While World of Warcraft’s Wrath of the Lich King expansion had a rather large focus on the undead via the Lich King and the Scourge, there was also a significant emphasis on dragons, mainly through Wyrmrest Temple. Among the few raids centered around these giant winged beasts is Obsidian Sanctum.

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There is one boss residing in Obsidian Sanctum: Sartharion. There are also three optional minibosses. Any number of them can be killed prior to engaging Sartharion, but they can also be left alive. If so, they will partake in your battle against Sartharion. As such, there are a couple of different strategies for approaching this raid, so let’s get into it.

Why Are We Killing Sartharion?

Sartharion is a black dragon who is charged with defending a whole bunch of twilight dragon eggs. As you’d assume (especially with the Cataclysm expansion in hindsight), twilight dragons are bad news and need to be taken out. Unfortunately, since the red dragonflight is a bit busy with Malygos and the Scourge, it falls to us to infiltrate the Obsidian Sanctum to get rid of the twilight dragons. However, Sartharion stands between us and them. So, he’s got to go.

Location Of Obsidian Sanctum

The Obsidian Sanctum is located beneath Wyrmrest Temple in the Chamber of the Aspects. Wyrmrest Temple is located at the center of Dragonblight. There is only one entrance to the bottom chamber of the temple, and the raid portal to Obsidian Sanctum stands directly across from it.

The entrance to Ruby Sanctum is in the same room as Obsidian Sanctum, so don’t get them mixed up. A good way to remember which is which, is by checking the guards in front of the entrance to the raid portal. If they’re alive, you’re looking at Obsidian Sanctum. If they’re dead, you’re looking at Ruby Sanctum.

There is no attunement needed for this raid.

Sartharion’s Mechanics

First thing first, let’s look at some notable mechanics of Sartharion himself before even looking at the three minibosses.

• Tail Swipe and Flame Breath: Like any good dragon, Sartharion breathes fire and has a tail swipe, so do be careful of these. As such, you may want to fight him on his flanks to avoid getting hit by either.
• Flame Tsunami: This mechanic is Sartharion’s signature one, as he summons giant waves of lava from either side of the crater. There will be gaps in these walls, and you will want to position yourself in them to dodge the big fire damage that will hit you otherwise.
• Lava Blaze: These are the small fire elemental adds that spawn during the fight. They are easy enough to deal with. But do be careful as they will enrage if they get hit by a Flame Tsunami. It’s not the end of the world if this happens, as this enrage can be removed by the likes of Shiv (Rogue) or Tranquilizing Shot (Hunter).

Strategy One: Killing The Minibosses First

The easiest way to clear Obsidian Sanctum is by killing the three minibosses (the twilight drakes) prior to engaging Sartharion himself. This will net you with the least valuable loot from Sartharion, but will nonetheless get you the kill.

Fighting each of the twilight drakes individually is extremely simple, as they are all pretty much tank-and-spank fights. The only notable mechanic for each of them is that they open a portal. For Shadron and Vesperon, some DPS will be designated to enter the portal and kill the elite add within it.

When it comes to Tenebron, however, there are a bunch of eggs on the other side of her portal, as opposed to a single elite add. While you can send some DPS in to kill the eggs before they hatch, what groups usually do is let the eggs hatch and allow all the whelps to come out of the portal. The reasoning behind this is that it’s a more efficient use of your group’s DPS to area-of-effect (AoE) all the whelps down alongside Tenebron than it is to send the DPS into the portal and sacrifice the DPS on the miniboss.

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Strategy Two: Killing The Minibosses During The Sartharion Fight

This strategy can be used with any number of the minibosses partaking in the Sartharion fight, but this section will cover all of them (Sartharion gains health and damage for each miniboss left alive prior to engaging him). Each twilight drake has a very similar mechanic as their original when fighting alongside Sartharion as they do when fighting alone, and the off-tank should be the one to pick them up.

• Tenebron (joins the fight after 30 seconds): Tenebron should be treated exactly as she would be treated if you fought her alone. Ignore her portal, let the whelps spawn, and AoE them down alongside her.
• Shadron (joins the fight after 75 seconds): Shadron’s portal can actually be ignored during the Sartharion fight because you want to kill him as fast as possible. The reason for this is that he makes Sartharion immune while he’s alive, as well as increases your entire raid’s fire damage taken by 100 percent. Considering Sartharion’s attacks are mostly fire-related, that’s bad news, especially for your tank. Definitely pop some cooldowns here.
• Vesperon (joins the fight after 120 seconds): Vesperon’s elite add cannot be ignored by any means. His portal must be entered and the add must be taken care of quickly, for as long as it is alive, your raid takes increased fire and shadow damage and all attacks against him reflect shadow damage back at the damage dealer. That’s not fun. Kill it. Also, Vesperon reduces everyone’s health by 25 percent while he’s alive.

After the twilight drakes are taken care of, the rest of the fight is just Sartharion, and it’s a cakewalk — just try to make sure each miniboss dies before the next one joins the fight. Having multiple minibosses in the fight at the same time can overwhelm your off-tank and cause a wipe. Other than that, avoid their frontal breath attacks and Shadow Fissures, and you’re good to go.

If you only want one miniboss in the fight against Sartharion, Tenebron is the easiest choice. If you only want two minibosses in the fight against Sartharion, killing Shadron off before is your best bet.

Strategy Three: Rushing Sartharion And Ignoring The Minibosses

This strategy is only for the giga-geared DPS, as you’ll have to kill Sartharion before Shadron enters the fight, since once he does, Sartharion becomes immune to damage. It’s hard to burn the boss down when he can’t take any damage, no?

That’s all there really is to say in this regard. Burning Sartharion down in 75 seconds (that’s when Shadron lands) is certainly doable, but it requires some serious DPS, so save this strat until you and your raid group are geared enough to do so.

Recommended Party Composition

Obsidian Sanctum is generally a pretty easy raid, so what classes your group brings don’t matter all too much. That said, some can make things slightly easier, such as…

• Classes that can soothe enrage effects (Hunter, Rogue, etc.) for the Lava Blaze adds.
• Tanks with strong defensive capabilities and self-sustain (Paladin, Death Knight) for when Shadron joins the fight. Sartharion’s Flame Breath will hit much harder with the fire-damage debuff Shadron puts on your raid group.
• DPS with strong area-of-effect damage, so you can cleave down Tenebron’s whelps (and the Lava Blazes) more efficiently.

Rewards

Since there are two different raid difficulties, there are two different loot tables: one for 10-man and one for 25-man. Since the gear’s quality scales with how many of the minibosses partake in the Sartharion fight, gear of varying item levels drops in both difficulties. That said, the 25-man difficulty generally provides better loot.

The max item level of gear in the 10-man difficulty is 213, while the max item level of gear in the 25-man difficulty is 226.

The charts below will lay out both loot tables, as well as how many minibosses must be a part of the Sartharion fight in order to get a chance at each item.

10-Man Loot

25-Man Loot

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