Legend of Korra

Why has zaheer and his squad not "won" until now then? They're using some bending powers that literally the entire avatar universe has never seen before. Zaheer can travel to the spirit world, and he's clearly a master of tactics and a smooth talker. All of those reasons should be enough to consider them competent both in battle and in strategy, yet they've failed to capture the avatar in 100% of their tries, losing to the various "weaker" benders during the metal city's events, as well as strategically losing to the f'ucking earth queen of all people.

I've never thought zaheer and his men to be competent. They're badass as hell, but not very competent.

tbh I attributed all of their success to P'Li; she practically carried them in every operation.