Sith and Light sabers

[Amaethon]

I think perhaps Sidious meant that one's Force abilities should be so strong as to simply seek to mock Jedi through 'playing' lightsabers. Consider that Sith Apprentices were hand-picked and were thus the strongest possible contender at that time. Darths Maul and Tyranus were mere placeholders for Vader, who unfortunately got burnt to hell and compromised much of his Force ability.

The Jedi, on the other hand, saw the lightsaber as a weapon of honor. They tended to place more emphasis on it for a bunch of reasons. First, the Light Side seldom had as much raw killing power as the Dark. The Sith suffered degradation as a consequence, but short term, they got a lot more power much more quickly. Second, the lightsaber could disarm and disable as well as shield rather than kill. It's a flexible tool which was also a symbol.

 

[Preliat Mantis]

I feel like that was because Sidious wasn't around when battles were won with combat skill alone. I mean, around you know, say Anakin's Jedi time and whatnot, Jedi duelling against Sith was realllllllllly not common because there were like maybe four-five sith tops. So you know, deflecting blaster shots and roflstomping droids was more important.

I bet if Sidious was around in the Old Republic era where you had Jedi running around everywhere he'd have a different opinion.

 

[Tellos]

[member="Preliat Mantis"] that could be I suspect he looked at things as his own times view point. back in the long ago days you'd see many more saber battles because the Sith and Jedi fought in large forces. By Sidious's time few sith remained.