Red Nemesis
The Blind Critic
Originally posted by Gideon
With a lightsaber? Someone either prove that or, if it's already been done, refer me to the post in question.
woahpoasts
This is self-evident. There is literally no doubt in my mind that this is the case, and after I have told you the reasons why this is so I suspect that you will agree with me, even if you never achieve the crazily biased outlook I possess.
The level of talent that Kas'im brings in to any competition is prodigious. From his personal history to the narration of Path of Darkness (PoD), everything he is can be distilled into one word: skill.
In PoD Kas'im is tasked with the job of training the Brotherhood of Darkness's most promising students in personal combat. In this job he must have a working knowledge of every form, at a level high enough to train the future leaders and kingpins of the movement. This indicates that he knows all the forms of this era. Darth Maul comes out the lesser in any comparison of general knowledge of saber combat; the most we can say about Maul is that he is a high-level master of multiple forms--not all.
How do we know that Kas'im's knowledge of the various forms equals Maul's knowledge of the subset that he does know? This too is solved with a simple recollection of the plotline of PoD. The method that Kas'im uses to teach his students is one focusing heavily on rote memorization. A new student is given a sequence of moves to learn, gradually weaving these "combinations" into a coherent fighting form. Kas'im knows all of these. In fact, he knows every combination for every form with any mainstream variation of the lightsaber (double blade or single, dual wield or otherwise) and some more obscure variants (like the lightwhip). Even if Darth Maul does not use these exact combinations, the degree of familiarity that Kas'im has with any fighting style thrown at him (with the possible exception of Vapaad [which is notably different from Juyo, which Kas'im is aware of]) puts him at a considerable advantage.
Rote memorization is not Kas'im's only tool, however. His functional skill can be seen in his duel with Darth Bane. When using his weapon of choice--dual wielding sabers--his speed and skill overwhelms both Bane's skills (which at this point were considerable, rivaling Kas'im's familiarity with the various forms of combat) and his Force precognition, which was powerful enough even in an untrained state to protect him on the front lines of the War against the Republic. This indicates that mere "technical mastery" is not the only thing Kas'im brings to a fight; he also has an excellent grasp of in-combat applications.
Kas'im has a greater degree of technical skill and combat experience than does Maul, making him the victor in any clash of blades between the two.