Questions about destructible character model

I am working on a game where you play robots (humanoid) and I want the limbs and body to be able to be blown off. What I am thinking is a skeleton for animation, but no mesh and attach the nodes where the actual body parts that can be blown off go.

I was wondering if this was the best way to do this (import a human model, turn off the mesh renderer and just use it for animation) and what problems I may encounter along the way. Or, if there's a better solution, I'd love to hear suggestions.