Ruins: enemy threats

How to read stress pressure, ranged attacks, and enemy protection in the Ruins.

Updated 10/16/2026Source-backed editorial base · v1

Overview

The Ruins teach a useful rule: prioritize what an enemy will do, not only its health. Skeletons, cultists, and support threats pressure the party in different ways; quest tier and encounter composition change who appears together.

Threats by role, not a fixed kill order

Enemy / group	Pressure	Decision to consider
Bone Courtier	A back-rank threat that can build party stress while it remains active.	Consider interrupting or reaching it early; do not leave it alone just because another enemy has less health.
Bone Arbalist	Ranged attacks can critically damage heroes; marked targets may be more exposed.	Check marks and health before choosing healing, protection, or removing the threat.
Cultist Acolyte / Madman	Stress and support threats can act behind the frontline.	Reach and speed matter: hitting only the front may not interrupt the enemy plan.
Bone Defender	Can protect another enemy and make a priority target harder to hit.	Decide whether to break protection, stun the defender, or switch targets.
Bone Bearer / Spearman	Support and direct frontline pressure vary with the encounter.	Read the current formation: movement and target access may matter more than a generic bonus against Unholy.

Read the encounter before committing

Choose the opening action with three questions: who acts before your healer, who raises stress, and who blocks access to the dangerous target? Against a back-rank threat, use reach, movement, or stun; if a hero is near death, protecting the next action can matter more than maximizing damage. Bleed is not a universal answer to skeletons; check the actual target and its in-game resistance.

Before the expedition

Read current enemy ranks and resistances; they vary by encounter and quest tier.
Separate immediate damage, stress, and support threats.
Choose damage-over-time effects for the target, not by region slogan.
Treat the table as selected threats, not a complete enemy roster.