Question about Duel Wielding

[Gabenfoodle]

In my hours of playing Skyrim, I still dont know how to duelweild. It seems pointless because you can only attack with one weapon at a time, right?So,besdies looking cool, why would you duel wield?

[Skyrimnut]

Do you play 1st or 3rd person? I found that dual-wielding worked better for me personally when I switch to 3rd person. If I'm in 1st, I don't see what I'm doing as well, and because I'm right-handed, I favor the weapon on the right, which makes me not attack as efficiently. Using 3rd person for dual-wielding, helps me target better and the moves are kinda cool to watch.

As for why. I tend to really like it for builds that don't use block and either have light armor or no armor. You can do quite a bit of damage if dual-wielding is perked and you have 3 words of the shout Elemental fury. I use it for vampire hunters as the dawnguard axes have a nice balance for speed, do decent damage and work with the Elemental fury shout. They also have a imbedded enchantment against the undead. A dual-wielding Redguard with Adrenaline rush, dual-wielding perks, good smithing, and elemental fury can do a lot of damage and it's a fun way to play.

[Ben]

I find that duel wielding is a quick way to attack and I find it better against weak enemies. If you duel wield and hold down both mouse buttons then you do an attack that does 3 hits and they are all full powered hits

[wowszer]

Use the right mouse button to swing your right weapon (sword?), and rhe left mouse button to swing the left weapon (axe?), And yes you can use both at the same time. Pt can take some getting used to though.

[Roscaria]

I tried the dual wielding but found that when swapping from a bow, that you always had to go into the inventory to put a weapon in your left hand. Even if you assigned a favourite such as 2 for left and 3 for right hand the weapon was always placed in the right.hand.

I did use the L and R MB together to fight with but got fed up with the inventory usage so now use spell and sword. Is there a way to put both weapons in your hands with keys?

[Danny]

Dualwielding is the best because of these specific build you do. Get perks that increase attack speed and damage when you flourish while dualwielding. Then get the crit for longswords perk. Then get swords. Use OP blacksmithing boosters and enchanted items with smithing boosts. Dont forget blacksmith elixirs and enchant elixirs when enchanting the items for smithing boosts. Get attack speed shout. Dont forget to add the chaos enchant on your swords to make them do a ♥♥♥♥ ton of elemetal damage (DB dlc only) damage

After doing all this you should have swords that do close to 500 damage or more a swing if you also enchanted your armor to boost 1handed strikes and stuff like that.

How to assault the enemy and win everywhere
1) use a different weapon to cast your attack speed shout because your dualswords are enchanted so it wont allow you to cast it while they are out.
2) after casting the shout switch to your OP dualswords and 500damage a slice
3) run up to enemy and hold both left and right attack buttons to do super spin dance.
4) watch as you spawn legendary dragons with super L and R attack button combos so fast per second because of perks and shouts boosts.
5) realize how cheap this is and just super buff a bow and play sniper from then on while wearing daedric with muffled boots because steed stone is OP.

Pro tip: if youd like you can wield daggers instead as they hit 4x during a flourish while swords only hit 3 times. Plus side is daggers still get boosts from crits I think, or maybe only the blade of woe because its counted as a "sword" even though it gets dagger boost from sneak kills.
Cons: need a mod so daggers get affected by the onehanded wielding damage boost perks.

[Sexual Tyrannosaurus]

Danny, you do realise that crit is added to weapon`s BASE damage, excluding weapon`s skill and upgrade - therefore this is a useless perk (as all three weapon exclusive perks, since this is the same crap with axes. mace perk is working, but technically 90% of enemies have 0 armor, so it is useless perk too)?

[Danny]

Originally posted by Sexual Tyrannosaurus:

Danny, you do realise that crit is added to weapon`s BASE damage, excluding weapon`s skill and upgrade - therefore this is a useless perk (as all three weapon exclusive perks, since this is the same crap with axes. mace perk is working, but technically 90% of enemies have 0 armor, so it is useless perk too)?

Ahhh ♥♥♥♥ I never checked the wiki to see how that perk worked. Well then if anyone here ♥♥♥♥♥♥ up like I did just use the console to reassign perks.

Next youll probably tell me the 25% damage boost from strong attacks is off the base damage too. Gonna check it out on wiki now because I hate the headcutting animation but the damage boost sounds nice

[Ilja]

Dual-wield has most (weapon) combinations from all combat styles. You can strike with both weapons in fast space - and deal a huge amount of damage - by making dual-wield power attacks. It takes a little practise, but is there.

Go behind Companions mead hall at late time, when no one is nagging your character. Swing dolls while moving to different directions. Try power attacks while stepping front, back and sideways. Try also sprinting front, back and sideways, while creating a power attack. You will learn these combinations soon enough.

I is also important to understand that the most important factor with dual-wielding is not the damage from single attack, or even from the single power attack. The important factor is the speed, compared to other weapons. 

This is why most players use either 2 daggers or sword+dagger combination, while dual-wielding. Practised wielder can strike faster than the other guy can swing his axe. Even more important than that, dual-wielding character can strike a power attack with both weapon enchantments and poisons, before the other guy can swing her great sword.

Of course, if the third guys manages to swing the character with his "Holier than thou, weepingwido's megahack of ancient frostdragon's tale", then you are likely Holier than thou, weepingwido's megahack of ancient frostdragon's taled.

I like dual-wielding. Many others seem to hate it. :)

[Avatar1971]

Originally posted by Roscaria:

I tried the dual wielding but found that when swapping from a bow, that you always had to go into the inventory to put a weapon in your left hand. Even if you assigned a favourite such as 2 for left and 3 for right hand the weapon was always placed in the right.hand.

I did use the L and R MB together to fight with but got fed up with the inventory sage so now use spell and sword. Is there a way to put both weapons in your hands with keys?

When switching from a bow back to my right handed weapon I also get whatever was in my left hand before I switched. Granted I mostly just use a controller with this game so only use 2 quick slots anyway. I use one for my bow and one for my right hand weapon. When switching back to my right hand weapon I also get whatever was last in my left hand, be it a shield, weapon, or spell. I use SkyUI and all the Unofficial Patches so am not sure if that makes a difference or not when switching back and forth but I do not have to reequip anything in my left hand when switching.

If you use you favorites menu finding whatever you need to equip is easy anyway, even easier if you use SkyUI. With SkyUI you can break you favorites up into 8 sub categories. I have one for weapons and armor, one for powers, one for shouts, and one for each school of magic for my 8 for example.

Strictly speaking for myself but I have found this game is better played with a controller especially for combat (Like Dark Souls and a few other games as well), the mouse stinks at detecting power hit vs. regular hits for example. I never accidentally use a power attack with a controller unlike with my mouse where every attack is a power attack no matter how quickly or lightly I press it.

[Eat3n]

I've found that duel wielding works great for speed, especially if you power attack. It works good if you have lighter weapons (daggers vs axes or something).

[EbonHawk]

Originally posted by Roscaria:

I tried the dual wielding but found that when swapping from a bow, that you always had to go into the inventory to put a weapon in your left hand. Even if you assigned a favourite such as 2 for left and 3 for right hand the weapon was always placed in the right.hand.

I did use the L and R MB together to fight with but got fed up with the inventory usage so now use spell and sword. Is there a way to put both weapons in your hands with keys?

Yeah, but it requires using SkyUI, as minoravatar said. With it, it's the only way I've found that the game properly saves your weapons' various handed states. Works every time.

Originally posted by minoravatar:

... the mouse stinks at detecting power hit vs. regular hits for example. I never accidentally use a power attack with a controller unlike with my mouse where every attack is a power attack no matter how quickly or lightly I press it.

I don't have that problem and get a power attack when I want one (by holding the buttons down), and a regular attack with a short click of each button. I keep a soul-trapped weapon in my left hand (a glass sword of Malediction) and Mehrunes Razor in my right. Enemies fall quickly and efficiently with that setup, now that they're both Legendary quality.