Reanimated Skeleton is one of the most unique bosses in Don’t Starve Together, as it has multiple variants and requires a complex spawning process.
Not only that, it’s impossible to fight this skeleton creature without learning its abilities.
Recommended Read: How to Fish in Don’t Starve Together
Beating the Reanimated Skeleton in Don’t Starve Together is a complex process. This guide will show you how to beat all 3 Reanimated Skeleton variants, including what items to prepare, how to spawn each variant, their abilities, and their fight cycle.
Table of Contents
How to Beat Reanimated Skeleton in Don’t Starve Together
Unlike most other giants in the game, Reanimated Skeleton can only be summoned manually by completing a series of complex steps, which includes defeating two more bosses and traveling deep underground.
First, let’s prepare the necessary weapons and armor!
Prepare Weapons and Armor
Since you have to participate in at least 3 boss fights, it’s crucial to prepare a lot of weapons and armor, as well as some food to restore health and sanity for the underground journey.
1. Armor
Log Armor and Football Helmets are the first option on the list, as they’re quite cheap to make in the early game.
However, as you progress, using Thulecite Crown and Thulecite Suit is recommended for stronger protection.
Of course, it all depends on your kiting experience, but we recommend preparing ten or more armor pieces.
You don’t need to bring all of them at once, but a few for each boss fight is enough.
For the Ancient Fuelweaver boss, you may need a lot more. Don’t worry about the inventory slot because you can always craft and drop the armor pieces in the boss room to pick up during the fight.
2. Food
For food options, we always use Pierogies or Fishsticks for health restoration and Jerkies, Cooked Green Caps, or Vegetable Stingers for sanity.
By this point, you should have the Bundling Wrap recipe to wrap all your food items inside, preventing them from spoiling.
3. Tools
To fight the Reanimated Skeleton (specifically the Ancient Fuelweaver), you should have the following:
- Weather Pain: used to quickly kill the Woven Shadows, a creature that heals the Ancient Fuelweaver.
- The Lazy Explorer: used to escape the Bone Cage instantly.
- Nightmare Amulet: used to induce insanity effects, allowing you to see and destroy the Unseen Hands.
The above tools are expensive to craft and optional for the fight. However, the lack of them will make the fight extremely difficult.
How to Spawn the Reanimated Skeleton
Reanimated Skeleton has 3 variants: Forest, Caves, and Ancient Fuelweaver.
To spawn the first two, you only need to find 8 Fossil Fragments and fight the Shadow Pieces boss to get the Shadow Atrium.
To find Fossil Fragments, go underground and find the Stalagmites.
Each Stalagmite mined with a pickaxe has a 10% chance of dropping one Fossil Fragment.
You can use the fragments to build the Odd Skeleton by right-clicking them on the ground.
The first fragment creates the skeleton’s foundation, while the remaining 7 will slowly upgrade it.
Remember that there are another 3 Odd Skeleton variants, and only 1 is correct. Thus, you can only spawn the Reanimated Skeleton using the correct variant.
Here’s the fun part! Depending on where you build the Odd Skeleton, a different Reanimated Skeleton variant will be spawned.
- Forest: Odd Skeleton must be built above the ground. This variant can only be summoned during the night.
- Caves: anywhere underground.
- Ancient Fuelweaver: Odd Skeleton must be built in the underground Atrium biome. This biome can only be entered by traveling through the Tentacle Pillar Hole or using the Lazy Explorer. In our runs, we were lucky to find the edge of this biome while exploring the underground map, so we just used the Lazy Explorer to teleport over.
If you want to spawn the first two variants, then go ahead and put the Shadow Atrium inside the Odd Skeleton and watch the transformation!
Otherwise, you must locate the Ruins and find the Labyrinth biome. Then, defeat the Ancient Guardian here to get the Ancient Key.
Back to the end room of the Atrium, put the Ancient Key inside the Ancient Gateway. Then, to spawn the third variant of the Reanimated Skeleton, build the Odd Skeleton in this room and put the Shadow Atrium in.
How to Beat the Forest Reanimated Skeleton
The Forest variant is a passive creature that doesn’t attack you, even if you initiate the battle.
It wanders around, leaving a trail of plants (Lesser Glow Berries, Lightbulbs, and Ferns) for some seconds on the ground for you to harvest and destroy any structures under its feet.
You can defeat this variant using any type of weapon you have. However, the best way to beat the Forest variant is to wait until the following day for it to decay.
The Forest Reanimated Skeleton returns 100% materials on death (8 Fossil Fragments and 1 Shadow Atrium), so it’s best to spawn it a few times before the other two variants if you want to farm the plants.
How to Beat the Cave Reanimated Skeleton
The Cave variant has roughly the same amount of health points and attack damage as other giants in DST, so beating it shouldn’t be a big problem.
It has two moves: attack with its skull and slam the ground to snare all players inside a bone cage. The latter skill is only available after the boss is lower in health.
To beat the Cave Reanimated Skeleton, hit it 4-5 times and then run away to dodge its attack. Then, repeat the process.
When it uses the snare attack, use the Lazy Explorer to teleport out of the bone trap. If you don’t have this staff, just stand still and tank the boss, and remember to check your helmet or armor’s durability.
The bone cage will disappear after some seconds. When you’re out, just repeat this cycle to beat the Cave Reanimated Skeleton.
How to Beat the Ancient Fuelweaver
It’s time for one of the most challenging bosses in Don’t Starve Together!
As mentioned earlier, you must prepare lots of armor, helmets, healing food, and the three special items:
- 2-3 Weather Pain
- 2 The Lazy Explorer
- 1 Nightmare Amulet
Once you’ve located the end room of the Atrium, drop some extra armor and tools around the room so you can quickly pick them up during the fight.
When ready, activate the Ancient Gateway, build the Odd Skeleton, and insert the Shadow Atrium.
In the first stage, the Ancient Fuelweaver has 3 moves:
- Regular attack.
- Snare attack like the cave variant.
- And Fossil Spikes drop from the ceiling.
It’s recommended to stay near the boss, as you can tank the boss in the first stage, and it will do the snare attack if you run too far.
Like the cave variant, you can use the Lazy Explorer to escape the snare attack.
If you have limited resources, try dodging its attack by hitting it 3-4 times and then run away. Then go back in, hit it again, and dodge its Fossil Spikes attack if possible (pay attention to the shadows of the spikes).
Normally, the boss’s fighting cycle should follow this pattern:
Regular attack x3 > Fossil Spikes > Regular attack x2 > Snare attack > Repeat
When the boss’s HP drops below 10,000, it enters stage 2 with 3 new moves:
- Spawn Woven Shadows to eat, restoring 400 health points per creature.
- Spawn 6 Unseen Hands to create Shadow Shield, blocking 100% damage.
- Mind Control attack targets insane players and stuns them for 3.5 seconds.
By the time it reaches stage 2, the boss kneels down, and it will spawn Woven Shadows to eat. Typically, the first two new moves usually happen together, so you can’t deal any damage while watching it restore health.
To remove the Shadow Shield, you must destroy all 6 Unseen Hands. And you can only see these hands if your sanity is low.
Standing near the boss to receive a -400 per minute sanity aura is a great idea. However, as you’re low on sanity, shadow creatures will spawn, making the boss fight even more challenging.
In that case, you need a lot of sanity restoring food or simply using the Nightmare Amulet to quickly switch between sane and insane status.
Regarding the Woven Shadows, they will always crawl toward the Ancient Fuelweaver, so you can quickly destroy them by using the Weather Pain under the boss’s feet.
Woven Shadows spawn in waves, so you must use the Weather Pain multiple times.
The second stage is quite stressful, but the trick here is to simultaneously destroy the last Unseen Hand and Woven Shadow. This way, you will have more time to hit the boss before it uses these 2 moves again.
Each time it kneels down, immediately equip the Nightmare Amulet and destroy the Unseen Hands while paying attention to the Woven Shadows. If one of them comes near the Ancient Fuelweaver, then use Weather Pain towards the boss.
Repeat this cycle: Unequip the Nightmare Amulet > Re-equip it > Destroy Unseen Hands > Destroy Woven Shadows > Repeat
Then destroy the last two Unseen Hand and Woven Shadow, and beat the boss like the first stage.
You have to unequip and equip the Nightmare Amulet continuously because of the boss’s Mind Control attack. If you wear the amulet for too long (insane for too long), you will be stunned for 3.5 seconds.
Believe us, being stunned while watching the boss restore its health is not something you’d want to experience.
How Much Health Does Reanimated Skeleton Have?
In Don’t Starve Together, the Forest and Cave Reanimated Skeleton variants have 4,000 health points, while the third variant (Ancient Fuelweaver) has 16,000 health points.
Beating the Forest variant is easy, but beating the Cave Reanimated Skeleton requires more effort as it has roughly the same HP and attack damage as other bosses in the game.
The Ancient Fuelweaver is an absolute nightmare, as you need to hit it 269 times with a Thulecite Club or 236 times with a Dark Sword while dodging its abilities to defeat it.
What Day Does Reanimated Skeleton Spawn?
Reanimated Skeleton doesn’t have an exact spawn day. Instead, you must manually spawn it by building the correct Odd Skeleton in your desired location and inserting the Shadow Atrium into the skeleton.
If you want to spawn the Ancient Fuelweaver, then remember to activate the Ancient Gateway first with the Ancient Key.
What to Do When Reanimated Skeleton Isn’t Spawning?
By default, if you collect enough Fossil Fragments and get the Shadow Atrium from the Shadow Pieces (which can’t be turned off in the settings), you can spawn Reanimated Skeleton whenever you want.
As far as we know, the only reason why Reanimated Skeleton isn’t spawning in your world is because you’ve built the wrong version of the Odd Skeleton.
If you still can’t spawn the Reanimated Skeleton, press “~” on your keyboard to open the debug menu. Then type:
- /c_spawn(“stalker_forest”) to spawn the Forest variant.
- /c_spawn(“stalker”) to spawn the Cave variant.
- /c_spawn(“stalker_atrium”) to spawn the Ancient Fuelweaver.
That’s how to beat the Reanimated Skeleton in Don’t Starve Together!
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