Scorching Skeletons

The scorching skeleton is a variant of the hostile wither skeleton in the nether which is always searing with lava. They spawn in groups of one to three in the nether wastes and basalt deltas and they hold stone swords just like their withering variants. They will battle alongside wither skeletons against piglins.

Wither skeletons also turn into scorching skeletons after being submerged in lava for ten seconds like a zombie to a drowned.

Scorching skeletons prefer to be near or in lava and they are a bit slower than striders while swimming in lava. Scorching skeletons will take damage from water and ice.

When a scorching skeleton hits a player, it deals 2.5 hearts of stone sword damage and the wither effect is replaced with a total of 4 hearts of burning damage. When killed, it drops 0 - 2 coal, rarely drops 1 gold ingot, and has 0.5% chance of dropping a netherite scrap.

The purpose of this mob is to add some more challenge on the lava seas as the scorching skeletons will try to attack players who are riding on striders or bridging across by leaping out of the lava towards players.

Lastly, Scorching skeletons won't spawn near blaze spawners.