Guild Wars 2

Well, when you think about it, nearly all of the combined responsibilities of the Spirits of the Wild are contained within the portfolio of Melandru the Goddess of the Wild, so it might not be unreasonable to presume that Melandru alone is close to, or surpasses, the combined power of all of the Spirits. And those that went up against Jormag were the lesser spirits in the norn reckoning.

Given that the dragons eat magic, and the gods do seem to be basically creatures of magic, my suspicion is that they’re essentially playing it safe – as long as there’s even the possibility that a god could lose to a dragon in a direct confrontation, then a dragon with all the powers of a god added to its own would be too horrible to contemplate. Zhaitan got enough of a benefit from stealing the power that the gods had invested into Orr before they left, and the power behind the statues and Risen priests is probably a mere fraction of the full power of a god. At the very least, I suspect that if he’s managed to eat one of the gods, he’d be able to extend the effect of the statue associated with that god across the entirety of Orr, and wouldn’t need the cathedral to do it.