While the spoiler season for Phyrexia: All Will Be One began just a few days ago, one particular uncommon is causing competitive MTG players to lose their minds. It’s undeniable that this card has some strong potential in older formats, but the wide variety of takes has been… surprising, to say the least. Let’s dig into the Minor Misstep drama and why it’s one of the most popular topics in the MTG community right now.
Minor Misstep
Minor Misstep is an officially spoiled one-mana Blue Instant that does something simple but extremely powerful: Counter target spell with a mana value one or less. While this won’t be doing much outside of countering the odd
Sol Ring
Sol Ring
{T}: Add {C}{C}.
or
Swords to Plowshares
Swords to Plowshares
Exile target creature. Its controller gains life equal to its power.
at casual Commander tables, it does some pretty devastating things in Legacy, Modern, Vintage, and cEDH. To get an idea of the scary potential this card has, here is a list of relevant cards it counters in the Modern format alone:
-
Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer
Ragavan, Nimble Pilferer
Whenever Ragavan deals combat damage to a player, create a Treasure token and exile the top card of that player's library. Until end of turn, you may cast that card.
Dash {1}{R} (You may cast this spell for its dash cost. If you do, it gains haste, and it's returned from the battlefield to its owner's hand at the beginning of the next end step.) -
Living End
Living End
Suspend 3—{2}{B}{B}
Each player exiles all creature cards from their graveyard, then sacrifices all creatures they control, then puts all cards they exiled this way onto the battlefield. -
Crashing Footfalls
Crashing Footfalls
Suspend 4—{G} (Rather than cast this card from your hand, pay {G} and exile it with four time counters on it. At the beginning of your upkeep, remove a time counter. When the last is removed, you may cast it without paying its mana cost.)
Create two 4/4 green Rhino creature tokens with trample. - Dragon-Rage Channeler
-
Lightning Bolt
Lightning Bolt
Lightning Bolt deals 3 damage to any target.
-
Unholy Heat
Unholy Heat
Unholy Heat deals 2 damage to target creature or planeswalker.
Delirium — Unholy Heat deals 6 damage instead if there are four or more card types among cards in your graveyard. -
Glimpse of Tomorrow
Glimpse of Tomorrow
Suspend 3—{R}{R}
Shuffle all permanents you own into your library, then reveal that many cards from the top of your library. Put all non-Aura permanent cards revealed this way onto the battlefield, then do the same for Aura cards, then put the rest on the bottom of your library in a random order. -
Colossus Hammer
Colossus Hammer
Equipped creature gets +10/+10 and loses flying.
Equip {8} ({8}: Attach to target creature you control. Equip only as a sorcery.) -
Sigarda’s Aid
Sigarda’s Aid
You may cast Aura and Equipment spells as though they had flash.
Whenever an Equipment you control enters, you may attach it to target creature you control. -
Esper Sentinel
Esper Sentinel
Whenever an opponent casts their first noncreature spell each turn, draw a card unless that player pays {X}, where X is this creature's power.
-
Amulet of Vigor
Amulet of Vigor
Whenever a permanent you control enters tapped, untap it.
-
Spell Pierce
Spell Pierce
Counter target noncreature spell unless its controller pays {2}.
-
Aether Vial
Aether Vial
At the beginning of your upkeep, you may put a charge counter on this artifact.
{T}: You may put a creature card with mana value equal to the number of charge counters on this artifact from your hand onto the battlefield. -
Path to Exile
Path to Exile
Exile target creature. Its controller may search their library for a basic land card, put that card onto the battlefield tapped, then shuffle.
(if this is even arguably relevant anymore) -
Undying Malice
Undying Malice
Until end of turn, target creature gains "When this creature dies, return it to the battlefield tapped under its owner's control with a +1/+1 counter on it."
and other Undying cards in Scam -
Lava Spike
Lava Spike
Lava Spike deals 3 damage to target player or planeswalker.
and other one-mana burn spells -
Spell Snare
Spell Snare
Counter target spell with mana value 2.
(if considered relevant) -
Shadowspear
Shadowspear
Equipped creature gets +1/+1 and has trample and lifelink.
{1}: Permanents your opponents control lose hexproof and indestructible until end of turn.
Equip {2} -
Thoughtseize
Thoughtseize
Target player reveals their hand. You choose a nonland card from it. That player discards that card. You lose 2 life.
-
Summoner’s Pact
Summoner’s Pact
Search your library for a green creature card, reveal it, put it into your hand, then shuffle.
At the beginning of your next upkeep, pay {2}{G}{G}. If you don't, you lose the game. -
Minor Misstep
Minor Misstep
Counter target spell with mana value 1 or less.
itself -
Veil of Summer
Veil of Summer
Draw a card if an opponent has cast a blue or black spell this turn. Spells you control can't be countered this turn. You and permanents you control gain hexproof from blue and from black until end of turn. (You and they can't be the targets of blue or black spells or abilities your opponents control.)
-
Blacksmith’s Skill
Blacksmith’s Skill
Target permanent gains hexproof and indestructible until end of turn. If it's an artifact creature, it gets +2/+2 until end of turn.
- Other random hate cards like
Relic of Progenitus
Relic of Progenitus
{T}: Target player exiles a card from their graveyard.
{1}, Exile this artifact: Exile all graveyards. Draw a card. , Pithing Needle
Pithing Needle
As this artifact enters, choose a card name.
Activated abilities of sources with the chosen name can't be activated unless they're mana abilities. and Haywire Mite.
Minor Misstep hits significant cards in every Modern deck, making it a strong possibility for the format. Besides Legacy, Mental Misstep may also be a strong cEDH contender but likely falls short of its potential in the two formats above. The bigger issue when discussing Minor Misstep is that a lot of players do not agree if this is a sound card or not.
Is Minor Misstep Even Good?
It seems the entire competitive MTG community is shining a light on this counterspell, and everyone has a widely different take to share. The most common takes by the community seem to boil down to the statements as follows below. Do keep in mind that the most common take isn’t always the correct one:
- Minor Misstep is very good/broken in Legacy
- Minor Misstep has potential in Modern
- Minor Misstep isn’t great anywhere else.
One big thing missing from Minor Misstep to be an absolute all-star in the Modern format is to address cards with larger mana values that only spend one or less mana to cast them:
“God damnit they could have made this awesome by including “OR if no mana was spent to cast it” to deal with those Elementals. What a missed opportunity.” – FFIXwasthebestFF
What Could be Better?
For reference, in the Modern format, there are a series of Evoke Elementals that were released as Mythic Rare cards in Modern Horizons Two. Aptly named Solitude,
Subtlety
Subtlety
Flash
Flying
When this creature enters, choose up to one target creature spell or planeswalker spell. Its owner puts it on their choice of the top or bottom of their library.
Evoke—Exile a blue card from your hand.
,
Grief
Grief
Menace
When this creature enters, target opponent reveals their hand. You choose a nonland card from it. That player discards that card.
Evoke—Exile a black card from your hand.
,
Fury
Fury
Double strike
When this creature enters, it deals 4 damage divided as you choose among any number of target creatures and/or planeswalkers.
Evoke—Exile a red card from your hand.
and
Endurance
Endurance
Flash
Reach
When this creature enters, up to one target player puts all the cards from their graveyard on the bottom of their library in a random order.
Evoke—Exile a green card from your hand.
in WUBRG order, you have the option to exile a card from your hand in the matching color to Evoke these cards for free. The downside is that after they enter the battlefield and do their powerful ETB effect, they die. There are ways to recur these creatures, like
Undying Malice
Undying Malice
Until end of turn, target creature gains "When this creature dies, return it to the battlefield tapped under its owner's control with a +1/+1 counter on it."
and
Ephemerate
Ephemerate
Exile target creature you control, then return it to the battlefield under its owner's control.
Rebound (If you cast this spell from your hand, exile it as it resolves. At the beginning of your next upkeep, you may cast this card from exile without paying its mana cost.)
, but that’s a story for another time.
The point is that many cards in the Modern metagame require one or less mana to cast that are not countered by Minor Misstep. Even though Modern players commonly cast
Leyline Binding
Leyline Binding
Flash
Domain — This spell costs {1} less to cast for each basic land type among lands you control.
When this enchantment enters, exile target nonland permanent an opponent controls until this enchantment leaves the battlefield.
for one mana, its mana value is six, meaning Minor Misstep will not work. Ironically, there is a counterspell that does work in these situations called
Nix
Nix
Counter target spell if no mana was spent to cast it.
. This one mana counterspell from Time Spiral only counters cards that did not have mana spent to cast them.
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What About cEDH?
Like Modern and Legacy, it’s easy to see Minor Misstep’s implementations in cEDH. There are a ton of mana rocks that this card hits and many popular interactive options that it can stop to – at least until yet another piece of interaction counters it.
“I think this is cEDH playable. Obviously nothing will be as good as Mental Misstep but hitting Crypt, Petal, LED, the legal moxen, Jeweled Lotus, etc is really nice.” – AvatarofBro
This may not come as a surprise to seasoned MTG players but, generally, countering mana rocks in cEDH is not really something you want to be doing. You aren’t getting rid of your opponent’s win conditions, just how fast they get to them. You’re also, generally, taking inefficient routes to do this by holding up mana. CEDH is a fast enough format that one mana definitely matters in terms of development. The kicker here is, unlike in a two-player game, only you and one opponent are being slowed down by this. The other two opponents are essentially at an advantage after this exchange, which is not a favorable position for the player casting Minor Misstep. If this were a better piece of interaction in the cEDH format, that would be different. This comment highlights the perspective explained in this paragraph from the cEDH subreddit.
A Questionable Answer
For those interested in making Minor Misstep work, this is the majority of the community’s current consensus on its viability. Notably, there are a lot of Modern players, in particular, who think this card is completely unplayable in the format. Personally, I believe Minor Misstep could be a one-of in main decks that want it if it covers enough of the metagame, which I think it does. The card could also be a decent sideboard choice. For reference, Void Snare currently sees a good amount of Modern play, and Minor Misstep counters a lot more cards than Void Snare does. The difference, however, is the cards that Void Snare is played to cover cards that generally end the game when resolved (see Underworld Breach). No matter what your take on Minor Misstep is, it’s undeniable that the card has many MTG players excited.
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