Nylon is safer than wood, due to it having an adequate amount of flex for thrusts to be generally safe, unlike wooden wasters.

The use of wood or nylon instead of metal provides an economic option for initial weapons training and sparring, at some loss of genuine experience.

Over the course of time, wasters took a variety of forms not necessarily influenced by chronological succession, ranging from simple sticks to clip-point dowels with leather basket hilts to careful replicas of real swords.

As the martial art has grown and academic interest has risen in weapons other than the longsword and arming sword, other types of wasters have been produced commercially.

The lower cost of ownership in comparison to a steel weapon of the same variety makes the waster a much more affordable and expendable tool.

[1][2] Many modern wasters are fashioned to replicate the original weapon with accuracy, including functional integral sword parts.

The use of wooden wasters is somewhat safe as it lacks a cutting edge, but does not equate a safer alternative to steel training swords.

It is for those reasons strong cuts or thrusts to unprotected body parts during sparring may lead to significant blunt force injuries (with the wooden weapon acting like a bludgeon).

[7] As the individual becomes more skilled, they will begin to use blunt steel weapons which offer a more realistic set of properties in comparison with a sharpened metal blade.

The pommel acts as suitable counterweight for the blade and a stable gripping surface, providing the sword's intrinsic balance and allowing the user a weighted leverage point for more powerful manipulation of the weapon.

A similar find in Ireland adds historical backing to the Irish myth, the Táin Bó Cúailnge, in which the use of a wooden training sword is mentioned.

One translation of Juvenal's poetry by Barten Holyday in 1661 makes note that the Roman trainees learned to fight with the wooden wasters before moving on to the use of sharpened steel, much in the way modern reconstruction groups progress.

Instead, the dussack resembled the großes Messer or "great knife", a weapon found more often amongst the common people than longswords, the cost of which allowed only relatively wealthy individuals to purchase them.

Longsword wasters are generally between forty-two and fifty inches long and are also known colloquially as Hand-and-a-Half swords, allowing the use of both hands on the hilt while using them.

Arming sword wasters span the broad gap of thirty-two to forty-two inches in length and, like their historical counterparts, have a shorter hilt than a longsword, allowing only one full hand to hold the grip.