Human Skull

The Human Skull is a non-elemental cat toy available for NoLegs in Epic Battle Fantasy 5.

Description

As the name suggests, the Human Skull features a small, off-white skull used as a buckler; according to its menu description, the skull is that of a human child cursed with dark magic. Feeble red lights glow in its empty eye sockets; the lights are white in its icon. Its associated weapon is a broken, off-white femur bone (presumably from the same child), with the broken end serving as a hilt and two splinters forming a crude crossguard.

Normal

The Human Skull is a support weapon with the worst boosts to Attack and Magic Attack of any cat toys; it's only ahead of weapons with no offensive stats whatsoever. On the other hand, it gives NoLegs a fair amount of survivability; its Defence and Magic Defence are the third-best among cat toys (tied with the Steel Buckler and the Icecream Sandwich), while its Evade is tied with the Pixel Popper and only surpassed by the Neon Lightbulb. It also empowers debuffs and status effects; the former benefits the Defence debuff inflicted by its weapon-elemental skills, and the latter benefits The Reaper it can summon between turns.

Even without the Human Skull's auto-skill, NoLegs can make good use of its status boost; aside from his natural elemental slashes, the weapon itself inflicts Bad Luck with weapon-elemental skills. In fact, The Reaper is guaranteed to kill non-resistant foes if it connects, and Bad Luck will further increase its effectiveness. On the other hand, NoLegs's debuffing capabilities are the worst among players, but he can still use Swift Slash to make entire waves of foes much more vulnerable to physical attacks. The appropriate Flairs can further amplify elemental blows, but the default Bad Luck can be conducive to setting up deadly critical hits with other statuses.

Overall, the Human Skull is mainly effective for setting up physical damage combos; it's certainly capable in this regard, but the player may prefer a more versatile weapon for this role. Its Bio immunity can also be useful if the player is expecting to contend with Virus (either from enemies or as part of a Virus-infliction strategy).

The Human Skull resists Bio, Curse, Bad Luck, and Dark. All but the last become a full immunity at Level 5.

Equip Remix

The Alt Human Skull's only stats are the lowest Attack boost and second-lowest Magic Attack boost of any cat toy that raises those stats. It empowers debuffs, but NoLegs has very few ways to exploit this compared to his allies. It also boasts a variety of summons - Zombie Hydra, Skeleton Cat, and Skeleton Hand - which can allow for some luck shenanigans and mass Instant Death, but they're inconsistent enough to be outclassed by a Fat Fly status build with Firecrackers support (which is admittedly only available in the very late game).

However, the Alt Human Skull has one valuable asset; with three pieces of debuff-boosting gear (including itself), its weapon-elemental skills can reduce the victims' Magic Defence by 80%. This effectively turns Swift Slash into a damaging Enfeeble with a 1-turn cooldown, providing excellent support for a magically offensive Lance or Natalie build. In this respect, the Alt Human Skull should be treated like the Alt Club of Withering or the normal version of the Kaladanda; instead of direct damage, it should be used to open gaping holes in the foes' defenses for other party members to exploit. Giving NoLegs the appropriate status Flairs can further boost elemental magic damage.

The Alt Human Skull resists Bio, Earth, and Dark, becoming immune to none of them at Level 5.

Epic Battle Fantasy 5

"What the hell, NoLegs? Where did you find such creepy equipment?"

―Natalie, Epic Battle Fantasy 5

The Human Skull is found inside a chest in the Mystic Woods, on the same screen you obtain the Stepladder. The chest is hidden behind the leaves in the upper-right corner of the screen.

	Human Skull
	The cursed skull of a young human child. Increases the effect of debuff skills used. Level 3: Randomly casts The Reaper between turns. Level 5: Increases the chance of inflicting status effects.

Statistics
Stat Bonus												Resistance
	LV1	LV2	LV3	LV4	LV5		LV1	LV2	LV3	LV4	LV5		LV1	LV2	LV3	LV4	LV5
	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-		20%	40%	60%	80%	100%
	-	10%	20%	30%	40%		-	5%[0%]	10%[0%]	20%[0%]	30%[0%]		10%	20%	30%	40%	50%
	-	5%	10%	20%	30%		-	-	10%[5%]	20%[10%]	30%[10%]		20%	40%	60%	80%	100%
	-	-	-	-	-		-	5%[0%]	10%[0%]	20%[0%]	30%[0%]	Element		----
Spells & Statuses
			Power					Chance Modifier				Attack Status
Auto Skill			100					(100%)					30%	50%	70%	85%	100%
Bonus Skill			--					--					2x	2x	2x	2x	3x
Auto Status			--					--					30%	40%	50%	60%	70%
Defend Status			--					--					20%	20%	25%	25%	30%
Note: Stats in brackets (below/right from actual) are for its pre-v2 update version. Before the v2 update, resisted Death/Doom instead of Bio and had no special effect at level 1 (with the debuff boost at level 5 instead).

Forging Information
Lvl	Requirements			Lvl	Requirements
2	x 1	--	--	3	x 3	--	--
4	x 4	x 4	--	5	x 1	x 3	--

Statistics with Equip Remix enabled.

	Human Skull
	The cursed skull of a young human child. Increases the effect of debuff skills used. Level 3: Randomly casts Skeleton Cat between turns. Level 4: Randomly casts Skeleton Hand between turns. Level 5: Randomly casts Zombie Hydra between turns.

Statistics
Stat Bonus												Resistance
	LV1	LV2	LV3	LV4	LV5		LV1	LV2	LV3	LV4	LV5		LV1	LV2	LV3	LV4	LV5
	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-	-		10%	20%	30%	40%	50%
	-	5%	10%	15%	20%		-	-	-	-	-		10%	20%	30%	40%	50%
	-	5%	10%	20%	30%		-	-	-	-	-		10%	20%	30%	40%	50%
	-	-	-	-	-		-	-	-	-	-	Element		----
Spells & Statuses
			Power					Chance Modifier				Attack Status
Auto Skill			--					(40%) (30%) (15%)					60%	70%	80%	90%	100%
Bonus Skill			--					--					30%	35%	40%	45%	50%
Auto Status			--					--				-	-	-	-	-	-
Defend Status			--					--					-	-	-	-	-

Forging Information
Lvl	Requirements			Lvl	Requirements
2	x 1	--	--	3	x 3	--	--
4	x 1	x 4	--	5	x 1	x 3	--

Trivia

• The Human Skull can be considered part of a subset of bone-themed weapons in EBF5, along with The Deceased, Kaladanda, Club of Withering and Spine Snapper. Other than their visual appearance, their common themes include being focused around debuffs, being able to inflict either Instant Death or Doom (be it directly or through bonus/auto skills), and being Non-elemental (except for the Spine Snapper).
• 

  Seems morbidly familiar...
  The Human Skull may have been inspired by the skull that served as a weapon option for Cat Soldiers in Epic Battle Fantasy 2.