Haktos the Unscarred – Theros Beyond Death MTG Review

David
Fanany
Player
since
1995

“Even so, let me not die ingloriously, without a fight, without some great deed that future men will hear of.”
— The Iliad chapter 22, translation by Martin Hammond

I would not have guessed that there would be such a good way to make a card inspired by Achilles, but it’s all here: the godlike handsomeness and combat skills, the consuming hubris, and the near invincibility. That last one might be the thing that’s most eye-catching to a lot of Magic players. It goes so much farther even than protection from a color, or a card type, and when you get lucky (or when the Fates favor you!) with the chosen number, Haktos will do terrifying amounts of damage to opponents. I wouldn’t underestimate him as a commander, even. If there’s someone at the table who relies on ramping into huge creatures or sweeping the board with X spells, Haktos will likely destroy them with commander damage before they can find an answer, and even if someone does get him off the table, there’s a good chance that whatever they used won’t work on him the second time around!

Constructed: 3/5
Casual: 5/5
Limited: 4/5
Multiplayer: 4/5
EDH/Commander: 4/5

Haktos the Unscarred is a cute homage to Achilles, and it comes across in its unusual protective effect. He’ll come in protected from all but one specific mana cost, which can mean that a lucky “roll”, per se, could blank your opponent’s entire deck. It’s a color-intensive mana cost, but a six-power creature that demands very specific answers (either non-damaging board wipes, sacrifice effects, or the selected mana cost) means there will well be games where Haktos just wins the game swinging turn after turn.

Haktos is by no means unkillable, and 1 toughness means that anything able to actually get through to him will dispose of him in short order. Most decks will have at least one answer to Haktos, but a lucky set-up will make it so that they have to try and dig for that answer instead of just dealing with him. Haktos isn’t unbeatable by any stretch, but he’s a flavorful and interesting take on Achilles, and I think he’s actually pretty decent overall; there’s a large amount of in-baked variance, but a 6/1 that can sometimes be completely unblockable and unkillable is a worthy mana investment for any Boros-adjacent deck.

Constructed: 3.25
Casual: 4.75
Limited: 4
Multiplayer: 3.5
Commander: 3.75

Phat
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Hello and welcome back to Pojo’s Card of the Day!

Todays’ card of the Day is Haktos the Unscarred, which is another awesome flavor win by WotC being able to capture and manifest some of the real world inspirations for these cards. Much like Achilles and his heel, this guy is going to run into the fight with his eyes a-blazin’ and his determination endless.

And much like Achilles it could be a random act of the RNG Gods that decides whether or not he lives to see the next attack phase.

Haktos attacks each turn if able, which can be pretty common for Red Creatures who have bulky stats as a way to make them ‘fair’.

White on the other hand has a familiarity with Protection that they seem to be slowly dripping back into the color pie. Now one thing a lot of people miss when they read this card is that Haktos protection is from each converted mana cost other than the chosen number.

So if you get 4. Haktos has protection from… 1,2,3,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13,14,15,-1,000,000 (Gleemax) so if you get super lucky, this might just be a game-ending win condition if you roll the correct protection number.

It’s also Legendary so you can play it as a Commander for a Commander Themed Combat Damage style of deck, just playing out RNG until you can get a win in. However in Commander there’s a ton of varied cards and varied mana costs so it might simply be that you get hit hard.. or they can beat you before you can win out.

Constructed 2/5 – Consistency is key in Constructed Formats and this guy does not bring it to the table, too random for a 4cmc creature but it might be fine if you’re running boros and simply want to roll the dice… literally.
Limited 3/5 – Similar to constructed but here you might get luckier more often than not, it isn’t first pickable but if you’re already deep in those colors may as well shake them bones.
Commander 2/5 – I can see this in a Boros Style Gamble build that is more built around having fun with random Red Traits than going for a win.
Cube 1/5 – If it had haste, then maybe, but as it stands it can simply be too much of a feelbad in a powered environment. Especially when there’s better boros options to choose at lower cmc.

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