Weapon and Natural Attacks Setup
 

Thanks to what has really been a nasty east coast storm, I had a snow day to spend indoors and play around with HL. So, I'm learning more and more as I go. I am also learning Pathfinder more or less concurrently, which makes it a bit more of a challenge curve.

At the moment, I am trying to figure out how to represent a skeleton-type critter's attacks. Like the basic skeleton in the PF Bestiary, it can attack with a melee weapon (in my case, a battleaxe), with or without a secondary claw attack. Another option is for the creature to attack with two claw attacks. How should I set this up in HL. The various configurations I've tried do not seem to generate the right stat block output--it seems different from the Bestiary's syntax. That may be fine, but I am hoping someone has a solid way to approach this.

Also, the battleaxe is a one-handed weapon that can be used two-handed. How does HL distinguish between a weapon gripped in one hand vs. using two? Or does it?

As always, thanks for any advice and guidance. These forums are very useful and informative.

MK

On the weapons tab, each manufactured weapon that has "hands" has two boxes next to it. Checking one or the other box means only 1 hand is using the weapon. Checking both means both hands are using it.

You'll find that creatures with natural attacks has a natural attack removed when equipping a manufactured weapon in either hand.

The changes when you equip/un-equip the weapon happen in the Armory Summary under the Weapons section. As well as in the weapons tab itself under "Other Weapons".

Hmmm. I tried that, and I get a "too many weapons equipped in off-hand(s)" complaint. There must be something wrong with the way I've added natural attacks in my custom creature, because the regular skeleton template with a battleaxe works as you describe.

Thanks for the quick reply.

Ah! Apparently my new monster needs hands, specifically set up in the Background tab.
Obvious in retrospect.

Equipment sets let you represent, for example 2 claws or 1 claw and axe or axe in 2 hands

Thanks Aaron. I haven't looked at that feature yet, but that might come in handy as well when I actually start running such creatures in play.

Aaron: Sweet! Equipment sets are things of beauty. That makes the stat block output more like the PF Bestiary format for attacks.

Thanks.

MK

Stat blocks are one of the main reasons we added equipment sets.