Randy,
by virtue of its convenience/readability/choose-your-favourite-superlative one should use "ad_form" (which is built on top of the form builder) wherever possible.
Some links:
http://www.brasileiro.net/code/forms/
http://jongriffin.com/static/openacs/ad_form/using-ad-form
https://openacs.org/api-doc/proc-view?proc=ad%5fform
/Ola
