LogFAQs > #956468537

PiOverlord posted...

That's fair and true. Although, with earth, he did seem to get the seismic sight down in the end, so that's really impressive. But yeah, far from a master, and probably far from how strong he was by the time he was Korra's age.

In theory, wouldn't the Avatar be able to beat their teacher in their respective element by the time they are finished? We saw Roku able to beat his water-bending teacher in a fight and his earth-bending teacher in a race. Forget if he bested his air-bending teacher(s), but still, I assume he would have been rather impressive there too. I wasn't under the impression that Aang could beat Toph in a straight-up Earth-bending battle except if he were to use the Avatar state of course. I also don't remember him being as versatile as Katara was with water (did he even really use ice at all in the series), so I don't think he'd beat her either honestly. I mean, Katara and Toph were prodigies with blood bending and metal bending respectively but still.

I could see Aang eventually being able to beat Katara in waterbending, especially since Katara was still a relatively new bender, despite being a master. I don't see Aang being able to beat Toph's eartbending, since it's more than a martial art to her, and Aang's disciplines are spread thinner than being able to just focus on earthbending. Aang could definitely take Zuko as well. I never saw Zuko as a particularly gifted firebender - he was always a better ninja/swordsman than a bender, though. Zuko canonically trained with Piendao to a high level of proficiency before his exile, and at the beginning of this series Iroh was still trying to keep him on learning the firebending basics.