Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-4519633-20141022032431/@comment-24674051-20161024172756

Another example. Emma, very early in her training, was using invisible chalk to cast a protection spell. She had no real idea of what she was doing, and had barely touched the surface of her power potential at that time. Yet she was able to put up a protection spell that significatnly slowed down Cora and Regina. Had anyone else tried that same protection spell with the chalk, the results would be varied, because I imagine that the strength of the protection spell is directly proportional to the power of the caster. The chalk is just a focusing tool.

Point is, Emma had little knowledge and mainly power. Back up just a few episodes earlier. Emma did not even KNOW she was magical (ie knowledge = 0), and yet she was able to prevent Cora from stealing her heart and defeat her. And Cora had significant knowledge, not to mention that she was powerful in her own right. But in that case Emma's raw power completely trumped Cora's.