User blog comment:EvanDude345rv5/Fairy Tail 337 : R.I.P Fairy Tail/@comment-173.79.127.144-20130705030711

"by not having them kill dragons, you devalue their worth as characters and devalue the plot entirely and you basically ruin the entire series."

Wrong. It does not devalue their worth as characters. It establishes that none of them (including Natsu) are ready to fight and defeat dragons.

And if the dragonslayers were to defeat the dragons this arc, people would be howling until the end of time about the dragons being fodderized, that it was horrible writing for the super hyped dragons to lose so easily etc. So no matter what Mashima does, some people will complain.