Just my humble opinion, I never "got" the karambit personally. I mean it looks cool but it always struck me as an agricultural tool first that could also be used for self defense. The same could be said of a rake or shovel or sai . The straight double edged dagger, on the other hand, has always been designed for pretty much one thing since the beginning - killing. I never understood why you would want something designed for superficial slashing when you could just carry something designed to get to the stuff behind the rib cage. I got heavy into this debate once before and I had one karambit fanboy telling me I didn't understand the concept of "defanging the snake". I asked him why not just stab the freaking snake?
Maybe it works better for some guys, who knows? If you're good with it and it works for you - go for it.
I agree with what you say on the straight double edged dagger.I carry one as a neck knife and this thing can pierce thru anything.It's scary.
The karambit is designed for a different style of fighting.You cannot say than one is better than the other.
It just depends what you do with it, where and how you aim and both can be very deadly.
The design of the karambit blade makes it for very deep slashs, nothing superficial.
A strike with a karambit to the neck would stop a fight just like a stab to the heart with a dagger.
But im not looking at the best killing tool, I already have other weapons that I would use before I ever use a knife in a defensive situations.
Im just wondering how that style of knife would work as a EDC utility knife.