Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-4519633-20141022032431/@comment-25926288-20160529174302

This topic is about being the most powerful, not being the best fighter. Skill and expertise can help a bit, but at the end of the day, name of the game is power.

The Dragon using magic in the Land without Magic shows he's at least very skilled. He also seemed capable of almost creating a portal which Regina and Zelena can't even try to do without the Sorcerer's wand.

Merlin, Dark Swan and Dark One are technically all close in power, but Merlin gets the boost up because he's experienced, Emma had extra raw power and was the most powerful Dark One (before Rumple absorbed all the power) and then there's the usual Dark One.

The list is power, skill and experince can help, but they don't really change to much how powerful someone is. I'll give an example.

Regina has more raw power than Cora, but I think Cora makes up the difference with experience.