop to negate the range advantage, Against melee troops, the Skeletons should be placed in the center so that the troop has to walk farther, giving the Crown Tower more time to chip it down and the Skeletons time to deploy.
• Their 1 Elixir cost makes them an effective distraction against a Sparky, leaving the player with more Elixir to deploy other units to destroy her. Skeletons can also be deployed directly on top of her to surround her, which will counter her for a 5 Elixir advantage with the help of a Crown Tower. However, an adept Sparky player may preemptively Zap on top of their own Sparky as it crosses the bridge. Players relying on Skeletons to surround and counter her in this situation this will suffer major damage to their Crown Tower, so the player should switch up their tactics.
• If the opponent places an Inferno Tower to counter a tank, Skeletons can stall the Inferno Tower for a short time, giving the defender time to place another card to counter it or reset its damage ramp-up. This also works against the Inferno Dragon.
• Since it costs only 1 Elixir, it can shuffle the player's deck quickly and add a significant damage boost to an attack. Better yet, since they are also easily defeated by many cards and Crown Towers, not many players are willing to play cards to only take out Skeletons, given that their 1 Elixir cost will almost always result in a negative Elixir trade for the player countering them. They are very good to be split behind the King Tower while shuffling the player's deck, as it can discourage the opponent from immediately attacking either lane slightly.
• Skeletons can provide a cheap, but threatening boost to a small attack due to their Fast move speed and high combined damage. For example, a Miner accompanied by Skeletons will be much more threatening as the opponent will take much more damage if they ignore it, as opposed to ignoring a single Miner.
• Skeletons can be used along with certain other cards like Knight, Valkyrie, or Mini P.E.K.K.A. to easily counter high damage single-targeting troops like Elite Barbarians, Mighty Miner, P.E.K.K.A, and Prince. Use the Skeletons to pull them into the center while absorbing some of the damage then place down Knight or Mini P.E.K.K.A. to finish them off. This can then assist in a counterattack.
• If the player thinks their opponent will try and send a Goblin Barrel far behind their Crown Tower, they can try and activate their King's Tower. The Skeletons should be split behind the player's King's Tower a few tiles before the barrel's shadow crosses the river. 1 Skeleton should go in the lane of the barrel while the 2 go in the other lane. If the opponent does send the barrel to the back of the player's Crown Tower, the Goblins will defeat the Skeletons and 1 Goblin will head towards the King's Tower afterwards instead of towards the Crown Tower. Even if the opponent does not send the barrel behind the Tower, the player will have sufficient Elixir to counter the regular placement.
• Against an offensive Mortar on the center of the bridge, meet the Mortar vertically and play the Skeletons on the first tile in front of the King's Tower slightly before the Mortar's deploy timer is three fourths of the way finished. The Mortar will fire its shell at the Skeletons just as they are deployed, and the area damage effect will clip the King's Tower, activating it.
• Skeletons can fully counter a Bandit. Before the Bandit is about to dash, place the Skeletons on the third tile vertically from the King's Tower and the third tile horizontally from the Crown Tower. The front Skeleton should appear to be slightly more forward than the Crown Tower. If executed correctly, the Bandit will be in range of both Crown Towers after her dash, resulted in her being whittled down quickly and getting no hits on the player's Tower.
• Skeletons have very high DPS/Cost ratio. A strategy is to place an Ice Golem to distract a troop, and Skeletons behind the attacking troop to severely cripple them, if not, destroy them.
• Skeletons can be used as a cheap way to kite air troops placed at the center of the Arena. Split the Skeletons so that one goes into the lane the air troops is staggered towards, and two go into the other lane. The single Skeleton will tank an attack and buy time for the two Skeletons in the other lane to distance themselves from the air unit, allowing them to live longer. However, this will not work against the Flying Machine, as its sight range is equal to its attack range, meaning that if an enemy walks out of its attack range, it won't try to follow them. To counteract this, players should place Skeletons in front of the Flying Machine to distract it.
• Placing Skeletons and then placing down a single grounded unit on the same tile right afterwards will cause them to spread further apart from each other while deploying, allowing them to be targeted individually by certain area damage attackers like the Baby Dragon and Skeleton Dragons, making them more effective at stalling these units.
  • This tactic is most effective if the grounded unit is a ranged attacker, as it will not continue to collide with the Skeletons upon deployment and will not be susceptible to area damage damage until after all of them are defeated.
  • This tactic is ineffective against cards with a large enough area damage radius, such as the Mega Knight and the Dark Prince with their jump and charge attacks respectively.

Statistics

Cost	Hit Speed	First Hit Speed	Speed	Deploy Time	Range	Target	Count	Transport	Type	Rarity
1	1 sec	0.5 sec	Fast (90)	1 sec	Melee: Short (0.5)	Ground	x3	Ground	Troop	Common

Level	Hitpoints	Damage	Damage per second
1	32	32	32
2	35	35	35
3	38	38	38
4	42	42	42
5	46	46	46
6	51	51	51
7	56	56	56
8	61	61	61
9	67	67	67
10	74	74	74
11	81	81	81
12	89	89	89
13	98	98	98
14	108	108	108
15	119	119	119

Card Mastery

Type	Level/Tier	Objective	Reward
Damage Dealer	1	Deal a total of 20,000 Damage to enemy Troops or buildings	200 Skeletons cards 25
	2	Deal a total of 60,000 Damage to enemy Troops or buildings	2,000 25
	3	Deal a total of 100,000 Damage to enemy Troops or buildings	150 25
Hit Maker	1	Hit enemy Troops a total of 700 times	3,000 100
	2	Hit enemy Troops a total of 2,000 times	200 100
	3	Hit enemy Troops a total of 3,500 times	5,000 100

History

2016

• The Skeletons card was added with Clash Royale's game launch on 4/1/2016.
• On 19/2/2016, the Balance Update, increased the Skeletons' hitpoints and damage by 11%.
• On 29/2/2016, the March 2016 Update, decreased the Skeletons' sight range to 5.5 tiles (from 6 tiles).
• On 3/5/2016, the May 2016 Update, increased the Common card Level cap to 13 (from 12). The update also fixed the “range bug”, which decreased the Skeletons' range to 0.5 tiles (from 0.75 tiles), but their effective range was unchanged.
• On 18/5/2016, a Balance Update, increased the Skeletons' hitpoints and damage by 5%.
• On 21/6/2016, a Balance Update, decreased the number of Skeletons spawned to 3 (from 4). This also changed the numeral "Four" to "Three" in the description and replaced "swarm" with "surround" due to the lower number of Skeletons.

2017

• On 13/2/2017, a Balance Update, increased the number of Skeletons spawned to 4 (from 3). This also changed the numeral "Three" to "Four" in the description.
• On 12/6/2017, the June 2017 Update, decreased the number of Skeletons spawned to 3 (from 4). It also increased the distance between the Skeletons upon deployment. This changed the numeral "Four" to "Three" in the description.

2019

• On 26/11/2019, the End of November 2019 Update, added a card render to the Skeletons' card info screen.

2021

• On 27/10/2021, the Champions Update, increased the Level cap of all cards to 14 (from 13).

2023

• On 19/6/2023, the Card Evolution Update, increased the Level cap of all cards to 15 (from 14), and added the Skeletons' Evolution. It also changed the Skeletons' card image.

Gallery

Skeletons’ card image before 19/6/2023.

Current card render.

Skeletons’ card render in the Chinese version of the game.

Skeletons Full Body.

Skeletons 1

Skeletons 2

Trivia

• The word "Skeleton" comes from the Greek "σκελετός" (skeletós), meaning dried up or withered.
• The Skeletons are 1 of 19 troops which first existed in Clash of Clans, the others being Minions, Archers, Goblins, Barbarians, Giant, Valkyrie, Wizard, Hog Rider, Witch, P.E.K.K.A., Balloon, Golem, Wall Breakers, Bowler, Cannon Cart, Phoenix, Lava Hound, and the Archer Queen.
  • It is the only troop that is only available as a sub-troop in Clash of Clans.
• The Skeletons are 1 of 3 troops which can be spawned by a troop (Skeletons/Skeleton Army), a spell (Graveyard), and a building (Tombstone). The others are Goblins and Barbarians.
  • Skeletons spawn from more cards than any other troop, being able to spawn from a total of 8 cards.
• The Skeletons, along with Electro Spirit, Fire Spirit, Ice Spirit, Warmth, Heal Spirit, and Heal, are the cheapest cards, costing 1 Elixir.
  • The Skeletons were the first 1-Elixir card to be added in the game.
• The Skeletons are tied with Bats and Suspicious Bush for the lowest hitpoints of all troops, with 119 hitpoints at Level 15, and 32 hitpoints at Level 1. Guards also have the same hitpoints, however, they come with a shield.
• The Skeletons are one of the first troop cards to be featured in a Trainer's deck, alongside the Minions, Archers, Knight, Spear Goblins, Goblins, Bomber, Barbarians, Minion Horde, Mini P.E.K.K.A, Musketeer, Giant, Valkyrie, Wizard, Hog Rider, Baby Dragon, Skeleton Army, Witch, P.E.K.K.A, Prince, and Balloon.
• The Skeletons are one of the first troops to be featured in a Loading Screen, alongside the Knight, Goblins, and Prince.
• The Skeletons are one of the first troop cards to receive a card render, alongside the Archers, Knight, Goblins, Bomber, Barbarians, Bats, Royal Recruits, Skeleton Barrel, Rascals, Musketeer, Giant, Valkyrie, Wizard, Flying Machine, Hog Rider, Royal Hogs, Dart Goblin, Zappies, Elixir Golem, Baby Dragon, Skeleton Army, Witch, P.E.K.K.A, Prince, Balloon, Giant Skeleton, Goblin Giant, Hunter, Electro Dragon, Wall Breakers, Bowler, Cannon Cart, Mega Knight, Ram Rider, Miner, Royal Ghost, Ice Wizard, Magic Archer, Bandit, Lava Hound, Night Witch, and Fisherman.
• The Skeletons are one of the first troop cards to receive a Card Evolution, alongside the Barbarians, Royal Giant, and Firecracker.
• The Skeletons are 1 of 9 troops that have the same sprite for both players, the others are Electro Spirit, Fire Spirit, Bats, Ice Spirit, Heal Spirit, Elixir Blob, Phoenix, and Lava Pup.
• Even though the card spawns 3 Skeletons, the card render displays only 1 Skeleton.
• The Skeletons are 1 of 4 troops which can defeat themselves in one attack, the others being Bats, Firecracker and Wall Breakers.
• Along with the Skeleton Army and Wizard Trio, the Skeletons are the only swarm card whose members spawn all at the exact same time.
• In the Korean language settings of the game, the Skeletons' name translates to "Skeleton Soldiers".
• The Skeletons has been featured in multiple special game modes outside of the card. More specifically:
  • The Skeletons are 1 of 23 troops that have been featured in the Troop Rush game mode, the others being Skeleton Dragons, Fire Spirit, Bats, Elite Barbarians, Firecracker, Rascal Girls, Royal Hogs, Heal Spirit, Elixir Golem, Guards, Prince, Balloon, Golem, Wall Breakers, Ram Rider, Sparky, Phoenix, Royal Ghost, Bandit, Lumberjack, Santa Hog Rider, and the Monk.
  • The Skeletons have been featured with multiple buffs. More specifically:
    • The Skeletons are 1 of 3 troops that have been featured with an Invisibility buff, the others being Goblins and Bats.
    • The Skeletons are the only troop that has been featured with a Shield Boost buff.
• The Skeletons, along with the Minions, Bomber, Skeleton Dragons, Ice Spirit, Mini P.E.K.K.A, Mega Minion, Dart Goblin, Ice Golem, Elixir Golem, Goblin Brawler, Guards, Baby Dragon, P.E.K.K.A, Giant Skeleton, Golem, Wall Breakers, Bowler, Executioner, Mega Knight, Inferno Dragon, Royal Ghost, and Lava Hound, are featured as a monster in Squad Busters.
  • An ice variant and a lava variant for the Skeleton are also featured as a monster in Squad Buster.
  • Also along with the Bats and Royal Recruits, it is also featured as a sub-character in Squad Busters.
• The Skeletons, along with the Archers, Goblins, Barbarians, Mini P.E.K.K.A, Musketeer, Wizard, Witch, Prince, and Princess, are featured as a sticker in iMessage, in a sticker pack called Clash-A-Rama.
• According to a Clash-A-Rama comic strip, a Skeleton is the Giant Skeleton's child.
• In Royal Crypt, Skeletons can be seen sitting in the audience.
• Using the Skeletons card to summon 15 Skeletons would cost 5 Elixir, whereas using the Skeleton Army card to summon 15 Skeletons costs 3 Elixir.
• The first Trainer the player battles in the Training Camp uses 2 cards, one of them being Skeletons, and the other being Goblins.
• The Skeletons are the subject of certain cosmetics in the game. More specifically:
  • The Skeletons are the subject of a few Clan badges.
  • The Skeletons are the subject of a few Emotes.
    • The Skeleton Mariachi Emote may possibly be a reference to Poco from Brawl Stars, another Supercell game.
  • The Skeletons are the subject of a few Battle Banner items.
    • The Red vs Blue frame is created by Myoho.
    • In the Raise your Battle Banners trailer, there was a Battle Banner decoration that showed a Skeleton riding a tusk like a snowboard. However, this Battle Banner decoration never made it to the game.
• In the Thai language setting of the game, the card description incorrectly states that the card spawns 4 Skeletons.
• The Skeletons were featured in the winning deck of the Super Magical Cup Tournament, by a player called CMcHugh.
• Before the Skeletons' card release, the Skeletons' hitpoints and damage were increased by 8%.