Aerodactyl GL (Rising Rivals RR 55) – Card of the Day

Written by | February 5, 2011 | 11 comments | 1,002 views | Rating: +2

Today, I thought I would take a look at Aerodactyl GL, which was released in 2009 along with the rest of the Rising Rivals set. Aerodactyl is an SP Pokemon, so if it is good, it should have little trouble seeing a lot of play.

For starters, it has 80 HP, which is average. Since its a Fighting type, you can hit Regigigas LV.X, Luxray GL and Magnezone Prime for twice the damage.

The x2 Lightning Weakness makes it extremely vulnerable to a “Bright Look” KO. However, that doesn’t stop Crobat G from being played. It also comes with a -20 Fighting Resistance, giving you a bit more durability when facing Donphan, Machamp Prime or Promocroak. To wrap things up, Aerodactyl has a very helpful free Retreat Cost.

Overall, I would say its stats (the Weakness and Resistance) are a bit strange as not a lot of Fighting Pokemon are Weak to Lightning and Resist other Fighting Pokemon.

“Collect” was a very common attack back in the day, usually allowing you to draw 1-2 cards for a Colorless Energy. In this case, it lets you draw two cards and if you use a TGI Energy Gain, it doesn’t require any Energy. This makes it a pretty good starter Pokemon, but probably not as good as Smeargle.

Aerodactyl’s second attack, “Primal Breath” is where things get interesting. For FC (a Fighting and an E-Gain) does 30 damage and prevents the Defending Pokemon from evolving or Leveling Up for one turn. I said interesting, not broken.

I don’t think Aerodactyl GL has seen much tournament play since its release and it’s probably best if it stays that way, it just doesn’t do anything special enough to warrant play. However, if a Regigigas LV.X deck that doesn’t really use a Mesprit lock becomes popular, this card would be useful.

You could use “Bright Look” to drag up a benched Regigigas, Retreat Luxray GL and bring up Aerodactyl GL. Then, by using “Primal Breath”, you would do 60 damage (because of the x2 Fighting Weakness) and prevent them from getting Regigigas LV.X in play that turn. There are ways to get around it, but then if that deck were to become popular, I could see at least trying out Aerodactyl GL.

My Recommendation: I suggest keeping Aerodactyl in your binder until a non-Poke-Power locking Regigigas or something similar becomes popular. (I’m sure that it’ll happen really soon. *wink*)

My Rating: 2.5/5 (This rating is mostly based on what it can do right now, which is very little.)

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  • Anonymous

    The free retreat on this card always irked me. Somehow a flying rock thing is way faster than Charizard (retreat of three)? Seriously? What the heck is up with that?

    • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_AHE7W74T3ZL5RFLI4R2B7A6ZIQ Alex Holdway

      They’ve always had a problem with Chari’s retreat cost. Maybe they think he’s real lazy like the one from the anime. ar ar.

      Nice review tho Dakota, like this one!

      • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001734489773 Dakota Streck

        tyvm, good sir.

  • Anonymous

    It’s too bad there’s no “Old amber GL” or anything, because then this guy would make a much better tech against lostgar.

    That said, I think Aerodactyl MD will start seeing a lot of play now.

    • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001734489773 Dakota Streck

      How come you say that?

      • Anonymous

        I say the “Old amber GL thing because then it would be a trainer in the hand and a pokemon on the field (to counter seeker+hurl into darkness).

        This is pure speculation, but I say the Aerodactyl MD thing because of all the fossils and such in format, Aerodactyl has a decent power. (Basically, use only the fossil against lostgar, use the damage counter dropping against non-gar decks)

        While not perfect (spiritomb TM fixes your wagon) this provides a decent “soft” counter to seeker, while still gicing you a semi-useful tech instead of an otherwise worthless card.

      • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001734489773 Dakota Streck

        No, what I meant was, why do you think Aerodactyl will see more play now?

      • Anonymous

        Yeah, i think the Aerodactyl MD will become the anti seeker tech against lostgar. I didn’t mean Aerodactyl GL, lol, i’m kinda hijacking your thread. I mean the MD one. The SP one is kind of useless except in a few scenarios, although i could see him finding his way into a teacher deck fairly easily.

  • Anonymous

    Nice card to highlight!

    One of the Platinum Dialgas has a body (Time Aura) that’s similar to the effect of this attack. Its attack is much worse (4 energy) though.

  • Anonymous

    What’s so strange about the weakness to lightning and resistance to fighting? It’s a flying-type. That seems completely logical, even if its abnormal.

    • Anonymous

      http://bulbapedia.bulbagarden.net/wiki/Aerodactyl#Type_effectiveness

      The lightning weakness seeming weird stems from the fact that since the start, lots of people have mistakenly believed that rock is not affected by electric attacks at all, because many Pokemon were dual rock and ground types.

      However, fighting has no change on type for this Pokemon. It seems they’re trying to allude towards Aerodactyl’s typing allowing it to ignore all ground-based moves.