User blog comment:KnocknickKnock/Celestial combination attacks with Lucy"s 10 zodiac keys./@comment-3424593-20140310043620/@comment-24066070-20140310215248

What I meant with "the perks of being a main character" is that she gets those Golden Keys, because she is a main character. She acquired them all pre-time skip, thus before the Zentopia incident which wiped out all Celestial mages. Pre-time skip there must've been quite some Celestial mages around, but apparently they didn't bother going after the Golden Keys. She just conveniently happened upon one Golden Key after the other. Point is there were quite some Celestial mages around and you would expect some of them, especially Angel, to go hunting for Golden Keys. Angel would've been able to defeat or even kill Everlue and take Virgo. She may also have been able to track down Loke and force him into becoming her Spirit one way or the other. However, all these keys fall into Lucy's hands while it is not that far-fetched to assume at least some Celestial wizard out there would be collecting them. The only Spirit that should've come to her was Caprico, which he eventually did.

I agree Wendy receiving the notebook from Porly to be quite ass-pull and I would've preferred she learned her Secret Dragon Slayer skills on her own like Natsu and Gajeel did, but they were still spells she had to master and not just an object to use whenever she pleases.

Why do I bring in strategic thinking? Experienced combatants can quickly grasp the situation and come up with a strategy. Strategy is just as much part of one's "power" as is brute strength, so a person can also grow in this area. The encounter with Jackal made it painfully clear Lucy cannot keep her calm and come up with a strategy while being under pressure, so she lacks "growth" in that area.

Why do you automatically assume the others were mages 7-8 years before she became a mage? They did join the guild while still being children, but I don't see them do serious training as a kid or go on loads of missions. Yes, Gray was trained by Ul and Natsu by Igneel, but you can't possibly measure how much training they did in comparison to Lucy.You raise the point that she was probably forced to study by her dad and only practised in her spare time, but she also rebelled against her father and ran away. I'd say it's likely she practised quite some magic behind her father's back as a means of being close to her mother and at the same time to resist her father's tyranny by her own means. The fact she was able to recognise spells like Charm and the sleeping spell or whatever Bora used makes me think she studied magic rather than economy.

Furthermore, I don't praise Natsu for getting plot power-ups and him getting a dual element really made me facepalm, but can you honestly say he received less "growth" in terms of "power" than Lucy?

Wendy went from being a shy girl who was only capable of doing some healing before getting exhausted to someone who could fight 30 minutes against someone who had a stronger version of her own magic, that's some improvement in "power" if you ask me.

Of course Gray was struggling against Doriarte, but hey, Doriarte did reduce everything one needs in a battle, thus leaving Gray greatly weakened. The fact he still managed to channel Silver's power while being in a weakened state, should give him some credit. Besides, he only managed to channel it after calming down and carefully assessing the situation he was in, remember what I said about strategy being a part of one's "power"? Here it literally allowed him to win.