One of the points of contention when comparing the martial arts levels of the DGSD Elites to the martial arts levels of the L/ROCH Greats is how Jin Yong actually *described* (i.e. the imagery and word choices he used) to discuss the same skills in different novels.
Bearing in mind that Jin Yong wrote DGSD a number of years after he had written LOCH and ROCH, and his writing style and sensiblities had evolved, the depiction of martial arts in DGSD is very different from their depiction in LOCH or ROCH. I believe it was former Wuxia Forum poster Kenny who once said that in LOCH and ROCH, the Hong Lung 18 Palms was described as a series of arm movements used by North Beggar Hung 7 Gung or Gwok Jing, while in DGSD, the same palm technique was described more like a power in Kiu Fung's hand (i.e. an energy force that shoots forth from his hand rather than a series of arm movements).
That being the case, the DGSD martial arts are always going to look much, much more powerful than their L/ROCH counterparts, but how much is simply attributable to the evolution of Jin Yong's writing style rather than a specific intent on the author's part to make the DGSD martial arts more powerful? If Jin Yong had completely rewritten LOCH and ROCH after having written DGSD (and I don't mean those minor revisions like we've seen over the years, but a wholesale rewrite), would the LOCH and ROCH martial arts have been depicted similarly to the DGSD martial arts?