Guide to Understanding Fossil Zapdos 15/62 Variants

Hello everyone,

This post serves to educate people on the many variants of Fossil Zapdos 15/62. I have seen a lot of confusion/mislabeling surrounding the variants of this card so I hope that this guide can set that straight for everyone.

There are a total of five variants of this card, outlined below.

Happy collecting
:blush:


1st Edition Zapdos
Note: This card has the holo evolution box error. As you can see in the top left, the holofoil is missing as if this card had an evolution box. The 1st Edition print was never corrected, so every 1st Edition Zapdos has this error.


Zapdos - Evolution Box Error
Note: This card has the holo evolution box error. As you can see in the top left, the holofoil is missing as if this card had an evolution box. The unlimited print was corrected late into the print run (making it more rare) so the corrected variant is more valuable.


Zapdos - Corrected Evolution Box
Note: This card does NOT have the holo evolution box error. The unlimited print was corrected late into the print run (making it more rare) so the corrected variant is more valuable.


Zapdos - Thunderstorm Deck
Note: This card has a Cosmos holofoil pattern instead of the standard Galaxy pattern. This card can be differentiated from the standard release by looking at the copyright date. The Thunderstorm Deck card reads ā€œ1999-2000ā€.


Zapdos - WOTC Employees-Only
Note: This card has a Cosmos holofoil pattern instead of the standard Galaxy pattern. This card can be differentiated from the Thunderstorm Deck by looking at the copyright date. The WOTC Employees-Only card reads ā€œ1999ā€ and was only given out to WOTC Employees at the time of its release.

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Nice little article dude!

I didnā€™t know that wotc employee variant existed. Thatā€™s awesome. Iā€™ve been around the hobby for three and a half years now, which isnā€™t terribly long, but long enough I thought I knew all there was to know about fossil. Iā€™m very surprised Iā€™ve never seen it discussed here on the forum! @JoshsOddCollection, do you (or anyone else too) know a number of how many copys are estimated to exist?

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I actually learned about the variant from these forums :blush: It exists for all of the holos!

You can read more about them here, here, and here.

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Awesome guide, thanks!

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Lovely guide! Wouldnā€™t there also be a third print variant, with the 1999-2000 copyright date and the galaxy foil?

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Ignore that comment! Just realized that third print holos didnā€™t have the 2000 date.

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Iā€™m confused, the 3rd Print Zapdos (pictured above) did.

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@nemyanation Youā€™re correct, the third print run did have the 1999-2000 date but all of those Zapdos cards are Cosmos holofoil.

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Ah okay, that makes more sense.

Thanks for clearing up the confusion.

Man, I wish the 3rd print existed for the rest of the Fossil Holos.

Or at least the Zapdos 3rd Print didnā€™t appear in every single Thunderstorm deck.

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@nemyanation The third print run does exist for the rest of the Fossil Holos, they just donā€™t have the Cosmos holofoil. I personally I prefer Cosmos :stuck_out_tongue:

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Iā€™m pretty sure it doesnā€™t.

The only Fossil cards printed with the 1999-2000 copyright date (3rd Print) where the Holo Zapdos found in the Thunderstorm deck, and the rest of the cards (Rares+Commons+Uncommons)

Psyduck, Golduck, Energy Search, Holo Zapdos could be obtained from the Thunderstorm deck.

The rest of the cards can only be obtained from Red Logo Australian Fossil Booster Packs.

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^ English of course (non-english had 1999-2000 copyright date)

@nemyanation Derp youā€™re totally right, I recalled seeing 1999-2000 dates but after further research I see that that was only for the non-holo cards. Thanks for correcting me :blush:

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No worries, this set is my personal favourite and if there where 3rd Print holoā€™s - I would be all over them! :grin:

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Hey, I just stumbled across this great guide whilst looking for more information on my 1999-2000 Zapdos. I pulled it from a booster box ~2010 and not from a Thunderstorm Theme Deck. Perhaps, this is already a known possibility but I havenā€™t seen it mentioned anywhere else, and no other cards from the box have the 1999-2000 date.

Itā€™s from a red logo box. I believe they carry a premium

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It actually wasnā€™t a red logo box which is the strange thing. The copyright date on box reads 1999 and thereā€™s no other cards with 1999-2000. Maybe it was a one-off.

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Nice topic. You could add Fossil Aerodactyl to the thread as I feel it fits the theme nicely.

As far as Iā€™m aware

1st Edition Aerodactyl
1st Edition Aerodactyl Prerelease w/ Brown Stamp
1st Edition Aerodactyl Prerelease w/ Gold Stamp and cosmo pattern (Europe only?)
Unlimited Aerodactyl
Unlimited Aerodactyl (cosmo wotc employee)

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You mean like this other post I made? :blush:

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The real question is, do you have a guide for all your guides? Or is that what the ā€œthreads made by this memberā€ button on profile is for?