As an extension to learning, we brought John Clements in for a rapier-specific seminar here locally and he really brought it home for us. He first explained to us, and then demonstrated in adversarial freeplay just how common many concepts between longsword and rapier can be. In fact, when I told him before the seminar that I was not too terribly skilled with rapier nor was our local group, he said; "well, you're pretty good with a longsword and that means you're pretty good with a rapier too...you just don't realize it yet". He was right(As he is more often than not in my experience)! Once he tweaked the concepts for us, we really found we were much more competent than we had given ourselves credit for.
To this day, I prefer my longsword and will fence anyone with anything with confidence. I must admit however,that the rapier has it's place with me and our local group. Besides, since I learned to use one, I've learned how to defend against one too and that is critical even if you don't intend to be a rapier fencer in earnest. I likewise have observed that a good Swordsman is dangerous no matter what weapon you hand him because he knows how to handle himself in an efficient manner
