How to Defeat the Minotaur in Assassin's Creed Odyssey

This Assassin’s Creed Odyssey Minotaur Guide will show you how to start the Minotaur mission, get through the Labyrinth and kill the beast!

The Assassin’s Creed Odyssey Minotaur is one of the four mythical beasts available and probably the hardest one to reach. It’s locked behind a small chain of quests, that starts and ends on Messara.

Defeating the giant Minotaur creature in Assassin’s Creed Odyssey is all about learning the patterns from its special attacks and mastering your movement around the cave. Ranged builds are favorable as you can keep your distance.

Before you get to fight and defeat it, however, first you need to be level 35 or higher to pick up the quest.

The action takes place in Messara, which is located in the south-east corner of the map. Among the ruins of the Knossos Palace, which is located in the Minos’s Legacy area, you will meet a little boy called Ardos.

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How to start the Assassin’s Creed Odyssey Minotaur Mission

How to Find and Defeat the Assassin's Creed Odyssey Minotaur - The Header Mission

The name of the starter mission is Myths and Minotaurs. It features just a dialogue cinematic in which you meet the boy, who has set up his camp right outside the palace among the ruins.

After you speak to Ardos, he will give you three support missions under the “Of Minotaurs and Men” tag:

Blood in the Water – Investigate Swordfish’s whereabouts in Octopus Bay by asking around the villagers at the fish market.
Full Circle – Meet Ardos’s caretaker on the outskirts of Phaistos Village (small house).
Recollections – Talk to the collector about the labyrinth.

I am showing all the locations and objectives for these three missions in the featured video at the top of this guide. Check it out if you need to.

There’s nothing special in these three missions. Simply go to the markers and complete the objectives. Be ready to fight the Swordfish, nothing complicated or special about that fight.

How to get through the Labyrinth to the Minotaur

After completing all three support missions, you will be able to unlock the entrance to the Labyrinth and enter inside. Before you reach the Minotaur, however, you have to go through the labyrinth.

There is no “quicksave” feature inside, so if you fall (it’s very possible :P), you will have to start from outside again. Make a custom save right at the top near the entrance, just in case.

The video above shows you the direct path from the entrance of the Labyrinth to the Minotaur’s arena. If you use an ad-blocker, the video may be blocked too. There are a few side corridors, though. I strongly suggest you investigate them and you will not regret the extra few minutes spend – crafting materials in large quantities among other riches await you there. Now, check out the video walkthorugh through the Labyrinth:

How to defeat the Minotaur in Assassin’s Creed Odyssey

Note: I use Warrior Build in this video and some of the best tactics I describe below cannot be applied very well. However, as a big fan of the Warrior Skill Tree in Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, I wanted to feature a clip where I don’t use an optimal build for the beast, but still give you some advises on how to make the fight easier for you if you want to.

The final part of the mission, of course, is about you defeating the Minotaur. This is one of the four mythical beasts available in the game at launch (more might be added later with DLCs). His arsenal of abilities isn’t anything special. You just need to be careful and stay out of the long reach of his crazy axe.

The Minotaur’s attack sequences are repetative and he always performs the same combinations of attacks. You can wait for the perfect moment to strike when he finishes his series of swirls and twists, then quickly close in and hit as many times as you can. When he bends over to take a breath and pick up his axe, this is the perfect moment for you to strike.

A good choice are fire attacks from what I was able to test and find out. Hunter abilities are a plus, because you can drain him slowly, while keeping at a safe distance.

Every now and then the Minotaur might charge at you. If you dodge in the perfect moment, time will slow and you can land a few nice hits on him while he is slowly turning in his usual series of swirls and twists.

The fight is not too hard if you play it safe and keep your distance.

Around 50% of his Health, a new cinematic will play, the Minotaur will get mad and destroy portion of the walls around you, making the arena smaller in size for the remainder of the fight. This makes the fight a little bit more challenging, but there are no new mechanics or tactics for you to do in the second part. Simply keep avoiding his axe and dodge a lot.

After you defeat the Minotaur, you get his horn and bring it back to Ardos.

Your Reward from the Minotaur Boss Fight

How to Find and Defeat the Assassin's Creed Odyssey Minotaur - the rewards - Minotaur's Labrys heavy axe

As you have no doubt noticed from the videos, I am a fan of the Warrior tree. The massive Minotaur’s Labrys heavy axe that you get as a reward from this mission is an absolute beast if you get it on level. Very few weapons can compete with it. The axe also came with an amazing engraving: -1 Adrenaline Cost for Overpower Abilities.

How to Find and Defeat the Assassin's Creed Odyssey Minotaur - the rewards - Minotaur figurehead

You also get the Minotaur Figurehead for your ship. This one is just a decoration. It doesn’t enhance your ship’s performance in any way.

If you want to learn more about your Ship and Crew, check out my in-depth guide.

What is the Minotaur according to the Greek Mythology

For the most curious of you, I have extracted a bit of lore for the Minotaur from Wikipedia:

In Greek mythology, the Minotaur is a mythical creature portrayed in Classical times with the head and tail of a bull and the body of a man or, as described by Roman poet Ovid, a being “part man and part bull”. It dwelt at the center of the Labyrinth, which was an elaborate maze-like construction designed by the architect Daedalus and his son Icarus, on the command of King Minos of Crete. The Minotaur was eventually killed by the Athenian hero Theseus.

The term Minotaur derives from the Ancient Greek Μῑνώταυρος, a compound of the name Μίνως (Minos) and the noun ταύρος “bull”, translated as “(the) Bull of Minos”. In Crete, the Minotaur was known by the name Asterion,[6] a name shared with Minos’ foster-father.

“Minotaur” was originally a proper noun in reference to this mythical figure. The use of “minotaur” as a common noun to refer to members of a generic species of bull-headed creatures developed much later, in 20th-century fantasy genre fiction.

Source ► Wikipedia

This is my Assassin’s Creed Odyssey Minotaur guide. I hope you have found it useful. For more content on Assassin’s Creed Odyssey, check the NEWS and GUIDES sections to stay up to date with everything that Ubisoft does to the game.

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