Guns and Swords - Sword Art Online 2 Episode 5 Reaction

Laughing coffee comes back to haunt him. But which of me is he? The suspense killed me

yup. he transferd his ALO / SAO character over which has insane reflex and mobility skills etc. but zero gun skills. the rest you said is right :)

I 1,000% don't remember why he starts off so strong. My personal opinion is that it seems like he got a really expensive avatar because of his mission. An avatar that just starts off with crazy stats, hence why it's expensive. Then on top of that he has a butt load of personal experience to draw from which also gives him an advantage. That is supported by the fact that he is shown to not be very good when he used the pistol at the target since he never used a gun in SAO or Elfheim.