You can tune the Mimetic Digitalis's CV to notes but it will be easier to dial in melodies quicker with a quantizer since it does take some time to tune in melodies without one. For some people it might not be the most efficient workflow. I like to use it this way, but if you're used to writing sequences by playing keys or dialing notes, you may find it cumbersome. The shred feature creates random voltages across several octaves and since there is no built in scale quantization the results are not always in key or musical. It lacks dedicated gate outputs for each channel, but you can use the channels to out put a voltage to trigger an envelope per step.
If you can live with only 8 steps of sequencing, I would say go for the Varigate 4+ since it has built in scale quantization, a built in clock, probability, repeat, clock division and is expandable. MD is more of a modulation source so it lacks all of those features.
Have you looked at the Qu-Bit Octone? It's a similar module(size, price and features) but also have a few options the MD and Varigate 4+ don't