JHS Pedals Unicorn V2

My Unicorn came with a faulty tap tempo switch, so it went back. Despite that, some considerations:
- The vibrato (dry) mode sounds pretty good, the tone maintains its tonal integrity and the effect itself is neat.
- The univibe (wet) mode left me with mixed feelings. While the effect itself sounds gorgeous and expressive, the effect noticeably thins out the tone, taking off some of its low-mids/mids while boosting highs and deep throbby lows. Depending on your setup, this might be an advantage with distortion, as it will keep it from becoming too messy and muddy.
- The real bummer is that if you're using humbuckers or a hotter (boosted) signal before the Unicorn, the pedal will begin to clip in a nasty way. If used into distortion, the distortion itself will completely mask it off, but when using cleans it's pretty noticeable. This will only happen on the wet/univibe mode.
- Controls are very handy (especially subdivisions and volume knobs), but I would sacrifice the speed knob for a tone knob (as long as your Unicorn doesn't have a faulty tap tempo like mine did).

Buy, if you're use single coils exclusively. Don't, if you prefer humbuckers.

After watching both the 'JHS Show' and 'That Pedal Show' episodes on Univibe, I couldn't help but do my own shootout between JHS Unicorn v2, Fulltone Déja Vibe mk2, and Jam Pedals RetroVibe mk2.
I only tested the 'chorus' setting, and I used a Tele with Noiseless pickups, an (old US-made) Hod Rod Deluxe and a G2 switcher.
Result: the tap tempo on the Unicorn is great! Sound was good, but as with most JHS pedals a little bit too bright for my ears. I'm sure, this vibe won't get lost in the mix, but played on it's own – for my personal taste – it lacks some warm lo-mids/bass frequencies that I love.
The Dèja Vibe was almost perfect, not changing my original tone, but adding a great vibe. Con: bigger enclosure and it needs a 18V power supply.
The RetroVibe was kind of the opposite of the Unicorn: sound a bit dark, perhaps too dark in some setups, might get lost in the mix without an additional treble booster, no tap tempo, needs a special type of expression pedal to control speed by foot. And it does change the original tone, adding warm warpy beautiful magic that hit me in the face.
I would love a combination of all three: tap tempo and small enclosure of the Unicorn, no brightening or darkening of tone (like the Dèja Vibe), and the magic of RetroVibe.
But I had to chose and went for MAGIC!

This is the only modulation effect I use, mainly home playing and occasional recording.

Overall this is great vibe, very flexible with a wide range of sounds achievable.

The ability to set the volume control is useful and the sweep allows for subtle changes.

The ratio control for 1/4 notes etc. is the best feature... makes adjustment on the fly very easy.

I was not 100% happy with build quality, There is a small gap where the power input doesn't line up precisely with pedal case - wasn't enough to make me return it but does raise a question on QC!