History of Cradily in the TCG Pokemon Trading Card Game Overview!

What’s popping everybody and welcome to a Pokemon TCG Overview on the Cradily line. Today’s episode should be more unique than all the other pokemon I covered so far because Cradily is a fossil pokemon and fossil pokemon have always had some extra mechanics to them in the games and tcg. Ruby wasn’t the first pokemon game I played, but it was the first one I owned and Cradily just so happened to be my first fossil pokemon too. I still remember as a kid coming across the two fossils in route 111, mashing the A button thinking that I’m going to get both of these strange items and being surprised after the second fossil disappeared while I couldn’t move my character.

Every pokemon in those games was up to your discovery and that mystery aspect made those games wonderful. I had seen Cradily and Armaldo used by Steven but it was long after that when I randomly restored the Root Fossil and realized I had just obtained the pre-evolution to one of Steven’s exclusive pokemon. In gen 4 and 5 I was playing on the Gamefaqs battling boards using Cradily quite a bit on sandstorm teams and remember some of those crazy battles fondly. Good times indeed.

Now even, though after you restore a fossil you can evolve and breed those pokemon as normal, the first forms are always treated as stage 1 pokemon in the tcg which has always caused problems no matter how they tried to make them good.

It was probably for this reason that when the DP era rolled around this was changed, if your opponent KOed Root Fossil this time, they did get a prize. Root Fossil would heal 1 damage counter from itself between turns but that poke-body still wasn’t enough to make it not helpless and 40 HP was even weaker in the DP era. Other than the prize rules and artwork, all 5 of these prints are identical. Gen 5 was even worse as they made fossil cards act like the Dusk Ball trainer card, but they could only grab the corresponding fossil pokemon. For Root Fossil it was Lileep.

The Root Fossil itself as a card has appeared in 3 different generations getting only drastic changes in gen 5. It deputed appropriately in ex Sandstorm and got 3 more reprints in the era with different artwork in ex Legend Maker, ex Holon Phantoms and ex Power Keepers. In the ex era fossil cards did not count as knocked out pokemon even if knocked out which was a good bonus seeing as they had low HP and couldn’t do much when you played them down. For this reason Root Fossil along with other fossil cards got used in unintended ways, as wall cards to stall and other combos.

The card range for this effect was so bad considering you could only get one specific target, a maximum of 4 cards in your entire deck. This wasn’t even the worst case scenario, if you had Lileep cards prized or in your hand your odds got even worse. This wasn’t the case with the discard pile but more about that later.

The few Lileep cards printed so far have always been weak to fire, had a double retreat cost and had 80 HP. The only exception is Plasma Blast Lileep also having a water resistance and Cosmic Eclipse Lileep with 90 HP in 2019. What an improvement right? Both Lileep and Cradily have no Japanese exclusive promos and really you only have 8 total cards for each if you want to collect them all. A couple of Lileep cards do some unique things but nothing that would push them to be good cards.

One of the original Sandstorm Lileeps lets you get other stage 1 fossil pokemon directly to your bench with Influence. If you were mad enough to use an all fossil pokemon deck this attack would be very helpful but still too slow to be good. Legend Maker Lileep utilized React Energy and the Holon Phantoms one is only unique by being a Delta Species pokemon. That’s it. No poke-bodies or powers on any of them. Plasma Blast Lileep does have an ability but it’s the same one all stage 1 fossil pokemon had in gen 5 besides Aerodactyl. If Lileep is in the discard pile put it at the bottom of your deck. This was obviously made to combo with the Root Fossil item card from the same set but it was sooo difficult to pull off it’s not even funny. If you’d told me they were designing these effects on a whim just to get them over with I’d believe you. Either they didn’t test them or they didn’t care; probably the latter.

Gen 5 is when everything really went to hell with regular pokemon and it’s easily reflected with the fossil pokemon too. They were still easier to use in the previous gens despite being so bad. They must have realized that too as in the Sun and Moon era they went back fossils being played as basic pokemon with Unidentified Fossil. In this mega rough environment with GX pokemon they thought 60 HP and nothing else on this thing was good enough and this is why I’m always raging about modern pokemon cards. Because this generic fossil is used to evolve into every stage 1 fossil pokemon now this caused all sorts of other consistency problems but I’ll just leave it at that.

Before I start covering Cradily though I gotta do this because I can’t help myself. Compare Absorb and Spiral Drain from a 2008 and 2013 Lileep card. Look me in my f***ing eyes, and tell me to my face the designers are not taking the piss. What in the actual F**K.

As with Lileep, the first Cradily card debuted in ex Sandstorm. Miraculously and unexpectedly, Jason Klaczynski does have an entire deck based on this pokemon having said that it still won’t be easy to use. Cradily’s stats are only average for a stage 2 with 100 HP and a double retreat but I’m sure the real difficulty in using this card isn’t the stats but getting it out efficiently as a fossil pokemon. With Lure Poison this Cradily can pull a benched pokemon and poison it while its poke-body prevents pokemon from retreating. Paired with a Houndoom in the era you can make a powerful lock deck slowly killing off your opponent’s pokemon while they’re struggling to switch. Spiral Drain is pretty solid for the time too, doing a typical 50 for 3 but also healing up to 20 damage from Cradily. This card was also featured as the main pokemon in the Caravan theme deck for ex Sandstorm.

It wouldn’t take that long for the next Cradily print to come out, one of only two special cards it ever got, Cradily ex. Released in ex Team Magma vs. Team Aqua this card is almost randomly included there as there isn’t any Lileep or Root Fossil in the set but this was something pokemon did with Lv. X pokemon and other cards in the DP era too. Only one set after Sandstorm, Cradily ex did have a few things going for it but also some big drawbacks. Stats are standard for a stage 2 ex at the time, 150 HP was a good number to hit but that double weakness was a really unnecessary liability. With Primal Vibes as long as Cradily ex was active your opponent wouldn’t be able to evolve their active pokemon which could definitely cause some issues.

The attacks are kind of average. 30 for 2 with auto confusion and 60 for 4 with auto poison and burn. There was definitely room for improvement. It would really be better if Acidic Poison dropped the burn and did 60 for 3 with poison instead but that’s all in the past now. This is a pretty cool holographic ex coming in the last e-reader set but unfortunately doesn’t do that much to be mega useful. It is the most premium and only true special card Cradily ever got if you don’t want to count a Delta Species print.

If everything else fails you can do 50 for 3 with Mud Shot. This attack is also fully compatible with Boost Energy, a really nice bonus and because it works with any energy in general it could have made Cradily flexible to use in decks where you wanted to hit for grass weakness perhaps. I say “could have made” because as a fossil pokemon it was impossible for Cradily to flexible in any deck, in any form. I’d say this cradily is more useful as whole compared to cradily ex.

So, as I’ve been saying you’re cursed either way and can’t make the best of fossil cards in any format, unless you make up your own rules. I do hope eventually they implement some mechanics to fix their issues once and for all, it honestly isn’t that difficult, they could just hire me to do it. Nevertheless, I hope you enjoyed this tcg overview and also found it insightful. I'll catch you guys on the next one as always and thanks for reading.

Originally Written in 2024

After Cradily ex it took 2 years for the next Cradily print to come out in ex Legend Maker. Its stats are exactly identical as the Sandstorm print but plays completely differently. The theme of ex Legend Maker was React Energy, a colorless special energy with no effect but something a lot of pokemon in that set needed to be at their best. Devolution Wave can be pretty nasty, devolving a number of your opponent’s pokemon for each react energy on cradily. What’s more, the cards gets shuffled back in the deck instead of going to the hand, potentially turning this into a really deadly attack. The best use would obviously to use on somewhat damaged pokemon so when they lose the extra HP from their evolved forms they’ll get knocked out. Linear Attack aids in that a little bit working as a 2 for 30 snipe in the era which was alright at the time.

From here the other two Cradily cards released pretty rapid fire. Cradily from ex Holon Phantoms is the only other special print Cradily ever got being a delta species pokemon. Despite that, it’s actually the simplest one to utilize, as a dual dark and metal type pokemon it can use both special darkness and special metal energies to boost damage and defence. Harsh Fluid can be played around easily but if your opponent doesn’t switch the damage is incredibly strong for the time adding up to 70 without factoring special darkness energy. Poison Tentacles is also a simple but good enough attack dealing 50 with poison before any other boosts. Had this Cradily had 120 HP it could have made for a decent little tank, simple but usable since like I’ve said it is one of very few pokemon that could use both special metal and darkness energies.

But, sharing the same stats as the others before and still being the same difficult fossil pokemon to get out made it not do anything in high tier play.

ex Power Keepers Cradily is the last print from the ex era and the most universally useful. The poke-power Evolutionary Call allows you to grab any 3 pokemon from your deck to your hand when this card evolves. This effect isn’t limited to non ex pokemon either. It also has 10 more HP than the other ones and the best attack in terms of raw damage and effects. Poison Ring also does 50 for 3 with auto poison but it also won’t let your opponent’s pokemon retreat next turn. Sceptile ex had almost the exact same attack for 10 less damage so I think this is good enough on a non ex Cradily. I don’t remember all the deck lists by heart but I think I do remember seeing this card used in at least one of Jason’s decks if not more, so despite being held back as a fossil the poke-power here is strong enough to warrant some use.

In terms of prints Cradily did very well getting 5 cards in its debuting era. However, to say that Cradily prints dried up from there would be an understatement. After Power Keepers in 2007 Cradily would only see 3 more cards up to now in 2024. Insane. The first one is in the Diamond and Pearl era in Legends Awakened. 120 HP was only okay during that time with the HP and damage standards going up in the era. Not only that, but it got an even bigger retreat compared to the ex era cards and no improvement on its 3 energy attack Acid. It does 50 for 3 and preventing your opponent from retreating. This is barely even average since every other Cradily card in the ex era hit for 50 for 3 and had better effects on top of that even. Add in all of these factors together and objectively speaking this Cradily was more of a downgrade in this era.

With this Cradily, at the very least you know once you do get it out it’ll help you set up the rest of your pokemon even if they’re fossil pokemon too.

The next Cradily would come out in Plasma Blast towards the end of 2013. At this point that would be 5 years after Legends Awakened. This card frustrates me to look at quite a bit but during that period every stage 2 pokemon was terrible with the only exceptions able to be counted in one hand. Even though I say this some people did actually try to make a deck around this card, possibly more so than some of the other Cradily cards we’ve seen thus far. This reason for this is Lifesplosion, for every energy attached to Cradily you can grab a stage 2 pokemon from your deck and play it directly on your bench. No pre-evolutions and no Rare Candies needed. Having said that this would still be difficult to pull off with Cradily being a fossil pokemon in the gen 5 era and needing at least 2 energies on it for this effect to really be worthwhile.

This attack does 30 for 1 and in this case the damage for the cost is good in the DP era. You also have the option to pull a benched pokemon before doing damage which is a great disruption bonus. Finally, the aspect standing out the most here is if you get a KO with this attack you can remove all damage counters from Cradily. This is an incredible effect as massive healing like this was pretty hard to come by in the era. Unless of course your name was Garchomp C Lv. X. Either way, this attack had a lot going for it, if the rest of the card was a bit better and Cradily didn’t need to evolve from Root Fossil this could have made for a great tank pokemon alongside the aid of Expert Belt. Unfortunately, all the drawbacks just mentioned were reality so this card didn’t contribute anything in serious play.

Speaking of the XY era, Cradily would see zero cards in this era and only 1 card in the Sun and Moon era in the very last set, Cosmic Eclipse. As of writing this, that would be its last print thus far, not seeing any cards in the Sword and Shield era and so far nothing in Scarlet and Violet either. I honestly don’t need to elaborate about anything; this card was extremely underpowered when it came out in 2019 to the insulting degree all regular pokemon have to bear for so long now. About the only use this card could have would be in some kind of control stall bullshit deck preventing your opponent from retreating but that’s about it.

Everything else about it was weak, especially this late in the gen 5 format going into the XY era. Even tougher cards would be coming out by then.

This concludes this TCG Overview on the Cradily-Lileep line. From its inception, it has always struggled thanks to fossil mechanics that have always been liabilities in the tcg. You could say this about all fossil pokemon in the tcg. The rule changes in Diamond Pearl would have given it and other fossil pokemon hope, since you could open with fossil cards as your active pokemon during set up, but the release of Spiritomb from Arceus would ruin all that progress. Thanks to that card, trying to use any fossil pokemon seriously would give you huge disadvantages without even the chance to try. After that regular pokemon in general became weaklings and filler cards, not just Cradily, so there wasn’t much hope in that regard as well.

It has received very few cards given its age as a gen 3 pokemon and more than half of them were in its deputing era. That doesn’t help either. If you don’t include the Delta Species print it has only had one special card with Cradily ex and nothing else. In this video series, only the Furret line has managed to be worse in terms of prints so far. All things compared with the format, the best Cradily cards you can use would be in its deputing era, but the rules with fossil pokemon there make it difficult to use in decks with fossils not counting as basic pokemon.