Many of the reprints included in The Pokémon TCG’s 30th Celebration Classic Collection are former meta champions. Long before Dragapult dominated the competetive scene, Sneasel from Neo Genesis was beating up the opposition, and EX Ruby and Sapphire’s Delcatty was the premier option for digging through your deck. It’s hard to believe it, looking at the card now, but Erika’s Jigglypuff has absolutely earned its place in this highlight reel of former champions thanks to the curve topping power that it once commanded.
Lillie’s Clefairy ex is a basic Pokémon included in decks in the current meta that serves as a benchmark to demonstrate how far the game has come in the 26 years since Erika’s Jigglypuff debuted. The cards share a few common qualities. They’re both generation one Pokémon who were updated to become fairy types (which later got folded into the psychic type in the TCG) in the game’s later years. They’re both owned by a trainer, and neither has a printed stage one form despite the fact that they could both evolve further. The similarities end there, though.
Not only does Lillie’s Clefairy have almost four times as much HP as Erika’s Jigglypuff (sitting at a towering 190, rather than just 50). It also has significantly higher potential to deal damage, capping out at 220 rather than merely 40. Despite its massively raised damage ceiling it’s Lillie’s Clefairy’s ability, to make dragon type’s vulnerable to psychic types, countering the dreaded dragapult, which makes it useful. Finally, there were no exs in the year 2000, and none of the various alternative art treatments that Lillie’s Clefairy is available in had been dreamed up yet.
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Source: Wargamer
