Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-68.73.215.56-20130901015455/@comment-65.8.254.72-20130906162821

I dunno. Personally, I see it as kinda being akin to playing with different styles. While Jaune's Sword and Shield is a classic, and easy to get used to and use, it may not have a high degree of abilties to work with. That being said, with it being such a basic set of tools, one could easily get to a level where even advanced weapons and techniques can't overcome it's simplicity and stability. In contrast, Ruby's weapon seems to be the opposite. A great deal of skill is required to wield it, but with that skill you get the ability to use a weapon considered seriously dangerous.

Think of it kinda like this:

In Dark Souls, to use most weapons, you need a base strength of X. Some weapons however require dexterity to a certain degree. While you have to pump yourself up with more dexterity to use these weapons, they're ultimately very useful and effective weapons. But with something as simple as a straight sword, they rarely require an overly high amount of strength, and tend to scale up with your strength and such. With enough upgrades and strength, the straight sword, with all of it's simplicity and it's rather good attack speed+damage balance can be considered one of the best possible weapons, especially with a good shield in the other hand. Now, despite the other maybe being better in the respect that the dexterity weapon gives some kind of epic bonus attack or ability, the sword and shield tends to be reliable, faster, and have less weight allowing for more mobility. This could prove the difference for an experienced person.

Okay, tl;dr, what I basically just said is that while his weapon is simple, it has a much more forgiving learning curve. After mastering it, he can increase his abilities to allow him to rival those with fancier, more skill-necessary weapons.