Yogg - Saron ( tactics ) Yogg - Saron is the final boss encounter of the Ulduar raid dungeon . It is mainly a DPS race , but also requires high situational awareness . " Yogg - Saron " with no keepers was the hardest boss to defeat in the game before Algalon . The fight is lighter on healing than Mimiron , one healer per five raid members is enough . Extra DPS reduces raid damage taken . Entering Yogg - Saron ' s room immediately starts the encounter . The fight has three phases , engaging Sara and her guardians first , then defeating the Brain of Yogg - Saron and finally his body . 15 minutes after the first raid member enters Sara ' s room , Yogg - Saron casts Extinguish All Life , which one - shots the raid . Keepers ' powers . The four Keepers of Ulduar can be activated individually by talking to each prior to the fight . Normal mode means using all four , every lower number of keeper yields an achievement . Three keepers also allows the forging of Val ' anyr , Hammer of Ancient Kings . Extra loot drops when using at most one Keeper ( usually Thorim ) . Each Keeper present increases character size and damage done by 10 % . On top of that , the Keeper ' s individual abilities are : Sanity . Throughout the encounter , players have a buff stack called " Sanity " , which starts at 100 . Players with 0 sanity must be killed quickly , and cannot be rezzed . Phase One : Sara . Sara cannot be attacked directly , and casts the following spells randomly on the raid and the Guardians : Sara is stationary in the center of the room . The only way to damage her is the AoE damage from dying Guardians ( see below ) . Green - yellow clouds move in a circular pattern through the room ( always the same path at the same speed ) , but they are faster than it seems . When players ( not pets or totems ) touch a cloud , a Guardian of Yogg - Saron spawns . This must be avoided at all cost . The golden rule of this phase is to immediately stop everything if a cloud comes close , and move away to a safe spot . 5 seconds DPS / Healing lost doesn ' t matter at all , while an extra Guardian means a substantial increase in difficulty . As with many such rules , it sounds simple , but actually doing it requires high situational awareness from everybody , and leads to many failures . Guardians also spawn automatically at an increasing rate , starting at about one per 40 seconds , increasing up to one per 10 seconds . Since 8 Guardians have to be killed close to Sara in order to end the phase , it may be practical to cause one ( or even two ) voluntary extra spawns early in the phase - this reduces the number of Guardians left over at the start of phase 2 . It is ok to have 2 Guardians up after the transition , 3 is still possible , 4 is a likely wipe . Guardians of Yogg - Saron . Abilities : Shadow Nova is the only way to damage Sara . Eight Guardians have to be killed close to her to start the next phase . Dark Volley should be interrupted . Ferrying . The safest method is to have one tank in the center of the room , a small ranged group ( 3 - 4 damage dealers plus one healer ) within range of that tank and the majority of the raid at the outer edge , near the door , where it ' s safe from clouds . The offtanks bring Guardians to the raid where they are nuked down to about 25 % ( don ' t use DOT s ) . Then , the offtanks bring the Guardians to the tank near Sara , who taunts them . When the Guardian is close enough to Sara , the small ranged group kills it . It ' s possible to have the tanks trade places ( and not taunt the Guardians ) . Taunt can be resisted , but is reduces the distance which the tanks have to move through the clouds . This method is fairly safe , because only the tanks and the dedicated ranged group must dodge clouds . Unfortunately , DPS output is low . For this reason , it ' s hardly ever used in 10 player or hard modes , but it ' s normally used by 25 player groups learning the encounter . Standard . The normally used method is to put tanks and melee on top of Sara ( tanking and killing Guardians there ) , while ranged and healers move around the outside . This method increases effective DPS on the Guardians , but requires everyone in the raid to dodge clouds . Phase Two : Tentacles and the Brain . Quickly kill any remaining Guardians from phase 1 . There are two areas , outside and inside the Mind ' s Eye ( Yogg - Saron ' s brain ) . During this phase , Yogg - Saron regularly opens portals to the Mind ' s Eye . After four portal phases , the spawn rate of the tentacles outside increases substantially . Phase two ends when the Brain of Yogg - Saron ' s health inside the Mind ' s Eye hits 30 % . Throughout the phase , all raid members not inside should concentrate close together while killing Crusher Tentacles . Outside : Tentacles . Abilities : Crusher Tentacle : Corruptor Tentacle : Constrictor Tentacles : The tentacles should all be killed as quickly as possible . Everybody capable of doing so must dispel the debuffs from the Corruptor Tentacles . They do not deal melee damage , and should be interrupted and stunned while being killed by melee . Melee damage dealers should generally stay away from Crushers . One melee damage dealer should carefully hit the Crushers regularly , to disrupt their damage reduction cast ( but not too frequently , so they don ' t gain the damage increase buff ) . Constrictor Tentacles randomly pick up players from the raid . Victims may continue to cast , and are freed by killing the tentacle . They do not cancel or prevent Druid ShapeShifting anymore . ( 3 . 2 . 2 ) Sara hovers above Yogg - Saron ' s main body and casts various spells : She spams Psychosis without pause on random raid members unless she casts something else . The other three abilities each have a 30 second cooldown , and are used randomly when available . Brain Linked players get a linking beam between them which is red when they are too far apart , and yellow when they are safe . Entering a portal ends Brain Link . Portals . 60 seconds into phase 2 , and then regularly after 80 seconds ( = 20 seconds after the preceeding portal phase ) , Yogg - Saron emotes : " MADNESS WILL CONSUME YOU ! " and opens portals into the Mind ' s Eye ( 4 for 10 players , 10 for 25 ) . They spawn in equal distances around Yogg - Saron ' s body . Each portal can be used by only one player , and they despawn after a rather short time . Using all the portals quickly and efficiently is the key to this phase . Since ranged are more effective outside , mostly melee DPS should enter . In 25 player , one healer should also join . The assigned players should make sure their sanity is high enough . It ' s a good idea to pre - assign portals , so that players can move to the portal spawn points before they actually appear . Inside : The Mind ' s Eye . Abilities : Laughing Skull : Influence Tentacle : Brain of Yogg - Saron After the portals are open , Yogg - Saron ' s brain starts a 60 seconds cast of " Induce Madness " , which turns everybody in the Mind ' s Eye insane upon completion . After passing through the portals , players enter one of three possible illusions . Each of them is a circular room with a door to the brain room right at the spot where players enter . The door is blocked , in order to open it , the Influence Tentacles in the first room need all to be killed . Additionally , laughing skulls float around . Characters looking at one of the skulls are affected by Lunatic Gaze ( a purple beam ) and lose sanity . To avoid this , players should look towards the outside wall of the room , and strafe . Use the camera controls to look around ; don ' t physically turn your character . Influence tentacles can be disguised as neutral mobs ( e . g . dragons or human guards ) , they always stand along the outer wall around the room . All attackable mobs in the room are tentacles . Damage dealers should take one quick tour around the room ( along the wall ) , and hit each Influence tentacle once or twice . After moving a full circle , all tentacles should be dead , and players are back at the door . Killing all influence tentacles has several positive effects : Inside the door to the brain room opens . Outside all tentacles are stunned , Sara stops casting and no additional tentacles spawn until the Induce Madness cast is finished . It ' s essential to kill the influence tentacles very quickly . After entering the brain room , players should look for the portal back outside near the rear wall . It ' s a good idea to stand next to that portal before nuking the brain . When about 5 seconds are left on the Induce Madness cast timer , quickly use it . Phase Three : The Head of the Beast . Abilities : Heroic 3 Keepers or Less Only : Note : the epic music and voicework that begin when the phase is initiated are worth turning on game sounds at least once . When phase three starts all tentacles left over from phase 2 remain active . Therefore , no Crushers must be up - some communication is needed , don ' t kill the brain until all Crushers are dead . A few Corruptor Tentacles can be ignored as long as the debuffs are dispelled . Phase three ends when Yogg - Saron dies . Yogg - Saron has no aggro list and is unable to move . Players should stand near near the green pillars if Freya is helping to be able to restore sanity . All healers should face away from Yogg - Saron at all times . The caster camp is best located about 20 yards away from the melee camp . Melee DPS can get knocked back by Yogg - Saron if they run into his body . Lunatic Gaze is used every 12 seconds , it creates purple beams between Yogg - Saron and the players facing it . Healers should turn away the whole time , tanks and DPS should get into the habit to regularly turn away . Yogg - Saron spawns ( and heals ) increasing numbers of Immortal Guardians , which eventually kills the raid . Ranged DPS should focus on Yogg through the whole phase , while melee and tanks deal with the Guardians . Melee may require help from ranged on the Guardians . If the raid is using three or fewer Keepers in 25 player mode Yogg - Saron emotes , " Yogg - Saron opens his mouth wide ! " while casting Deafening Roar ( about once per minute ) . This is the cue to throw the into Yogg - Saron ' s maw to recover the upon his defeat . Deafening Roar is best dealt with by Holy Paladins rotating Aura Mastery with Concentration Aura up . Immortal Guardians . Abilities : Yogg - Saron spawns Immortal Guardians every 10 – 15 seconds . These have to be picked up by the tanks and DPSed down quickly . At full health , they hit a well geared tank for 25k , when their health deceases , so does their damage output . Immortal Guardians can only be killed if Thorim is helping . Without him , they need to be tanked through the whole phase . Every 45 seconds , Yogg - Saron marks one or more Guardians with Shadow Beacons . 10 seconds later , it launches shadow missiles at the marked Guardians . Upon impact , the missiles explode and give the " Empowering Shadows " buff to all Guardians and Yogg - Saron within 20 yards . This means that at the moment when the missiles are launched , all marked Guardians must be 20 yards away from Yogg - Saron , else it gets healed . The healing Guardians receive can be reduced by a rogue with Wound Poison and Fan of Knives . To keep the Guardians at low health ( and thus at low damage output ) , they should be tanked in a tight group near Yogg - Saron , so that one or two ranged DPS can AoE the Guardians and Yogg - Saron . When the Guardians get beacons , they must be quickly dragged away until the missiles explode , then they can be brought back . Quotes . Sound Files . See " Sound Files of Ulduar : Yogg - Saron " Related Achievements . The following achievements are for the encounter ' s hard mode . The following achievement is given to the first raid group on a realm to defeat Yogg - Saron on Heroic difficulty without the help of any keepers . Videos . 25 - man Hard mode encounter . < nowiki > < youtube > XodAfSKLmGA < / youtube > < / nowiki > < nowiki > < youtube > zmQr _ M9PFng < / youtube > < / nowiki >