TotK Yiga Clan: Footsoldier, Blademaster HP, Drops, Spawns

The Yiga Clan are the Hylian enemies of Tears of the Kingdom: masked assassins sent out to find and kill Princess Zelda and Link. The game has two ranks you can fight anywhere, the Yiga Footsoldier and the Yiga Blademaster, plus their leader Master Kohga in the Depths. This page gives their HP and drops from the game’s own data, how to spot and beat them, where every placed Yiga stands, and the quests that involve them. For other monster families see the enemy overview; the Breath of the Wild version is on the Yiga Clan in Breath of the Wild.

Which Yiga can you fight?

HP is the MaxLife value in each parameter file. The game calls the Footsoldiers “the lowest-ranked members of the Yiga Clan”, “very agile”, fighting with bows and swords. The archers you meet, and the Footsoldiers riding vehicles in the Depths, are also called Yiga Footsoldier in the game; the archers carry a Duplex Bow.

The Blademasters are the clan’s elite. The game says they carry “blades of wind-cleaving power”, are “extremely agile despite their bulky build”, and can strike the ground to “raise stone pillars and unleash a blast of air”.

How do you spot a disguised Yiga?

The game warns that Footsoldiers sometimes disguise themselves “as simple travelers or villagers to get the jump on you”, so be wary of suspicious people. The game’s own name tags for these disguised Yiga are plain ones such as Traveler, Researcher and Stylish Person, so a stranger with one of those names standing alone by the road deserves a second look. A Depths tip adds that their disguise techniques have improved and “they sometimes transform into things other than people” to spring a trap.

How do you beat the Yiga fast?

These are from the damage files, the same for Footsoldiers and Blademasters:

• Aim for the head. Both have a head hitbox that takes double damage, so a headshot with a bow does twice the arrow’s damage.
• Lightning kills. Lightning damage is set to 999,999, so a thunderstorm or a lightning strike ends any Yiga at once.
• No element resists. Every damage rate is 1: fire, ice, bombs and electricity all work at full strength. Catching fire deals 10 damage and then 5 per tick; being frozen 10; an electric shock 20.
• Knock them off a ledge. A fall of 80 m or more kills outright.
• Footsoldiers die fast. With 72 HP, two or three hits from a decent weapon or one headshot from a strong bow finish one. Blademasters take more; dodge the swing and use Flurry Rush.

How do you fight the Yiga on vehicles?

In the Depths most Footsoldiers ride Zonai vehicles. The game’s tip for “Yiga on Wheels” is to “aim directly at the driver or try to overturn the vehicle so the driver falls off”. The placement data has 52 riders with swords and 22 with bows.

What do the Yiga drop?

Rates are from the game’s drop tables; a rupee roll that misses gives nothing. The archers and the vehicle riders in the Depths use the same table as the Footsoldier. The guards at hideout entrances have their own, smaller table, and nine Footsoldiers at three spots (Forest of Spirits, Dueling Peaks and South Akkala Stable) are placed with no drop table at all. Master Kohga has none; his rewards come from the side adventure.

• Rupees: averaged over the table, a Footsoldier is worth about 16 rupees and a Blademaster about 25. That is pocket money; for real income see rupee farming.
• Mighty Bananas: they cook into attack-up dishes; see Mighty recipes. The Yiga set’s four-star upgrade takes 10 per piece.
• Sundelion: the game says its petals, cooked, restore health “depleted by gloom”, which makes the Yiga in the Depths a handy source.

Where do the Yiga spawn?

These are the game’s placement data, archers and riders counted as Footsoldiers. On the surface they fall into a few groups:

• 10 roadside ambush points, each with 13 Yiga placed on two or three spots (4 with swords, 7 archers and 2 Blademasters): Washa’s Bluff, Outskirt Stable, Hylia River, Wes Island, Ternio Trail, Rowan Plain, Koukot Plateau, Zonai Ruins, Riola Spring and East Akkala Beach (named after the nearest landmark). The data alone does not say how many appear in one ambush.
• Guards at five hideout entrances: two at the Yiga Clan Hideout in the Gerudo Highlands, and one each on the Great Plateau by the Temple of Time Ruins, at the former Akkala Ancient Tech Lab and at the Yiga Clan Maritta Branch, 12 in all.
• Six inside a hideout on the Great Plateau near the River of the Dead, and the nine with no drop table mentioned above.

On the surface

In the Depths

In the Depths the Yiga stand in small groups of one to three all over the map: Gerudo has 18 Footsoldiers, Hyrule Field 17, Necluda 12, Akkala 8, Tabantha 7, Eldin, Hebra and Lanayru 4 each, Faron 3 and Great Hyrule Forest 1. Most of the Depths has no place names of its own, so the name given for a Depths spot is the name of the place on the surface directly above it. Find that name on the surface map and the spot is straight below. Yiga camps in the Depths guard treasure chests that open once the Yiga are beaten, and many hold a Yiga Schematic; see schematics.

What about Master Kohga?

The game calls Master Kohga “the leader of the Yiga Clan, who worship the Demon King”. After the Upheaval he “latched on to Zonai devices” and had his underlings build “bizarre and deadly contraptions to kill you with”. You meet him in the side adventure Master Kohga of the Yiga Clan, which starts at the Great Abandoned Central Mine. The placement data puts him at four places in the Depths: the Great Abandoned Central Mine, the Abandoned Gerudo Mine, the Abandoned Hebra Mine, and below Zora’s Domain by the Abandoned Lanayru Mine. After three of the fights a Steward Construct hands you a Schema Stone; the adventure ends with a Diamond and a Huge Crystallized Charge.

Which quests involve the Yiga Clan?

All three are listed with rewards on side adventures. The Yiga set page shows where each hideout is and what the armor does. For the rest of Hyrule’s monsters see the enemy overview.