User blog comment:Master Sima Yi/Assassinews 03-03-'13 — Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag trailer and screenshots/@comment-4928711-20130310170340/@comment-4636255-20130310175149

@ACSenior: Altaïr had already become a Master Assassin. Al Mualim didn't strip him of his robes when he took his ranks. Had we seen Altaïr as a true novice, not a demoted one, we would have seen him change robes with every rank.

Ezio simply inherited his dad's robes. His dad was a Master Assassin (I think), Ezio simply wore the robes. As far as I can see, the Italian Assassins were not uniformly dressed until ACB.

In Connor's time, there were no Assassins, just him and Achilles. He simply inherited Achilles' Master Assassin robes, again because there was no time or need for formality.

So I think it's fair to assume that if Ed has no beak, it's because he's the first novice we're seeing (with no special conditions).