Story: My sweet lil sister got me 2 Underworld Cerberus as she knew I liked MTG. Naturally she requested I build a deck around it that I will use with my friends at lunch. One problem its a very unique ability that requires some setup, so other than controlling my opponent's grave with rakdos charm or using Generator Servant I have absolutely no idea where to start. I have included what cards I have that might be relevant. Also I am willing to buy some cards (preferably less than $5 each) but am not investing any further into the manabase.
What I have
Fortunately I have already casually dabbled in BRRakdosBR and have quite a few dual lands at my disposal. Along with some removal and some bits and ends; which I have included in the list below.
Nezumi I just posted my own list discussing my favorite three heeded doggy, what you want is a way to break the symentry. And play around the effect. Playing more removal IS NOT how you should with good old doggy.
Playing the doggy is playing a lot like the modern deck known as Living End. Yiu want your creatures to jail or value. The difference however comes they return to not field. So you can use them with discard outlet. I use my Malfegor for this for example.
And you can play cards like Tasigur and Deadbridge Chant which don't actually target for their effects (there is a Mardu legendary that functional unsimklar to Deadbridge save opponent) is similar in this respect as well.
In addition Cerberus by himself is a good win condition with puesdo unblockable and doesn't die to doomblade and most burn. So playing puesdo hexproof is good to.
He also by nature plays well with discard on stick, or cards like maggot and tidehollow, because when he dies, he gives you target for their effects. And furthermore another point regarding doggy as a legendary bear by the name of Tymaret.
Tymaret can be milled and let sit their for awhile. Then during EOT use his effect to tribute your doggy and force discard from opponent. Then when you get cards like Maggot back take apart the hand.
Enter the battlefield (ETB) effects are all good and all but I did some snooping around discard based mechanics and came across the bloodrush mechanic. So ideally you use some efficient creature with decent stats then use bloodrush cards like Pyrewild Shaman to get more damage in which can be added back to your hand once underworld cerberus to be reused for further damage. Now the benefit of bloodrush is spend my hand so I can use cards like Jagged Poppet aggressively to drain my opponent of resources; ideally I can use some madness cards like Brain Gorgers or something like Stensia Masquerade.
Also you mentioned an way to keep cerberus from exiling self with some sac outlet or something? I know sacing is faster than targeting on the stack but am confused on how that would work in this case, would you mind explaining?
You can prevent the Cerberus's self-exile by sending it from the graveyard to another zone in response to its "dies" trigger. This will not nullify the trigger, the creature cards are still returned to the hands of their owners. Because this effect is not depending on the self-exile happening.
Tortured Existence, Corpse Churn, etc. can return the Cerberus to your hand in time. (Targeted spells/abilities are fine, since the Cerberus's ability that stops targeting is only active while it's on the battlefield.)
Edit:
Also you mentioned an way to keep cerberus from exiling self with some sac outlet or something? I know sacing is faster than targeting on the stack but am confused on how that would work in this case, would you mind explaining?
There is nothing inherrently "faster" about sacrificing. If at all, targeting is "faster" than sacrificing, because if you have to sacrifice as a cost for a spell/ability, the targets are chosen for it before the costs (including the sacrifice) are paid. Meaning, you could target the thing you're going to sacrifice. It also means, that you cannot target a card in your graveyard with Recurring Nightmare, even if you sacrifce the Cerberus to activate that ability.
Sacrifices can also happen due to effects (Geth's Verdict), and those happen as a spell/ability resolves, so long after targets have been chosen (in case of the Verdict, the target is the player, not the creature).
If you happen to sacrifce the Cerberus as a cost for some spell/ability, ts "dies" trigger will be put on the stack on top of that spell/ability and resolve before it.
You can prevent the Cerberus's self-exile by sending it from the graveyard to another zone in response to its "dies" trigger. This will not nullify the trigger, the creature cards are still returned to the hands of their owners. Because this effect is not depending on the self-exile happening.
Considering the power of the effect, and that the card is mostly designed to be a rakdos top end, I think trying to get around the exile is kinda pointless. Focus on making the return effect as one sided as possible, instead of allowing it to be recurred.
For a while I had attempted to make the Cerberus a primary win-con in a modern jund creature based deck. My initial idea never really got off the ground past this very rudimentary list. The list was still in development stages and the sideboard was just possible inclusions w/o actually being refined.
The idea was to have a lot of value-creatures that can end up in the graveyard while trying to get up to 5-mana hopefully around turn-3/4. With more refining and 1-drop mana dorks the Cerberus could easily come out on turn-3 more consistently. I really wanted to keep it Black+Red as those are my preferred colors, but just vexing devil + fulminator mage didn't seem like enough, and sakura-tribe elder seemed just way too good to pass up here.
The net failure was that another modern deck built around living end just does better, green or green/red ramp+stompy just does better, and purposefully not running spells means other value-creatures like goblin dark-dwellers wouldn't be ideal to include. So this design never took off.
The Cerberus is still really sweet if you tune your deck to always take advantage more than your opponent. You don't really have to do too much to focus on him, just play more creatures and make them worthwhile to be put in your graveyard.
Now the benefit of bloodrush is spend my hand so I can use cards like Jagged Poppet aggressively to drain my opponent of resources
The problem with this approach is that when the Cerberus dies and you get your creature cards back, your opponent gets his creature cards back too. You can break this symmetry with non-targeted graveyard hate such as Leyline of the Void, Nihil Spellbomb, and the first effect of Relic of Progenitus.
What I have
Fortunately I have already casually dabbled in BRRakdosBR and have quite a few dual lands at my disposal. Along with some removal and some bits and ends; which I have included in the list below.
3 Lavaclaw Reaches
4 Dragonskull Summit
4 Temple of Malice
3 terminate
4 lightning bolt
2 rakdos charm
3 night's whisper
Playing the doggy is playing a lot like the modern deck known as Living End. Yiu want your creatures to jail or value. The difference however comes they return to not field. So you can use them with discard outlet. I use my Malfegor for this for example.
And you can play cards like Tasigur and Deadbridge Chant which don't actually target for their effects (there is a Mardu legendary that functional unsimklar to Deadbridge save opponent) is similar in this respect as well.
In addition Cerberus by himself is a good win condition with puesdo unblockable and doesn't die to doomblade and most burn. So playing puesdo hexproof is good to.
He also by nature plays well with discard on stick, or cards like maggot and tidehollow, because when he dies, he gives you target for their effects. And furthermore another point regarding doggy as a legendary bear by the name of Tymaret.
Tymaret can be milled and let sit their for awhile. Then during EOT use his effect to tribute your doggy and force discard from opponent. Then when you get cards like Maggot back take apart the hand.
CerberusJund (Modern)GRB
Sidisi, Brood Tyrant Morphentress (Commander) GUB
I also play YGO (DragunFusion) and Hearthstone (Dragon Control Warrior)
Also you mentioned an way to keep cerberus from exiling self with some sac outlet or something? I know sacing is faster than targeting on the stack but am confused on how that would work in this case, would you mind explaining?
CerberusJund (Modern)GRB
Sidisi, Brood Tyrant Morphentress (Commander) GUB
I also play YGO (DragunFusion) and Hearthstone (Dragon Control Warrior)
Tortured Existence, Corpse Churn, etc. can return the Cerberus to your hand in time. (Targeted spells/abilities are fine, since the Cerberus's ability that stops targeting is only active while it's on the battlefield.)
Edit:
There is nothing inherrently "faster" about sacrificing. If at all, targeting is "faster" than sacrificing, because if you have to sacrifice as a cost for a spell/ability, the targets are chosen for it before the costs (including the sacrifice) are paid. Meaning, you could target the thing you're going to sacrifice. It also means, that you cannot target a card in your graveyard with Recurring Nightmare, even if you sacrifce the Cerberus to activate that ability.
Sacrifices can also happen due to effects (Geth's Verdict), and those happen as a spell/ability resolves, so long after targets have been chosen (in case of the Verdict, the target is the player, not the creature).
If you happen to sacrifce the Cerberus as a cost for some spell/ability, ts "dies" trigger will be put on the stack on top of that spell/ability and resolve before it.
Former Rules Advisor
"Everything's better with pirates." - Lodge
(The Gamers: Dorkness Rising)
"Any sufficiently analyzed magic is indistinguishable from science."
(Girl Genius - Fairy Tale Theater Break - Cinderella, end of volume 8)
Considering the power of the effect, and that the card is mostly designed to be a rakdos top end, I think trying to get around the exile is kinda pointless. Focus on making the return effect as one sided as possible, instead of allowing it to be recurred.
2x Birds of Paradise
2x Dawntreader Elk
2x Falkenrath Aristocrat
4x Fulminator Mage
4x Lotleth Troll
4x Mogg Fanatic
4x Sakura-Tribe Elder
2x Shriekmaw
4x Underworld Cerberus
4x Vexing Devil
4x Farseek
Land (24)
4x Blood Crypt
4x Forest
4x Mountain
4x Overgrown Tomb
4x Stomping Ground
4x Swamp
3x Caustic Caterpillar
2x Darkheart Sliver
1x Faerie Macabre
1x Hellspark Elemental
1x Ingot Chewer
1x Kalitas, Traitor of Ghet
1x Lyzolda, the Blood Witch
1x Reckless Reveler
1x Torch Fiend
1x Tymaret, the Murder King
1x Viscera Seer
The idea was to have a lot of value-creatures that can end up in the graveyard while trying to get up to 5-mana hopefully around turn-3/4. With more refining and 1-drop mana dorks the Cerberus could easily come out on turn-3 more consistently. I really wanted to keep it Black+Red as those are my preferred colors, but just vexing devil + fulminator mage didn't seem like enough, and sakura-tribe elder seemed just way too good to pass up here.
The net failure was that another modern deck built around living end just does better, green or green/red ramp+stompy just does better, and purposefully not running spells means other value-creatures like goblin dark-dwellers wouldn't be ideal to include. So this design never took off.
The Cerberus is still really sweet if you tune your deck to always take advantage more than your opponent. You don't really have to do too much to focus on him, just play more creatures and make them worthwhile to be put in your graveyard.
Links to my most current deck lists;
Primary EDH; Rakka Mar Token Perfection, Crosis Mnemonic Betrayal, Cromat Villainous, Judith Gravestorm, Rakdos Empty Storm, Exava Artifacts, Bant Trash, & Fumiko Voltron!
EDH kept at home; Ruzzian Isset & Rakdos LoR!
EDH (nostalgic/pimp/retired) in storage;
Latulla Burns, Akroma Smash, Jeska Voltron, Rakdos Storm, Bladewing Darghans, Lyzolda Worldgorger, Xantcha Steals your Heart, Jori Storm, Wydwen Permission, Gwendlyn Paradox, Jeleva Warps, & Sigarda Brick!
Legacy Showanimator and High Tide!