Uhm, just to adress a few of his points, even though the issue itself is more or less taken care of with the new experimentals. Some of his Statements need an answer, in my opinion.
To early game characters they're nigh impossible to shoot...
Correct. Makes Sense, doesn't it? A skeleton isn't a good target for very small bullets or even arrows/bolts. Try shooting a Metal Grate or some kind of wire fence, i can promise you, you won't hit much. There is simply not enough substance to get a reliable shot in, unless youre quite a skilled marksman, and even then it should be somewhat hard to do. That is just...realisitic, you know?
...and without armor, you quickly pain spiral into death.
Uhuh. Ever got hit by a bone? It hurts. Bones are pretty hard, even if you don't think they are. It just makes sense to get hurt if someone hits you hard with a bone, you would get bruises, you would start to bleed.
Of course, one could argue that skeletons shouldn't be able to hit that hard, because the goo has issues controlling a skeleton, but it would make sense to get hurt if something hits you with a bone. That is up for debate I guess.
... So if you kill a skeleton, it revives very quickly, but weaker and slower. (Quickly as in, within seconds)
That might be a problem, if you really want it to only stay dead for seconds. You can't even bash it that quick, and it gets even worse when you have several skeletons youre fighting. Unless you're proposing that it has a random chance of being 'pulped' or 'broken' after a kill, meaning, you were able to destroy or damage enough bones that i can't really move anymore.
there's no reason I shouldn't be able to hit a skeleton with my bare hands
Well...yes, you should have the ability to punch a skeleton. Thing is, you would most likely hurt yourself by doing so. A straight punch directly at a bone usually wouldn't be able to damage the bone, but you would most likely bruise yourself by trying. You can break small bones, or some protruding bones, yes, but that wouldn't do you much good. in the worst case, you'd have bone splitters in your flesh.
A broken Nose would be a good example of a bone you can break. You are definitely breaking a bone by punching someones nose, yes, but it's a small, protruding bone which is quite fragile compared to most other bones. But breaking the nose of a skeleton wont do much, will it?
Of course, this all changes when you have bionics, are somehow mutated or if you have some other kind of...advantage, like Weapons.
there's no reason a skeleton should be stronger than its fleshy counter part, or even at par
yes and no I guess? As I stated earlier, one could argue that the goo wouldn't be able to move a skeleton as well as a zombie, and therefore it shouldnt be able to throw punches as hard as a zombie can. That would definitely be true.
However, A normal zombie hits you with a fleshy hand. Said flesh of the hand would at least somewhat lessen the blow, while a skeleton hits you with something with a similar strength to some rocks. This goes back to the second point i wrote about, where bones are pretty hard. It's at least reasonable to assume that the lack of strength could be (at least partially) compensated by using pure bone.
Of course, all of this is my own opinion, I do feel like most of it should have at least some truth to it though.
I do agree with you though, one should be able to easily hit a skeleton in melee combat, or with a shotgun or similar weaponry, and it would make sense to me if one would weaken the skeleton somewhat due to the more problematic nature of its…revival I guess?
as Coolthulhu said though, it is at least somewhat weaker already, because you can hit it more reliably. I wouldn’t necessarily use a shovel though, try a hammer or an axe next time? xD