Guide:Skeletron strategies

"The cursed guardian of the dungeon..."

Skeletron is a Pre-Hardmode Boss guarding the Dungeon. It's big, tough, hard to dodge, and can seriously ruin your evening many times over. Like any other daunting task in Terraria, defeating it is largely about smart preparation. Following are some hints, tips, and strategies to help you do so.

Spawn Condition
Skeletron can be spawned by fulfilling one of these conditions: It must then be defeated before all the involved players die.
 * Talk with at night. He can be found at the Dungeon entrance;
 * Kill at night, with.

The Fight
Skeletron is a large skull, composed by a Skull and 2 Arms. In order to defeat it, you must kill the Skull.

He attacks the player mostly by swiping its hands. This attack is quite easy to predict, as it prepares them by lunging them backward, so you can prepare to dodge them. However, the main issue is their trajectory, as it's very erratic. You can dodge them by either jumping or running around. He can use both hands to have different timings and trajectories, so you might get off-guard by trying to dodge his other hand.

Timing is key in order to defend from hands: after dodging them, use your piercing weapons to deal damage to both arms (and Skeletron's Skull, if he happens to align with them). The arms don't have much health, so they can be detached fairly easily. However, be mindful that, even if Skeletron has no time limit, when daytime comes, he permanently spins against you. As such, it's important to prioritize the Skull if you can consistently dodge the arm swipes, rather than detaching them.

After some time, Skeletron will use his trademarked spin attack. It's slow, but it always hones at you. During this attack, which lasts for quite a bit, he is the most vulnerable; he increases the power of the attack by sacrificing defense. As such, use your strongest weapon at your disposal to deal a lot of damage. However, make sure to constantly move; if you get hit by it, you take a lot of damage and you get debuff, which stops Health Regeneration.

During the spin attack, the hands will stay fixed in a uphanded position while Skeletron moves. You can also use this time to deal damage to hands, but keep in mind that their defense aren't reduced.

Failing to defeat it till daybreak will make Skeletron permanently spin at you, just like Dungeon Guardian; it will increase defense and attack to the point where you get one-shot.

Expert Mode
The fight is separated in 2 phases:
 * During the First Phase, Skeletron can't be damaged. As such, you're forced to detach the Arms from it in order to progress. Moreover, hands can you;
 * During the Second Phase, Skeletron will get faster. It will start to shoot homing skulls at you. Moreover, the spin attack will be also much faster, to the point where it can outrun you. Skulls are very fast, but they turn very slowly. Make sure to dodge both the skulls and the spin attack by using enchanting your movement with, be that you use your, or running as fast as possible, and remember that if you get hit, you lose your momentum; thus you get constantly hit for heavy damage.

Terrain Preparation
Warning: Don't make significant edits to the dungeon floor. Doing so will stop the Endgame Cultists to spawn, potentially blocking progression if the old man can spawn than the Endgame Cultists can too.

The arena doesn't matter as much as it does in the other boss fights, but it can still be important. A large, flat surface with enough room to maneuver is key.

A fairly straightforward and common practice is to simply flatten out the roof of the dungeon and fight Skeletron there. A ceiling is mostly unnecessary and tends to get in the way of many attacks, especially if you are planning to use a.

Note: Ricocheting weapons, such as the, can make use of the ceiling efficiently. Always suit your arena by making full use of your gear.

Platforms may be used with decent effect, but keep in mind that they take time to drop through when dodging and too many platforms can interfere with attacks depending on the weapons used. Having multiple rows of platforms whilst having any items which allow flight can, however, be useful for dodging Skeletron's homing skulls in Expert mode as it allows much greater maneuverability to dodge his attacks.

Gearing up
It's recommended to try to fight Skeletron with at least 300 Health.

Armor
The more Defense you have, the better. You should use the best armor available to you at the time, but if the best you have is Silver armor or lower then you should seriously consider holding off and continuing the fight later with better defenses. Gold/Platinum armor or better is highly preferred. If you are having trouble finding enough ore, a Spelunker Potion can help immensely. If your armor is far ahead of your weapons then you can sacrifice power in favor of survivability, however you still have a time limit to defeat Skeletron.

Weapons
All classes are equal against Skeletron, so use your most preferred gear as per below.

For Melee users:
 * are reasonable weapons, however only the and  can be obtained at this point.
 * are excellent against Skeletron, as they can be directed easily to the target and held there for rapid repeated damage. Eliminating the hands first can be done very rapidly with a yoyo as the hands tend to push them around, making additional contact with the weapon.
 * Many swords above 20 damage and at or above fast speed, such as and, are useful as well.
 * works well but it's more effective when throwing past the Skull.
 * If you feel to challenge the Underground Jungle, you can use the against Skeletron, however it cannot poison since Skeletron is immune to poison.

For Ranged users:
 * / are the most accessible Bows at this stage. Use them with and.
 * The is great, but it's expensive to get one.
 * The is an excellent weapon for defeating Skeletron. However, you might need to try to be within Melee range to consistently do full damage against it.

For Magic users:
 * Using a with Meteor Armor frees you from the constraints of Mana and deals decent damage.
 * , despite it's low damage, is extremely effective, due to its homing bees.
 * can also be very effective such as the Ruby and Diamond Staff, requiring very little mana, while dealing significant damage.
 * The is also a very effective method of damaging Skeletron, even allowing it to be used in combination with other weapons. If carefully placed, the cloud created by the rod can cause 100 damage per second. However it will only be available in a Crimson world.

For Throwing users:
 * work great when spread around the Dungeon entrance, and when Skeletron spins.
 * and work well against Skeletron's head when it is spinning, but their low damage make them less useful against Skeletron's hands or Skeletron's head when it isn't spinning.
 * can be used to devastating effect on Skeletron.
 * can be useful for the fight, thanks to the homing bees that it releases. This makes dealing damage almost automatic without much need to aim.
 * If you have Fossil armor, are very effective. Use them when the head spins.

For Summoners:
 * At this point in the game, there is very little summoning equipment available. Because of this you may wish to play a different class.
 * Or, if you decided to brave the Underground Jungle first, you can use your first viable summoning weapon, which is the.

Accessories
The Rocket Boots, Cloud in a Bottle, Sandstorm in a Bottle, and Shiny Red Balloon are excellent choices for your first fight, as they'll give you vertical mobility. Hermes Boots and/or the Anklet of the Wind are also good choices, giving you more horizontal maneuverability. If you still have free slots, Feral Claws (for melee users) and the Band of Regeneration are great choices too. In Expert mode, it is recommended to that all of your accessories are reforged with Warding for maximum defense. You should also use the Shield of Cthulhu to dodge his attacks and the Worm Scarf to absorb more damage.

Potions

 * Ironskin Potions and Regeneration Potions will make the job easier for any player and are highly recommended. Two potions will last from sundown to dawn, provided the player stays alive the entire time.
 * The Swiftness Potion will help you evade Skeletron (and his skulls in Expert mode).
 * If you're using melee weapons and aren't concerned with being hit, Ale may help you as well.
 * The Bowl of Soup/Cooked Marshmallow/Pumpkin Pie/Cooked Fish will help you, no matter what strategy you are going to use.
 * An Archery Potion is a good last resort if you are running out of time in the night.
 * If you plan on fighting Skeletron in the sky (such as using a Gravitation Potion, or a Slime mount to jump on him), then it may be a good choice to use a Featherfall Potion in case you fall, to prevent both taking fall damage and Skeletron despawning.
 * An Endurance Potion should be used in expert mode if you plan to fight Skeletron with weaker armor.

Minecart Strategy
An alternative to high-maneuverability armor or accessories which can even work against Expert mode Skeletron is to craft a Minecart for the extra speed and build a large, diamond-shaped Minecart Track, such as one having in the middle on each side three Minecart Tracks with a Bumper on the outer end, and the inner end connects using a switch track to two diagonal tracks, with both connected and the preferred direction up on one side and down on the other, and with a total width of roughly 100-120 blocks. After the Skeletron battle begins, mount the Minecart and accelerate to maximum Minecart speed. While collisions can occasionally occur, they should be uncommon enough that healing will not be a problem. Using attacks at range is highly preferred, though unlike a Hoik system, a Minecart might not move fast enough to allow a boomerang to do all of the work as in some Dungeon Guardian strategies. If using pre-Hardmode weapons, the Molten Fury with Frostburn Arrows is highly recommended.

If using the Minecart strategy and for whatever reason the battle lasts until dawn, the Dungeon Guardian A.I. will actually cause the Skeletron head to follow you at such a slow and steady pace that it should never catch up. In such a case, however, you will take fatal damage from contact and deal 1 damage with every landed attack, or 2 from critical hits, causing fast attacks at ranged to become essential (such as the Space Gun with the full set of Meteor armor); thus, having a set of accessories with critical chance modifiers becomes far more important than damage, defense, or mobility.

Other Tips

 * If you can find a Water Bolt on a "shelf" around the entrance, it can be used very effectively inside the initial large room, due to the fact that it can bounce off of walls multiple times and deal decent damage.

Farming
Skeletron is much easier to beat once you've got access to Dungeon loot. If you must defeat it on a new world, all of the above strategies can still apply: It's simply easier the next time around. You can also summon Skeletron by killing the Clothier after you obtained the Clothier Voodoo Doll. Because the Clothier will simply respawn the next day, this is an easy way to obtain the rare items or get some additional money.