How to Defeat Sikran in WoW: The War Within (Normal and Heroic Guide)

Sikran, Captain of the Sureki, is the third boss of the Nerub-ar Palace raid and requires some key positioning to avoid sweeping raid damage. So whether you’re trying him for the first time on Normal, or struggling on Heroic, here’s how to defeat Sikran in World of Warcraft: The War Within.

How to Defeat Sikran in Nerub-ar Palace on Normal difficulty.

For Normal difficulty, Tank’s will want to keep the boss fairly central. The main mechanic they need to watch out for is called Captain’s Flourish, which is where the boss will cast three abilities in quick succession. The first two are called Expose and will increase physical damage by 50% each, while the final one is called Phase Lunge which places a 30 sec debuff that will double the damage from the next Phase Lunge. Tanks will want to swap after the two Exposes with the new tank taking the Phase Lunge. This ensures the incoming tank is not taking additional physical damage from Expose and the Phase Lunge debuff has time to drop off.

The rest of your WoW raid will need to be ready for Sikran using his Phase Blades ability. This will target several members of your raid with a mark before dashing through them, dealing burst damage, damage over time, and reducing healing. On top of that, the marked players hit will drop a Cosmic Simulacrum that pulses damage to the raid and must be destroyed with another mechanic. Anyone who gets this mark should stand off to the side of the raid in a box formation, but take care not to stand too close as Sikran can hit other players nearby (the little lines coming out from the marked player indicate his path).

A later ability, Decimate, will mark another set of players before firing a beam from the boss towards them, destroying any simulacra it hits. This is why we want them dropped in a box formation, or at least in lines, so you can hit multiple at once. Healers will also want to brace for a burst of raid-wide damage over time as the simulacra are popped and the raid will need to avoid the damaging pools they drop too. These pools persist for 3 minutes, so you’ll need to drop the next set of simulacra elsewhere.

Finally, Sikran will also cast Shattering Sweep at 100 energy requiring the entire WoW raid to run away. This reduces the damage, but also prevents getting hit by the knockback and damage increasing effect applied to players within 15 yards of him. Furthermore, any remaining simulacra will be destroyed by this ability, but their raid-wide damage over time will be increased for each one hit. Leaving even a few still standing can mean a wipe if you aren’t careful.

Throughout the battle, Sikran will also drop attacks marked by swirly icons on the floor. Avoid these and master the other mechanics and he will go down to your WoW raid. You can also have a look at the diagram below for a sense of where to stand.

How to Defeat Sikran in Nerub-ar Palace on Heroic difficulty.

On Heroic, Sikran’s abilities remain roughly the same except they become more punishing of mistakes. Anyone hit by the trajectory of Sikran’s Phase Blades will also drop a simulacrum, so you’ll need to have your whole WoW raid ready to move if they get the mark. The Cosmic Residue, the pools dropped when the simulacra are destroyed, will also stick around for the entire fight so mark several segments of the arena so you can direct players to drop new simulacra there quickly. As long as you can deal with these little twists and tighten up his regular mechanics, Sikran shouldn’t be too much of a problem even on Heroic difficulty.

If you enjoyed this guide or found it useful, feel free to check out some of Siliconera’s other guides on How to Unlock the Earthen Allied Race or How to Access the Nerub-ar Palace raid.

World of Warcraft: The War Within is immediately available on PC and Mac.