Unfinity - Minotaur Set Review
Hello everyone! Welcome to the One Minotaur Show at Myra's Marvels! The one-stop show to know all your Minotaur delights!
Hi there, I'm the Minotaur Reviewer. Some of you might know me as MagisterSieran on reddit, where I've been writing Minotaur set reviews since Core Set 2020. But for Unfinity, the good folks at Commander's Herald have asked me to do a guest set review.
Normally these reviews are geared toward a Pioneer audience, but given that Unfinity isn't legal there, I'll be looking at Minotaurs from a Commander lens. That said, this is written for Minotaur fans of all kinds and we've got plenty of interesting cards to discuss, so let's get into it like Rex Nebula crashing his latest spaceship.
Black
Attempted Murder
I won't pretend that this card is good, but it is interesting. There's a relative randomness to it, but it has a lot of upsides either way. Because this uses -1/-1 counters, you can either kill or weaken the target creature, and it'll bypass indestructible, something most removal spells can't do. The other end has us getting Storm Crow tokens, which has value because Minotaurs.... don't fly, and if your Commander deck runs Conspiracy or Maskwood Nexus, then those tokens will be Minotaurs and they'll get the full benefit of our lords.
Saw in Half
This is incredible! Saw in Half has so many uses, best of all being able to double up our nonlegendary lord creatures. Beyond that, you have uses like splitting Fanatic of Mogis to double up the enter-the-battlefield trigger (or any ETB creature we might run), or on Species Specialist to double card draw when a Minotaur dies.
You could also use it as a political tool to curry favour with your allies by doubling one of their key creatures. Finally, because this destroys the target creature, it allows you to reanimate it if you use cards such as Haunting Voyage or Raise the Draugr. There are so many applications for this card its almost laughable, though I don't imagine the creature being split in half would want it or find it fun.
Six-Sided Die
This card is a bit of a gamble (pun intended), but it has a lot of useful applications. However, there is a chance you can whiff on what your intended outcome is, so I recommend playing this if you like a little chaotic spice in your gameplay, but in general it would be better to run Murder or any other kill spell for targeted removal.
Red
Minotaur de Force
Okay, admit it. That's a good pun name!
Jokes aside, this is a very interesting card, namely due to this being the cheapest mana cost of a Minotaur with haste. This is less useful in Commander, but it's not worthless as it allows our curve to be a little more aggressive. In regards to gaining a ticket/placing a sticker, I'm not sure what to think of it yet.
The stickers can be strong, but I haven't seen anything in the set under red or black that draws me to them. They are very parasitic, and I think that could distract brewers. I think energy is a good parallel to consider when deciding to include cards that care about stickers or tickets. If you're still trying to make sense of how stickers work, read this.
Slight Malfunction
This card is comparable to Abrade but at sorcery instead of instant. I think Abrade is playable even if it was sorcery, so this seems just as usable. The main difference though is that this acts as a bit of sweeper, allowing us to pick off mana dorks and tokens that might chump our attacks or even to clean up the field after combat. Granted, the amount is randomly determined, but it's a useful tool to have at our disposal.
Wee Champion
Well, folks, here it is! The second ever one-mana Minotaur and the first ever one with red mana (the other is Gnarled Scarhide). Now if only we could get one legal in Pioneer.
Evaluating this card largely reflects on what I said above with Minotaur de Force. This child is like Steppe Lynx for stickers, art stickers in particular, so to make the most of its abilities you would need to devote a lot of your deck to revolve around sticker payoffs and ticket generation. Personally, I don't think this is the correct thing to do.
I choose to treat this as a one-mana 0/1 vanilla creature, like a Kobold. And even then, I think there's potential with it. It's a cheap proc with Sethron, Hurloon General for one thing, and a good chump blocker. It also can still be useful on attacks once we have some lords in play.
Also, I noticed the flavour text directly connects with the card Prize Wall, which I thought was a cute in-set reference.
Multicolor
Magar of the Magic Strings
Where do I even begin with a card like this? Once this got revealed a few months back, my jaw dropped. This is one of the most exciting Minotaur cards since Sethron or Deathbellow War Cry. It completely changes the direction you can build a Minotaur deck.
Being able to make token 3/3s out of your spells is pretty cool, but if they deal combat damage to a player you get to cast a copy of that spell for free. This plays well into Minotaur discard themes, as we can pitch high cost spells, like Apex of Power, Deathbellow War Cry, Brass's Bounty, Behold the Beyond, Din of the Fireherd, etc.
Check out my Magar of the Magic Strings deck tech right here on Commander's Herald!
Colorless
Strength-Testing Hammer
This is a very cheap but a powerful piece of Equipment. Its greatest strength is giving us extra card draw for having the highest power. This should be fairly easy to achieve, especially with the added power the Hammer randomly assigns. I can see this being very useful in decks that have Tahngarth, First Mate as the commander as he can attack whenever the opponent attacks and often is already loaded up with Equipment.
Ticket Turbotubes
These days, three is a lot for a mana rock, but if you're planning to go down the ticket route for the Minotaur Child, then this is a consistent way to get tickets.
Attractions
So attractions are another big part of Unfinity but like the stickers, they feel very parasitic. In order to make use of them you need a lot of cards to open the Attraction, and even then, it's random which you get and whether they even activate on your upkeep.
However, I would be a remiss to not acknowledge some of these Legacy-legal Attractions do have some useful repeatable effects.
So, if you wished to build around Attractions, the ones I think have the most utility for Minotaur decks would be: Tower Drop, Ferris Wheel, Hall of Mirrors, Storybook Ride, Swinging Ship, and Trash Bin. If you have no idea what I'm talking about or what an Attraction is, read this.
Acorns
This section of the review will cover the cards not normally legal in Legacy or Commander but could be with application of Rule Zero, so I feel that while most won't end up using these cards, I should still point out which Acorn (silver-border) cards can be applied.
Animate Graveyard
So, this is pretty bonkers. Not only is its power and toughness equal to the size of your graveyard (which is pretty easy to fill up with discard), but it has all the creature text boxes. This effectively becomes a super Minotaur lord which can be a serious haymaker at no real downside, so all you can really do is have removal spells or exile the graveyard.
Nocturno of Myra's Marvels
I feel I'm not smart enough to figure out what the optimal word is for Minotaurs, but I am confident its out there. Whatever it might be, being able to draw a card after casting a spell with the chosen word in the rules text is incredibly useful for keeping up our tempo and having cards for discard effects.
Aardwolf's Advantage
Giving all our creatures 2 power and "alpha strike" is pretty good in my opinion, as it can add some needed board wide first strike redundancy if we don't have access to Neheb, the Worthy. However, our opponent does get to choose how to block, so they can avoid the first strike.
Art Appreciation
This card is here solely for the art. I just love that a Minotaur judge is rating a diorama of Nykthos, Shrine to Nyx. You can't get more peak Vorthos Minotaur than that, especially when Fanatic of Mogis is one of the most iconic Devotion cards next to Gary (Gray Merchant of Asphodel).
Don't Try This at Home
I think there are enough Minotaurs with "Hot things" in the art for this to be a worthwhile inclusion to add to our damage capabilities. It's not a huge swing, but I think it's relevant enough to make an impact. For most Minotaurs (or spells with fire in the art), it's a +1 to power that can sometimes be the difference, especially when trample gets involved (doubly so with deathtouch paired to it).
Ignacio of Myra's Marvels
Like Nocturno, I feel this has potential; I just don't know which you need to choose. Also, you can pair both Nocturno and Ignacio as alternate commanders if you want to be extra spicy. I think Fire or Blood are the best choices, but I could be wrong, and it all depends on how you build the deck, but being able to get 2 Treasures when casting cards with the chosen thing in the art is huge! Some cards become free, but mostly it allows us to really accelerate in the game, either to cast more cards than normal, or saving up for a big spell.
Standard Procedure
This is hard to evaluate, as Standard is a constantly changing format, but effectively is a golden ticket as it can be whatever the situation requires. Kill spell, draw spell, burn spell. The possibilities are as endless as the Standard format.
As it currently stands the best things we can cast are the following:
Unfinite Possibilities
And that about wraps it up! We've come to the end of what this Space Carnival can offer Minotuars in terms of prizes. Be sure to leave a comment on your thoughts of my assessment and keep an eye out for my Magar of the Magic Strings commander Deck Tech due to release next week.
Thanks for reading, and here's hoping for more Minotaurs in Brother's War this November!
