Dual-Wielding

Humongous Mecha + Dual-Wielding Vibroswords = Major Badass

"If one sword has a power of 100, then using two swords would make it 200, right?"

—Lloyd Irving, Tales of Symphonia

Like Guns Akimbo, but with swords, and, like all forms of swordplay, subject to Flynning. A common variant is a sword in one hand and a dagger in the other, which reflects several widespread Real Life fighting styles. The dagger is normally used only for defense or (rarely) a surprise attack following a blow with the sword. Likewise, some Samurai wielded a katana in their main hand and a wakizashi in the other, with much the same use.

Using two full-sized swords is much more difficult, since a sword does not have the same freedom of movement a dagger has. While a master can probably prove proficient, normal people are more likely to survive with a buckler or dagger. In real life, the off-hand weapon is more effective for parrying than attacking, especially if the opponent is similarly armed.

Note, however, that there is at least one form of dueling, the Florentine, which specifically requires two swords. (Note that the name is a neologism—Florentine sword fighters were not more skilled in using sword and dagger than any other city's fighters.) Ideally, as with the dagger, these will be asymmetric weapons, generally one suited to slashing and parrying and one suited to stabbing. Another useful combo against a shield is a sword and bearded axe: the axe can hook away the shield, opening up the opponent for a quick thrust or slash. Some axe designs make this combination less necessary, however.

Oddly enough, it's almost always swords or axes. Very rarely do you ever see, for instance, a pair of hatchets or maces. This is a case of Reality Is Unrealistic. Many cultures prefer weapons other than swords, and use them in various combinations. Bifurcated Weapons lend themselves best to this type of combat.

Dual-wielding in real life has its advantages and disadvantages.

Having an extra weapon to work with gives you another option in combat—against only one weapon, trapping the opponent's weapon with one weapon can open him up to a nasty attack with the second weapon. Two weapons are especially useful in defending against Slice-and-Dice Swordsmanship.

The main flaw of dual-wielding versus other styles, on the other hand, is that using two weapons requires keeping track of far more variables in terms of range and available attacks, which makes training especially lengthy and difficult for a lot of the same reasons juggling is difficult for most people—the human brain isn't really wired to simultaneously operate both hands independently. Defending against thrusts with a weapon is more difficult than it would be with a shield. It also does not work too well in anything other than personal combat—it does not work well in formation on the battlefield due to the amount of room required to wield both weapons, it does not have the range or power advantage of a two-handed weapon or the defensive utility of a shield, and it offers precious little protection against archers and other ranged attackers.

Additionally, most established martial arts schools outright refuse to teach anyone who hasn't mastered single sword, because, as mentioned, the additional juggling of ranges, options, available attacks and defenses, etc. Not only does that make dual wielding more difficult in the traditional sense, but an inexperienced swordsman is fairly likely to injure him- or herself!

Expect to see a variant of Conservation of Ninjutsu come up, where someone with only one weapon can hold out against or even best a dual-wielder.

The Mary Sue upgrade from wielding two swords is using twin katanas. Often used to perform a Spam Attack. This is, more or less, the real life equivalent of running through a battle field naked, with a large red target painted on your chest.

A very few truly Badass characters actually use doubleswords, which have two blades but one handle.

And even more Badass characters will wield a BFS in each hand, truly taking this trope Up to Eleven.

See also Heroes Prefer Swords. Compare BFS and One-Handed Zweihander. For the firearms variant, see Guns Akimbo. When combined with Guns Akimbo, you get Sword and Gun. An easy way to up the ante even further is to be Multi-Armed and Dangerous, at which point the trope would be more accurately be called "Multi Wielding".

Examples of Dual-Wielding include:

Anime and Manga

• Typical with soldiers in Attack on Titan.
• In Azumanga Daioh, Yukari attacks Tomo with dual wielded cafeteria trays after Tomo accidentally hit her in the face with one.
• Hatsu from Tower of God dual wields Katana. Except that one of them, the Sword That Flies Higher Than Any, really flies around and incepts attacks.
• In Black Butler chapter 57, Lizzy Middleford becomes is a Dual Wielder. Who slays Zombies
• Captains Shunsui Kyoraku and Jushiro Ukitake from Bleach both have zanpakuto which transform into double swords when released - uniquely, according to General Yamamoto.
  • As recently revealed, Lieutenant Shuhei Hisagi's zanpakuto also does this.
    • Not exactly swords. More like the offspring of some dark union between a kusari-gama and an overgrown shuriken.
    • Ikkaku's Bankai gives him three BFS
    • Kyoraku's is the only one of the zanpakuto which involves two separate blades even unreleased. While fighting Starrk, he tries to hide the fact he duel wields by initially using only the larger blade.
  • Nnoitra Jiruga takes it a step further; his release causes him to grow extra arms, with his zanpakuto splitting to give him one blade for each arm (initially four, and later six).
  • Not quite as extreme, but Ggio Vega's release allows him to use three blades, one on each hand and one in his hair.
• Suzaku of Code Geass pulls off some dual-wielding in his mecha (pictured above).
  • Near the end of the series, Gino Weinberg's Transforming Mecha Tristan is upgraded to the Tristan Divider, and its main weapons include a pair of swords that used to be Bismarck Waldstein's mecha Galahad's BFS.
  • Rolo's prototype Vincent Knightmare had a pair of these that could combine into a double-bladed spear.
• Dual-wielding is fairly common in Humongous Mecha anime in general, especially in the realm of the Gundam series. It's also somewhat justified since a mecha, even a piloted one, will be automated enough that using two swords (or more) usually isn't any more difficult than wielding just one. Sometimes they even go beyond just dual-wielding, providing extra arms to wield extra swords. It just requires a little extra programming. Prominent examples from said series include:
  • Amuro Ray from the original Mobile Suit Gundam, who would use both the Gundam's beam sabers on occasion. His perhaps most famous instance of doing so is during his duel with Zeon commander M?Quve in the Texas colony.
  • From Zeta Gundam, Haman Khan and her Quebley often did this as well, mostly because the Quebley had no other equipment that required hands as it had no shield and all its other weapons were built in (or free-floating) so there was no loss in doing so. Paptimus Scirocco's The O is also notable in that it uses four arms in order to wield four sabers at once.
  • Sandrock in Gundam Wing uses a pair of heat shotels—a pair of very massive, and very heavy blades—as its primary melee weapons.
  • In Gundam Seed, Kira Yamato in the Freedom Gundam tends to dual wield his beam sabers when facing stronger opponents albeit at the cost of abandoning his shield. When he upgrades to the Strike Freedom—which has beam shields built into its arms—he can do this with no penalty. Yzak and Athrun are also prone to this.
  • Setsuna in Mobile Suit Gundam 00 does this all the time in his Exia (which actually has seven swords, but with only two arms it can't use them all at once). However, this is a slight aversion since most of the Exia's solid weapons are of different sizes and only the beam weapons have standardized sizes. This pretty much means that when he uses his GN blades, he's actually closer to the katana/wakizashi variation and the beam weapons are notably lighter than the GN blades. Meanwhile, the Seravee Gundam has the potential to wield six swords at once, two with its normal arms and four with its hidden arms. Finally, Mr. Bushido's Ahead employs this using the katana/wakizashi variation, as do his later suits the Masurao and the Susano-o.
  • The absolute nadir of this trope (insofar as a real robot show can do this in a feasible way) is the Seravee variant that appears in the manga. It has three seraphim units attached to its back, all of which are capable of fighting independently. When attached to Seravee, they can each pull out two arms, meaning that seravee can wield a total of 10 beam sabers at once.
• The anime of Murder Princess often has the titular character dual-wielding a katana and a dagger.
• And for some strange reason, the titular protagonist of Monster Princess does lots of this too. (Of course, she also wields chainsaws and jackhammers as befits the situation.)
• Although he does have a bow, and some ridiculously powerful Trick Arrows, Archer from Fate/Stay Night more often fights with two Chinese dao, Kanshou and Bakuya. Later on, Shirou uses Projection magecraft to make copies for himself. (It's usually around this point that fans start to wonder at the many similarities between Archer and Shiro...)
  • And in the novel prequel, Fate/Zero, Servant Lancer initially appears dual-wielding spears, although he generally fights with only one at a time (in one occasion, the shorter spear which he left on the ground was used in a surprise attack). Also, Servant Berserker (The Atoner Lancelot) manages to ward off Gilgamesh's "Gate of Babylon" using a spear in one hand and a sword in the other.
    • A spear and a sword, I might add, that he stole from the midst of Gilgamesh's Babyl-spam.
  • El Cid from Fate Nuovo Guerra dual wields swords, and as a bonus, creates Sword Beams with them. New Transfer Student Tetsuro dual wields shinai.
• In the second season of Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha, Fate's Bardiche was upgraded into Bardiche Assault and gained the Zamber Form, a BFS. By the third season, it has the ability to separate it into two halves, effectively twin longswords.
  • Other dual-wielders in the series include Teana with energy daggers, Schach with tonfas, and Deed with energy swords.
• Nanami in Revolutionary Girl Utena fights with a scimitar and curved dagger. This is possibly the only time in the series she attains anything resembling coolness.
• Roronoa Zoro, from One Piece, often triple-wields katanas, with one in each hand and one in his mouth. This being anime, of course, it's always quite effective, as absurd as it would be in real life. It goes even farther, however, with Zoro eventually learning to nonuple-wield—that is, use nine swords at once, or at least create the appearance of this.
  • Justified since Zoro's style isn't nearly as effective unless he uses three swords.
  • Not long after meeting Zoro, and long before Zoro's nontuple-wielding, Captain Kuro is seen wearing gloves with katanas on each finger. Combined with his incredible speed, he attempts to defeat Luffy, killing off or severely wounding most of his own crew, in order to carry out his master plan.
  • As well, Hatchan (an octopus fishman) uses six swords at once.
  • CP9 member Kaku uses two swords, and thanks to a special technique his legs act like blades making a total of four.
  • Mr. 1 is literally made of steel and can make blades appear from his body.
  • As for the recent events, is clear that many background/secondary characters wields two weapons at once, mainly swords or daggers. Expecially among high-level pirates and marine officers (including at least one man who fought with a katana and a jitte truncheon).
• Killer Bee, the 8-Tailed Jinchuriki in Naruto has been seen using 7 swords at once, in a way that's so weird it's hard to describe (you are not seeing things; none of those swords are in either of his hands). He fights by spinning around like a buzzsaw and juggling his swords, in case it wasn't absurd enough. After losing several of them during that fight he's since stuck with the regular dual wielding of two swords not counting Samehada.
• Father Anderson of Hellsing, Ciel of Tsukihime, and Kotomine of Fate/stay night fight with thin swords held between their knuckles, up to a total of six. (Mai-Otome pokes fun at this by having Yukariko do it with chalk. In both that series and My-HiME, she often uses a bow and arrows.) This seems to be some kind of Church Militant ability, as all three characters are associated with the Catholic Church (notably, the second two are members of the same organization, though vastly different rank).
  • Father Anderson's are specifically said to be knives. Bloody big knives.
    • They actually look more like bayonets...
• King Bradley does this in the Fullmetal Alchemist manga, using two sabers at once. This is also parodied in an Omake, where King Bradley wields five sabers at once: one in each hand, one in each ear, and one in his ass.
  • Denied, his saber, he then dual-wields a set of trench knives. Despite his comment that he's unused to using such weapons, he still proves deadly.
  • Overall justified for Bradley as he possesses the Ultimate Eye as a Homunculus. This allows him to eliminate the usual weaknesses of his style, even though he doesn't necessarily need it.
• Akane Higurashi from My-HiME, like Tracy, wields a pair of tonfa as her personal weapon. In her case however it's totally justified; tonfa, being both offensive and defensive armaments, are one of those weapons which are intended to be dual-wielded even in real life.
• Undine of the Twin Swords from Claymore is (of course) well known for the massive physical power that lets her use two standard issue BFS' at once. Upon her demise, Deneve took up her blade and spent the Time Skip learning to bulk herself up to pull the same trick.
• One of the myriad forms of the Ten Commandments in Groove Adventure Rave is Blue Crimson, which splits the weapon into two different swords: one of fire and one of ice. Interestingly enough, the hero finds it somewhat difficult to use because he's right-handed.
• In Mahou Sensei Negima, Punch Clock Villain Tsukiyomi is uses a dagger along with a katana.
  • Later on, Kotaro has an Imagine Spot involving Chizuru dual wielding onions.
  • Setsuna has her sword for her main hand and sixteen daggers for her off hand. Kaede often has a knife in both hands. Rakan's artifact can be used in both hands. He'd still rather fight you unarmed.
• Kyuzo from Samurai 7 wields two katanas. Conservation of Ninjitsu never really comes up, but Kambei manages to defeat him (or at least hold him off) using his scabbard as an extra parrying weapon.
• Viral from Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann has a mech that dual-wields katanas. Later, he pilots a mech that quadruple-wields them, and later, he gives the Tengen Toppa form of Gurren Lagann the ability to create and dual-wield katanas.
  • Gurren-Lagann is also seen dual-wielding giant sunglasses/boomerangs or drills for some of its attacks.
  • Not swords, but the Tengen Toppa Gurren Lagann wields two Giga Drill Breakers in the final battle against the Anti-Spirals.
    • Actually, TTGL briefly wields two swords when Viral takes the helm.
  • In the second movie, The Lights in the Sky Are Stars, Viral's Tengen Toppa Gunmen, Tengen Toppa Enki Durga wields eleven swords (and a club).
• Mazinkaiser can deploy two "Kaiser Blades" from its shoulders. By all appearances they're broadswords.
  • Great Mazinger, not only dual wields, it introduces dual wielding in Super Robot shows.
• Midori from Mai-Otome carries a pair of swords which she draws from a single sheath.
• Rurouni Kenshin has dual-kodachi user Shinomori Aoshi, and his "mentor" (long story) Okina, who duel-wields tonfas (y'know, those British policeman nightsticks).
• Akira of Samurai Deeper Kyo uses two katanas.
  • Later, during Akira's fight with Tokito, her sword splits into two swords.
• In Vinland Saga the hero Thorfinn fights with a pair of daggers. Not particularly strange, pretty reasonable. Contrast that however with his first major opponent and secret great uncle. Thorkell the Tall, who dual-wields axes. Not just any old normal sized axes, big mo' fo' great axes almost as big as the hero.
• In the climax of the Record of Lodoss War OAV, Parn dual-wields the Holy Sword of Valis and the Demon Sword Soulcrusher to shatter Kardis' barrier, in which Deedlit was imprisoned.
• Some of the weapons provided by the Gold Cloth of Libra in Saint Seiya, such as the tonfas and the nunchaku, are meant to be dual-wielded.
  • The Andromeda Cloth also wields the Andromeda Chain—one type of chain on each arm, and Shun can whip them out simultaneously to attack, unless the enemy requires more thoughtful tactics. Somehow, they never become entangled with one another, and Shun can wield them easily despite being the youngest, wispiest Saint ever.
• Guitar, the dog/deer swordsmaster from Violinist of Hameln, wields at least four swords at once, holding a pair in a claw-like grip in each hand. He's murderously proficient with this style.
• The title mech from Kurogane no Linebarrel. This is made notably less impressive when the soon-to-be-lancer starts quad wielding (and even then it has another sixteen swords to rely on), then there's Tsubaki-hime, that can dual wield chainsaws.
• The Digimon Daipenmon dual-wields popsicles. It even has a special attack for each of them—Strawberry Death for the red one, and Blue Hawaiian Death for the blue one.
  • Many other Digimon do this to, like Lobomon who dual wields light sabers (which can be combined to one two bladed lightsaber darth maul style) and some other sword wielding digimon like Karatenmon, Dinohumon, Yasiamon, Zanbamon and many others.
  • Beelzemon dual wields sawed-off shotguns named Berenjena.
• In the Fire Emblem: Sword of Seals manga, King Zephiel dual-wields the BFG Exaccus and the Infinity+1 Sword Sword of Seals!!
• The Hidden Weapons Master, Mousse, from Ranma ½, keeps a rather improbable number of weapons (bladed, blunt, piercing, etc.) hidden within his clothing and all over his body. A favorite intimidation tactic consists of him whipping up both his arms and displaying a frightening amount of blades from his giant sleeves, making it look like the swords and knives are his actual hands. And he's good at using them.
  • Shampoo also regularly dual-wields bonbori chúi, large Chinese maces. These demonstrate her prodigious strength, as they are known to be unbelievably heavy and unwieldy, yet she swings them around like they were nothing.
  • Kodachi has been shown to use multiple clubs at one time.
  • Ukyo uses both her large spatula and smaller spatulas at one time, though the smaller ones can double as projectile attacks.
• In Princess Mononoke, Lady Eboshi uses a sword and a hairpin in her fight with San. And it works.
• In Gun X Sword, Dann of Thursday uses a massive katana with a detachable knife (or presumably a wakizashi) attached to the reverse side. Van uses it occasionally to take on multiple enemies, while a twin-bladed mauling (Daitou Renzoku Kougeki, or Greatsword Multiple Attack) is one of Dann's attacks in Super Robot Wars K.
• Commander Mary in Kurogane Pukapuka Tai dual-wields a pair of (small) cutlasses.
• Haru and Lucia of Rave Master both temporarily do this whenever they use Blue Crimson
• Genkishi, the Phantom Knight of Katekyo Hitman Reborn is definitely one of these. He carried around four swords at this belt and usualy dual wields two of 'em. The others? Well, I hope this clears a few things up.
  • Adding on to this, it seems like a certain box weapon in in possession of three swords, carried on it's back. What makes this more interesting is that said box weapon is, in fact, a dog.
• Somewhat avoided in the Takehiko Inoue-drawn/written manga Vagabond, with two exceptions where it was acknowledged: Musashi used it as a reaction to being outnumbered by four senior disciples of the Yagyuu, and then he uses it to surprise the chain and sickle wielder Shishido Baiken (Tsujikaze Kouhei, who'd killed the original Baiken) and defeat him. Apparently Musashi is the only character to dual-wield in the manga because he's so strong that dividing his strength between the two swords isn't a problem, as he proves when he uses a one-handed sword to break a katana held in both hands.
• Gintoki does this for a while against Housen in Gintama.
• Hayate Cross Blade gives us Jun, the only student granted the right to use two swords; Shizuku, who wields her partner's sword sheath in addition to her own sword during the council battle; and Maki, who has not been shown Dual-Wielding per se but can be inferred to have the ability to do so because of her ambidexterity.
• Kanda does this at one point in D.Gray-man.
• Death Note does this with pens. Just watch me L, I'll solve equations with my right hand, and write names with my left. I'll take a potato chip...and EAT IT!!
• The titular character in Afro Samurai, who wields a single katana fights a dual wielder, and ponders briefly on the technique's worth. He decides on balance a single blade is better, but the fight is inconclusive.
• In the manhwa Chun Rhang Yhur Jhun, Ha-Rhang Whur takes this Up to Eleven by quad-wielding Chinese longswords and their scabbards, in an attack style that resembles a Cirque Du Soleil juggling routine as much as it does Dual-Wielding
• In the final episode of Transformers Armada, Optimus Prime breaks off Galvatron's horns and uses them as a pair of swords.
• Used for comedic purposes once in Azumanga Daioh. After Tomo accidentally lands a tray straight onto Yukari's face, cue Red Eyes, Take Warning... and Yukari dual-wielding trays onto Tomo's head.
• In Fairy Tail Erza duel-wields on occasion sometimes quad-wielding using her feet as well as multi-wielding with 200 swords at once.
• Mifune from Soul Eater carries multiple swords. Usually he uses one sword but he does multi-wield we he gets serious.
• Getter Robo G's Getter Dragon form duel wields battleaxesGetter Tomahawks for the Double Getter Tomahawk attack. It even throws them for the Double Tomahawk Boomerang! This goes double for Getter Robo Armageddon's Shin Dragon!
• Tsunashi Takuto, the protagonist of Star Driver, reveals that he is a duel-wielder in an I Am Not Left-Handed moment, specifically of swords. When piloting Tauburn, he dual-wields two "Star Swords" - mecha-scale swords made of pure light/energy (the anime never goes out of its way to explain the composition of the weapons) - Emeraude (green) and Saphir (blue).
• Elizabeth Middleford in the manga version of Black Butler.
• Kamika from Shikabane Hime fights with a pair of katanas.
• In Tokko Kureha wields a twin pair of daggers. In the Manga, Ranmaru gets two swords when he awakens his powers, but in the anime version he only gets one, but dual wields his and Sakura's swords in the final battle.
• Chikuma Koshirou from Basilisk dual wields two kama scythes.
• In the Aincrad arc of Sword Art Online, the game system in which all the players are trapped effectively limits them to a single blade. Except for Kirito, who has a unique Duel-Wielding sword skill that no one else in the game possesses (and which only contributes to the false rumors that as a former playtester for the game he uses unspecified cheats to be as good as he is).

Comic Books

• Leonardo of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles has two katana (usually drawn straight and relatively short like the fictional ninja-to). He normally uses one at a time, but has been known to dual-wield. (In most of the cartoons and video games, he's always dual-wielding.)
  • Counting non-blades, Raphael dual-wields a pair of sai, though that weapon was traditionally dual-wielded (usually with a third carried at the small of the back as a spare in case one was thrown or lost). Michaelangelo dual-wields nunchaku, which traditionally really, really weren't.
    • Whether nunchaku were "traditionally" anything is a matter of debate, though.
• Elektra, from Marvel Comics' Daredevil, dual-wields sais, though, as mentioned above, they are traditionally dual-wielded.
• Nightcrawler from X-Men is known as a swashbuckler being able to dual-wield sabers. He can even triple wield, when using his tail to hold a dagger. That being said, he's literally got superhuman agility and acrobatic ability.
  • Then there's the six-armed X-Men villainess Spiral. Predictably, she wields six swords, usually of varying lengths.
  • The short-time X-Man Marrow also is known for her tendency to dual-wield her self-made knives or clubs.
• In V for Vendetta, V's main weapons are multiple knives. He combines these with "fancy karate gimmicks" and superhuman abilities (thanks to a bunch of experiments performed on him by the government he now seeks to overthrow).
• Deadpool frequently wields dual blades of various sorts. He generally has two katanas strapped to his back, which he can use together, but also varies it up with a katana-and-sai combination (e.g. that Cable & Deadpool cover with Deadpool and Spider-man) or pretty much anything around. Usually he's got at least three to four blades on him at any time, along with the guns, grenades, and other various weaponry. (The cover of Wolverine #88 shows him skewering Wolverine with both katanas.)
• In the Batfamily, both Nightwing and Oracle fight with escrima sticks.
• Miho in Sin City often uses a katana in concert with a wakizashi.

Fan Works

• In The Tainted Grimoire, Luso does this sometimes
• In The Wizard in the Shadows, Emrys pulls this off and it becomes his favoured style, but only after unlocking his abilities as something that is effectively part angel under extreme stress, giving him greatly enhanced physical abilities, and solving the coordination problem. Before, both times he uses two swords, he uses them sequentially.
• In Better Living Through Science and Ponies (A crossover between My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic and Portal), Chell equips herself with four portal guns/long fall boots.

Films

• In The 13th Warrior, one of the Vikings wields a sword and a short axe in the final battle.
• In the most awesome scene in The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, the evil wizard Koura animates a statue of the goddess Kali to fight off Sinbad and his crew. Kali has six arms and wields a sword in every one, against multiple simultaneous opponents.
• Haige, the hero in Swordsmen In Double Flag Town dispatches the bandits threatening the village with dual-wielded short-swords.
• Golden Sparrow from The Forbidden Kingdom dual-wields short-swords.
• Darius in Dragon Hunter can not only dual-wield but fight off multiple people at once with two swords.
• One of the great love-it-or-hate-it moments in the Star Wars prequels is Anakin fighting with two lightsabers at once. (At least weight isn't an issue here.) The Expanded Universe makes this a Jedi fighting style called Jar'Kai, which is noted to be extremely difficult even for the most skilled Jedi Masters. General Grievous later uses four lightsabers, but as a cyborg, he has the strength and multitasking ability (and extra arms) to do this plausibly. In Clone Wars, he would sometimes substitute extra arms with use of one of his prehensile feet.
  • To be fair, it's not exactly portrayed as effective; while Anakin is dual-wielding, Dooku destroys his other saber and seconds later slices his arm off, and Grievous is defeated by a Jedi with a single lightsaber, though this is explained in the EU as Obi-Wan being particularly skilled with his preferred style. This stands in stark contrast to the Knights of the Old Republic games, in which dual-wielding is technically superior (especially in the second game, due to the number of upgrades you can apply to a saber).
    • KOTOR encourages you to have a shortened lightsaber in your off-hand, making it more of a realistic sword/dagger combo. It also mentions in the description of double-bladed lightsabers that they're normally used by Sith because only someone crazy and reckless would use such a weapon.
    • It only 'sort of' encourages this. At least in KOTOR 2, for any defensive build that doesn't rely on massive damage resistance, a single blade works best due to some feats. Two single blades allow better stats through upgrades, and have better criticals than a double-balded one, which is necessary for maximising damage at absurdly high levels. The double bladed variant has minimally better base damage, but can apply unique crystals to both ends at once, making them the best bet for optimizing damage without criticals.
  • Also in the Clone Wars cartoon, a female Sith wannabe, Asajj Ventress, dual-wields a matched pair of lightsabers. She fares better than Anakin at dual-wielding, but not by much. On the other hand, throughout her encounters in comics and novels, Ventress is so good at dual-wielding (perhaps the only Force skill she has that approaches Master level) that she kills many "mediocre" Jedi.
    • It's been said somewhere that Asajj Ventress forgot that dual-wielders have to exercise their arms a lot, so that they will be strong enough to parry and overpower two-handed blows, which is why she can't fight to Dual-Wielding's fullest potential. Anakin beats her by crushing her hand with his mechanical arm, and steals one of her lightsabers.
  • For the Saga Edition of the tabletop RPG, by taking Dual-Weapon Mastery feats (to reduce the attack roll penalty from -10 to -5, -2, and then negate it) a character can wield two normal-length lightsabers or a saberstaff just fine. (The difference from the Multiattack Proficiency talents is that those are weapon group-specific and don't require dual-wielding.)
  • One of the movie posters for The Empire Strikes Back shows a looming Vader with a lightsaber in each hand. It doesn't actually happen in the movie, but damn it looks badass.
• In the first Narnia movie, Aslan's Badass right-hand centaur fights using two longswords. Jadis, the White Witch, wields a longsword and a wand, which turns people to stone.
  • Edmund fights with two swords during the final battle of Prince Caspian.
• In the both the live-action and earlier animated adaptations of The Lord of the Rings, Gandalf is shown swinging his staff and his longsword against the invading enemy, including a nice twirl of the staff before smacking an unfortunate Orc with blade and blunt.
  • Legolas's other weapons (besides his bow) are twin fighting knives. The actor claims he actually became more proficient with that than with his bow.
  • These both show up very energetically in the videogame adaptations, in which Legolas almost comes off as some kind of elven ninja more than an archer. Many foes also dual-wield, but the cake really goes to the Easterling Elite Mooks in the videogame of Return of The King, who are armed with dual double-headed halberds.
  • In The Fellowship of the Ring, Saruman dual-wields his own staff and Gandalf's briefly.
  • Eowyn briefly uses two swords on horseback (with Merry holding the reins) to good effect against the Mumakil outside Minas Tirith.
  • In the film version, Sam wielded a sword and a frying pan in Moria (at least one shot, after Frodo is hurt, seems to show him using both at once). Later, when he stormed the tower of Cirith Ungol, he wielded Sting as well as his normal sword.
• In Tim Burton's Sleepy Hollow, the Headless Horseman, shortly before he becomes headless, fights some American soldiers with a sword and a hatchet. He seems to parry with both weapons and use both weapons to deliver decapitating blows. Of course, he's just that badass.
  • And, later, Brom is shown fighting the decapitated Christopher Walken using two sickles.
    • The first one is right, and it ends up costing him dearly when the Headless Horseman locks his weapons together and uses the distraction to cut Brom in half at the waist.
• Used briefly in Kingdom of Heaven by Guy de Lusignan. Then he loses one sword and pulls a dagger...
• In a surprisingly late addition to this page, River Tam, patron goddess of Waif Fu, dual-wields a sword and an axe in The Resolution Will Not Be Televised of Firefly, Serenity.
• During the battle scene in the later half of Beowulf, soldiers are seen dual-wielding axes.
• In the final battle of Shanghai Knights, the villain Lord Rathbone (named for the great actor and swordsman, Basil Rathbone) dual-wields a rapier and a saber against Jackie Chan (who just has the rapier). Justified by the fact that Rathbone was earlier referred to as a master swordsman, and actually fights realistically with the weapons (primarily using one for attack and the other for defense, catching the enemy's one sword while attacking with the other). The only reason he doesn't win the duel is because he prefers to prolong it for his own amusement.
• In the movie adaption of 300 Xerxes's elite, the "Immortals" dual-wield scimitars, as opposed to the comic in which they are armed primarily with shield and spear.
• In the final fight of the Sci-fi Channel original movie Thor: Hammer of the Gods the only thing NOT dual-wielding is a wolf.
• Optimus Prime, of all people, gets to dual-wield superheated retractable blades in the sequel. (He only had one in the first movie.)
• In the thriller Ballistic: Ecks vs. Sever, rogue agent Sever (Lucy Liu) dual-wields a pair of telescopic batons to great effect.
• In Jeremiah Johnson, the titular Mountain Man dual-wields a pair of percussion hunting rifles to thwart an ambush.
• In The Mask of Zorro, both Diego and Alejandro with the crappy Zorro costume do it with a sword and a knife. Later, Alejandro, this time with the official costume, does it with two swords against Montero and Love.
• Machete wields a pair of machetes against Torrez, who uses a katana and wakizashi.
• In The Last Samurai, there are two brief instances of dual-wielding badassery: first, by Katsumoto against the ninja at 3:42, and later, by Algren against the ronin (fight begins at 1:40).
• In Planet Terror, when denied a gun by Sheriff Hague, El Wray opens up his glove compartment and takes out a pair of Balisongs. His subsequent zombie-killing rampage through the hospital is one of his most awesome scenes.
• Done semi-realistically in the 1952 Ivanhoe; Ivanhoe uses a dagger in his left hand whenever he fights. Also, in the 1997 miniseries, Bois-Guilbert briefly dual wields an axe and sword during the trial by combat.
• In The Mummy Returns Princess Nefertiri/Evy and Anck Su Namun fight with dual sai type daggers.
• When Will and Jack first meet in Pirates of the Caribbean they engage in a duel. At one point during the fight, Will has two swords for a short period. Justified, as they're in the blacksmith's and there are plenty of swords about the place.
  • After Blackbeard breaks his crutch during their duel in On Stranger Tides, Barbossa starts Dual-Wielding it's broken shaft along with his sword.
• The Three Musketeers 1973, famous of the realism of its sword fights, has many characters fighting with both sword and dagger.
• In Tron: Legacy, Tron wields two Discs, which fit together during the coup. Turns out to be a Chekhov'sGun in identifying who's behind the Rinzler helmet.

Literature

• In The Dresden Files: Small Favor, Michael makes his last stand by dual-wielding a broadsword and a katana. And they're holy swords, too! It's a total cop-out that the villain beats him with a gun, but at least he ends up Not Quite Dead.
  • He did it in Death Masks, too. Same cop-out gun victory, too, but that time it was just a handgun and there was Kevlar plating in his armour.
• Drizzt Do'Urden, the drow ranger from the Forgotten Realms books, uses twin scimitars. Using two long blades is somewhat rare for drow, but not unheard of. Several characters note that Drizzt risks getting his blades tangled up using his style, but he's just that good. Notably, his arch-nemesis, Artemis Entreri, also dual wields, but uses a dagger in his off-hand.
  • In one of the later Drizzt books, when Entreri briefly winds up in Menzoberranzan, it's noted that several drow actually can dual-wield with ease (though Drizzt is the only one famous for it), and this is a sore point for Entreri, who despite being by far one of the best human swordsmen in Forgotten Realm existence (he actually outmatched drow on several occasions), simply doesn't have the agility and coordination required to wield two long swords with the same amount of proficiency.
• RA Salvatore's Crimson Shadow trilogy features the Highway Halfling Oliver De Burrows wielding the more traditional rapier and main gauche.
• A rare case of two different weapons, the Balrog of Moria in The Lord of the Rings has both a Flaming Sword and a fiery whip.
• Steven Erikson's Malazan Book of the Fallen has a few of these:
  • Kalam Mekhar, an assassin, dual-wields long-knives.
  • Silchas Ruin, a dragon-blooded immortal, dual-wields two swords. That is, when he doesn't just transform into a dragon...
  • The Segulah. Their entire culture dual-wields longswords better then 9/10ths of the planet fights with one.
  • Leoman of the Flails wields two flails.
• In Cloud of Sparrows, Shigeru's ability to fight with two swords is a sign of his unusual skill and strength.
• This is a common fighting style of Dragaerans in Steven Brusts's Dragaera books, with a dagger in the off-hand. Eastern-style fencing, on the other hand, involves using a single light rapier and turning your body sideways.
• On Barrayar, in the Miles Vorkosigan series, the Vor traditionally carry two swords, and dueling with two swords is mentioned as being specifically illegal. The two swords aren't described in detail, but one is shorter than the other (it's noted at one point that Miles finds the longer sword of the pair a particular trial (he's very short).
• Heralds of Valdemar: Weaponmaster-Herald Alberich dual-wields two daggers in one of his undercover personas. Until people wised up and quit challenging that persona to fights, he routinely beat sword-wielders with his two daggers. He also dual-wields sword and dagger in the climax of Take A Thief to beat three swordsmen, though he had help from Skif in that fight. It's also pointed out in Exile's Honor that Alberich is a combat prodigy and has been taught how to fight with nearly every weapon created and some that haven't been.
• The Casseline Brotherhood in Kushiel's Legacy dual-wield daggers as standard practice for defending their charges in close quarters or when they want to inflict non-lethal injuries. Their (two-handed) swords are only ever single-wielded and drawn only to kill.
• This is whole premise behind the hotas of the knife dancers in Karen Miller's Godspeaker Trilogy, as well as acrobatics. Rhian modifies this and uses broad swords.
• The Wheel of Time has one of its major characters do this. In a more unique twist though Perrin eschews swords in favor of a battle axe and blacksmith's hammer. When one considers the weight of just one of these weapons it says a lot about how strong the character is. The choice nearly gets Perrin killed though, since even he can't swing as fast as a good swordsman.
• Alaric briefly uses both an axe and a hammer in Hammer of Daemons. He isn't the only one running around with multiple melee weapons, though.
• In the Star Wars Expanded Universe, Luke Skywalker dual-wields on special occasions. Given that it's Expanded Universe Luke (the Grand Master), he's by definition good at it.
• Jean Tannen, Gentleman Bastard Sequence, dual-wields the Wicked Sisters, two short axes. It's briefly mentioned that his partner Locke carries two knives on his person, but he's not nearly as much of a brawler so they don't show up too often.
• The main characters of The Compass Rose all get Heldring Swords. Torhcay's are a matched set of short swords.
• Piers Anthony's post-apocalyptic collection of novellas, Battle Circle, features dual wielding nomads with daggers and sticks. Interestingly, Piers rates each weapon (including staves, swords and morningstars) on defensive and offensive utility.
• Scythe-arms in Chronicles of the Kencyrath by PC Hodgell are blade pairs attached to the fore-arm, with the longer blade jutting forward and the other back. They are used in pairs, ie one main blade and one spur on each forearm. Training with them easily dissolves into chaos, with inexperienced users not being able to keep track of the spurs.
• Mewick, a fairly minor character in Fred Saberhagen's Empire of the East, at least twice used a short sword in his right hand and a "basket-hilted hatchet" in his left. He managed to swing the hatchet around the guard of one highly skilled enemy swordsman to strike the man in the spine.
• In the Redwall book The Bellmaker, the otter Finnbarr Galedeep had twin swords.
• A Song of Ice and Fire
  • Catelyn recalls seeing Bronn fight with a sword in each hand while chopping through clansmen on the Mountains of the Moon. She's reminded of Jaime Lannister, reputedly the best swordsman in the kingdom.
  • Shagga fights with an axe in each hand and acquires three axes from the Lannister armory before a battle. Tyrion explains that Shagga believes that two axes are better than one, and three are better than two.
  • Daario Naharis apparently duel wields his arakh and dagger. They have matching hilts carved into the shape of naked women, and his hands frequently caress each of them when he's getting ready for a fight.
• In the Codex Alera, this is Kitai's preferred fighting style, usually with a shortsword and a longer sword.
• The Okar (Yellow Martians) from John Carter of Mars dual wield a fairly ordinary sword and a hook-sword designed to disarm an opponent as their standard technique.
• In The War Gods series, Champion Kaeritha dual-wields custom-designed short-swords, a feat aided by the fact that she is fully ambidextrous. Just how good she is can be seen by the fact that when she practiced against a group of Hradani (the smallest of whom was twice her size and far stronger), she trounced all but one of them. Her style is notably different from the War Maids who use a sword-and-dagger combo.

Live Action TV

• Subverted at one point in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. In a duel to the death with Gowron, Worf breaks his bat'leth and uses its broken ends as short blades. He fares much worse this way—and that was probably the point, as it makes Gowron overconfident, opening him up for a sneak attack.
  • Of course, it could also have to do with the fact that the bat'leth isn't two weapons, just a broken one.
  • Though his favored weapon isn't actually the traditional bat'leth. Worf prefers the mek'leth, a shorter one-handed hooked blade that is occasionally dual-wielded in the same manner as the hooked sword-breakers, so he might actually know how to use this tactic.
• Played straight in the first season of Power Rangers where the evil Green Ranger wields the Sword of Darkness and the Dragon Dagger against the Red Ranger.
  • Also, later in the series when the Red Ranger is using the Green Ranger's former powers, he dual-wields his own sword and the Dragon Dagger.
  • The Super Zeo Megazord has two swords that combine into a BFS made of energy that is as long as it needs to be... but is so heavy that it's not wielded so much as formed above the monster and allowed to simply fall, slicing through.
  • Power Rangers Mystic Force: Leanbow's got a sword in monster and Ranger form. He can use both at once, and has one attack that requires it (which he teaches his son The Hero, who does it with his standard Ranger form's sword and his Super Mode's staff.)
• In Robin of Sherwood, Nasir the Saracen dual-wields scimitars, but these are weapons with thin, relatively short blades. Inverting the trope, as in the pilot he manages to fight Robin, only using one sword, to a stand-still.
• Pretty Guardian Sailor Moon has the Senshi with swords (or an axe in Jupiter's case) but Venus and Mars have identical short swords which get dual-wielded since Venus is absent from the fight in the TV series and Mars is absent in the special. Some consider it symbolic of their relationship.
• Spartacus: Blood and Sand features Theokoles, a massive gladiator who fights with two BFSs. After defeating him, Spartacus himself starts dual-wielding normal-sized blades.
• In the British TV show Merlin, some mooks are seen using dual scimitars (and one knight who wanted to join the knights of the round table used two longswords).
• In Kaizoku Sentai Gokaiger, the Gokaigers dual wield a gun and sword by default and are known to swap weapons in the middle of combat. Blue and Yellow often end up Dual-Wielding the swords. This was taken to an extreme when Gokai Blue ended up wielding all five swords at the same time, very effectively at that.
  • Though there is a slight degree of justification, as Yellow can combine two swords into a Double Weapon while Blue's quintuple-wielding likewise involves combining the five swords into one with three blades and another with two.

Tabletop Games

• Dungeons & Dragons features specific and explicit rules on dual-wielding that vary depending on the edition.
  • AD&D's first and second editions allowed you to dual-wield melee weapons and make two attacks per round, provided your off-hand weapon was smaller than your main weapon, and your attack rolls with both were made at penalties of -2 and -4 respectively. This could be offset with a good Dexterity score, which lowered your penalties based on your ranged attack modifier. Second Edition's Player's Options (Combat and Tactics and Skills and Powers, as well as the Complete Fighter's Handbook) added Weapon Style specializations and Ambidexterity, which when put together could eliminate all penalties for dual-wielding and even allow you to wield two same-length weapons at once with a second specialization, provided you could wield them with one hand.
  • Rangers receive bonuses for dual-wielding. The character of Drizzt Do'Urden popularized the ranger's feat, though some players mistakenly believe that rangers were modified afterwards to to emulate Drizzt's iconic style.
  • In the 3.0 and 3.5 editions, characters receive heavy penalties when attacking with two weapons. You can receive lower penalties by using a light weapon in your off-hand or by using a single double-headed weapon. Several feats can be taken to lower your penalties further. Two-weapon fighting can also apply be applied to a monk's (unarmed) fighting style; the attacks stack.
  • As of 4th Edition, holding a weapon in each hand doesn't allow you to make two attacks by default, but certain feats give you benefits for dual-wielding, and quite a few Ranger powers require you to dual-wield. And Fighters have recently gotten into the act as well with the Tempest build from "Martial Power", which gives dual-wielding powers to the Fighter, and which, with a Ranger multiclass feat, can even wield two one-handed weapons like the Ranger can (since Fighters are usually limited to two light weapons or a one-handed weapon and a light weapon).
  • There are specialized weapons for certain tailed races that can act as a second or third equipped weapon with special training.
• Done with swords, axes, chainsaw swords, chainsaw axes, powerswords, giant hammers and enormous bladed claws that shoot lightning in Warhammer 40,000. Either this or Sword and Gun, with a pistol in one hand and a blade in the other, is used by virtually all close combat troops in the game. A few even use Guns Akimbo (including a pair of flamethrower pistols.
• Both the Warhammer Fantasy Battle roleplaying games (WFRP and Dark Heresy) permit this as well; however, this does not give you any extra attacks—the off-hand weapon is mainly used for parrying (much like in real life). Skaven characters in Warhammer fantasy can even triple-wield by holding certain specialized weapons in their tails, but they must be trained.
  • Duel-wielding in Dark Heresy does give extra attacks if the character has the right mix of Talents, for a maximum of four every turn.
  • In warhammer fantasy battles extra weapons gives extra attacks though. Special mention to warriorpriests that dualwields hammers rather than the normal axe or sword combos and ogres who dualwields clubs.
• You can do this in GURPS for a large penalty (which can be bought off in cinematic games). You can hold a weapon in each hand and attack with them one at a time for no special penalty.
• Feng Shui, in contrast, does not give you any penalties at all for Dual-Wielding any kind of weapon due to the game running largely on the Rule of Cool and the fact that many heroes in both kung fu movies and Heroic Bloodshed liked to dual-wield weapons. Golden Comeback, the Dragon supplement for the game, allows you to use many of the gun schticks in the original book for melee weapons if you're not a guy who uses Ki Attacks like the regular martial artist, meaning that you can use the schtick normally reserved for Guns Akimbo against named characters, Both Guns Blazing, to lay on the hurt using two swords or other melee weapons.
• Exalted typically averts this, which is slightly odd given its strong anime influences. Wielding two weapons doesn't give you an extra attack unless you use a flurry, which you can do just as easily with one weapon. Those trained in the Fire Dragon style of Immaculate Martial Arts are the exception, who wield two (relatively, in comparison to the BFS most Exalted wield) short blades.
  • Short and hook daiklaves, which Fire Dragon stylists use, are designed explicitly to be dual-wielded, and are usually found in matched pairs. Possibly in someone's ribcage.
• Vladimir Tzpeski, the dark prince of Umbray, in Warmachime dualwields a sword and a twin-bladed dagger.
  • As do Supreme Archdomina Makeda, Tyrant Xerxis and all the skorne Praetorian swordsmen.
• Starblazer Adventures, based on the 1980's British science fiction Comic Book. The Two Gun Joe stunt increases the damage done while shooting two guns at a time and makes it more difficult to disarm the user.

Theater

• Oddly enough, Mufasa and later Simba in the theatrical version of The Lion King use double swords during fights.

Toys

• The Transformers Revenge of the Fallen Voyager Bludgeon gets this right on the "one large one small" weapon front: he's a skeleton samurai robot who has a huge freaking katana and a smaller wakizashi. He also has a sheathe for each. Yes, this toy is So Cool Its Awesome.

Video Games

• In Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic and its sequel, any character except Kreia after she gets her hand chopped off can dual wield one-handed weapons. While the game doesn't allow for Sword and Gun, you can bring Guns Akimbo (even T3-M4, the game's Shout-Out to R2-D2, can do this) with dual pistols or dual wield 2 full-sized melee weapons. However, you take a penalty unless you invest in character perks, and an additional penalty unless you use a "balanced weapon" (generally a "short" variant of the lightsaber or vibroblade, or a smaller pistol) in your off-hand.
  • A bug will occur if you equip a lightsaber and a vibroblade dual-wielded. While it has no impact on game mechanics, the vibroblade will make the iconic lightsaber sounds instead of the sword sounds.
• Lloyd in Tales of Symphonia. Actually lampshaded, as Kratos mentions how using two longswords goes against what the art of the sword is about, and Lloyd reveals that he's using them simply because of the Rule of Cool—as the opening quote makes apparent, he thinks more swords means more power.
  • In the sequel, Dawn of the New World, Richter uses a single-bladed sword and an axe.
    • Actually, it's a sickle, which turns into an axe in his One-Winged Angel form.
• Judas in Tales of Destiny 2 dual-wields a sword and a slightly long dagger. Later, in the prequel remake, Leon Magnus follows the suit, because he technically is Judas.
• Spada Belforma, Tales of Innocence's lancer, dual-wields the same way Lloyd does, but is more serious about it than his predecessor.
• Kunzite of Tales of Hearts wields two katars. And has two additional blades mounted on flexible arms sprouting from his back. Chlorseraph, an early boss in the second half, also dual-wields giant green cleavers, and later teams up with his twin brother Clinoseraph, who dual-wields shields. Chalcedny, near the end, gets away with wielding a shortsword in one hand and, somehow, his trademark BFS in the other.
• In the Disgaea series, all the prinnies dual-wield daggers for their basic melee attacks.
  • Disgaea 4: A Promise Unforgotten allows the dual-wielding of Magichange weapons. Any combination of sword, spear, staff, axe, fist, gun or bow can be used together, and it tends to look even sillier with giant magichange weapons, which are much larger then the wielder.
• Persona 4's Yosuke uses small weapons in each hand.
  • We say "weapons" here, because they can include everything from machetes, to kitchen knives, to pipe wrenches. (The latter of which are actually are a good choice early on in the game, thanks to a nice critical-hit bonus.)
  • In Persona 2: Eternal Punishment, Baofu technically dual-wields coins. (Which may sound improbable, but when you consider that they're thrown with the force of a bullet...) In both versions of Persona 2.
• Vyse in Skies of Arcadia uses dual cutlasses. Because he's a Pirate. The second sword, however, is a tonfa-like weapon that isn't used in normal attacks.
• The Hero in Suikoden IV.
  • And the Hero in Suikoden II, though here he dual-wields tonfa. It's still pretty Badass.
  • Most characters in Suikoden Tierkreis who can use swords can do this, with game-breaking results considering that most swords are only slightly less powerful than two-handed weapons.
  • Yuber apparently wasn't content with just his BFS King Crimson and apparently split it into two katana-like weapons between the second and third titles.
• The Genji Glove item in the Final Fantasy series sometimes gives the equipped character the ability to do this. In Final Fantasy VI, the character could also equip the Offering (otherwise known as the Master's Scroll) for quadrupling the number of hits, yielding a total of eight strikes per turn. Each hit only deals half the regular damage...except there are 4 weapons immune to this: The Fixed Dice, the Dice (which you can buy freely,) the Valiant Knife, and the Ultima Weapon. Toss in the spell Quick, which gives a character two actions in one turn, and you get sixteen full-power hits at once, and can say goodbye to the Final Boss pretty quickly.
  • Ninjas, from the same series, usually possess or can learn this ability.
  • A similar trick to the FFVI example existed earlier in the series; in Final Fantasy V, the Ranger's "Rapid Fire" skill, which attacks four times, allows for eight hits (again at half power) when paired with the Ninja's ability to dual-wield.
  • There are even some FF games where everyone can dual-wield. In Final Fantasy II, dual-wielding is very powerful but not advisable long-term, as you'll be leveling up only attack and not defense. Conversely, Final Fantasy III for NES has no penalties for dual-wielding, and shields are weak anyway, so it's always advisable. Final Fantasy XI goes nuts with this, having players not only get Dual-Wielding, but also one of the best defensive spells in the game through the Ninja job. And with Dual-Wielding being more effective than 2-handed weapons by a large margin, until a certain patch... well, you get the idea.
    • It's also somewhat inverted in Final Fantasy II, as a pure caster is advised to dualwield shields.
    • In Final Fantasy III, it's utterly broken...and probably explains why usually only Ninjas or certain characters can Dual-Wield in future games. (With a few exceptions). Just about every single weapon in the game can be dual-weld...sure fists it makes sense, and knifes and swords, but characters will eventually start getting insane amounts of hits with bells, books, staves, and even Spears. Yes, even staves and spears can be dual-wielded.
  • Zidane from Final Fantasy IX equips knives and swallows. Whenever he equips a knife, he wields the equipped weapon in one hand and pulls out another basic knife to wield in his other, sort of hitting with both daggers at once. (It's just for show—you can't actually dual-wield two different knives.)
  • Judge Gabranth from Final Fantasy XII dual-wields a sword and dagger that combine into a sweet bladed staff. In fact, dual-wielding seems to be the de facto Archadian Elite fighting style. All of the Judges Magister, as well as Larsa Solidor, never go into battle without an ornate sword/mace/measure in each hand.
  • In Final Fantasy Tactics, the ability to dual-wield is unlockable as a passive skill.
  • Final Fantasy Tactics Advance has a passive skill for dual-wielding, but only Humes can learn it, and it's the most expensive one in terms of AP. On the other hand, it also allows you to learn two skills from weapons at once. For some reason, the sequel also allows all characters to dual-wield shields (if they could use shields at all), for whatever reason. This can be surprisingly useful for mages.
    • As is made annoyingly apparent in one bounty fight. Your opponent is a lone black mage wearing a thunder robe (absorbs lightning), an ice shield (absorbs ice), and a fire shield (absorbs fire). Given that black mages in this game mostly use the Fire, Ice, Lightning trio, this makes him immune to what are probably the strongest attacks you have when this fight becomes available, AND gives him the ability to heal himself at the same time he attacks you.
    • Have a Master Monk dual-wield shields. Because Master Monks have a huge unarmed attack raise, having one put on a couple of Fire/Ice/Lightning Shields boosts his evasion to frankly ridiculous (Bangaa or not) levels, renders him immune or worse to multiple elements or statuses, and does not ding his offensive ability one bit unless you have their absolute strongest weapon (even then it's just 17 Attack points).
  • Dual-wielding while using the opportunity command, Flurry!, can make your unit hit the enemy four times since the action is two hits and the other two hits are from your dual weapons.
  • In Final Fantasy Tactics, ninjas can naturally dual-wield, and have an ability that can be learned so a character can do it even in other classes.
  • The Thief Dressphere in Final Fantasy X-2. While not the strongest, she can chain two attacks together.
  • Gilgamesh from FFV and FFXII septa- and octa-wields weapons. Its effectiveness is... unsurprising.
  • In Dissidia Final Fantasy, Bartz dual-wields his allies' weapons in certain normal attacks as well as in his Ex Burst. The most memorable case, though, is his Crowning Moment of Awesome right before his fight with Exdeath, wherein he is serious.
  • In Final Fantasy VII Advent Children, Cloud owns six swords (none of which could exactly be described as small) which are stored in his motorcycle. These Fusion Swords are variously used singly, dual wielded in pairs, or locked together to form even bigger swords.
• Example of sword and dagger: the Prince in Prince of Persia: Sands of Time. The dagger in this case is the Dagger of Time and is the only one to off enemies for about 90% of the way.
  • Taken a step further in the sequel, Warrior Within. Here the Prince wields a sword in one hand and can pick up a variety of swords, axes, and knives from defeated enemies to use in his other hand. He can also ditch the off-hand weapon by throwing it at someone (often for a one-hit kill), and use his now free hand for grappling moves.
• In the Mega Man Zero games, Zero always seems to have two Z-Sabers in the official art, but never in actual play. Same goes for the Recoil Rod in Zero 3. The recurring villain Harpuia also wields two blades. When you get the Biometal based on him in Mega Man ZX, you have them too; you get a combo attack if you swing them alternately.
  • Zero does get two Recoil Rods, technically: one for each hand. Other than a slightly different animation for left and right hand, there's no difference to it.
  • The first Z-saber is for obvious use, while the second one is suggested to be used to augment Zero's other weapons in the series.
• In Kingdom Hearts 2, three of Sora's four Drive Forms allow him to wield two Keyblades at once. Interestingly, he goes from having one in each hand, to magically controlling one while manually using the other, to magically controlling both. His Nobody, Roxas, dual-wields Keyblades as well; before we knew his name, some people called him "Dual Wielder". And in the Roxas fight in Final Mix, Sora can steal both of Roxas's Keyblades, allowing him to Tri Wield. And while it doesn't seem possible for Sora to Dual Wield at all without an explosive clothing transformation first, since Roxas can do it naturally, more or less, Sora also has the potential, according to Nomura, who thought it would have been cooler as a special treat. The reason that Sora and Roxas can dual wield is because Roxas's anger during endgame because of Xion's death allowed him to wield Ventus's Keyblade along with Sora's and this power was transfered to Sora. They are not the only ones who dual wield:
  • Xaldin wields six lances.
  • Xemnas has a pair of "ethereal blades"
  • Larxene has 3 knives in both hands
  • Ventus in Birth By Sleep splits his keyblade into SIX swords of light in his Wing Blade Attack Style although since he only has two hands he only swing two at a time. His final move stabs all six swords forward at once before self destructing them in an explosion of Holy energy.
  • The Mysterious Figure in Birth By Sleep uses a pair of ethereal blades in a Reverse Grip
• In the online game Kingdom of Loathing, the Seal Clubber ability "Double Fisted Skull Smashing" allows one to do this; provided it is with one-handed weapons of the same type (melee, ranged, etc.). Damage bonuses only apply to the mainhand weapon so the damage increase isn't that significant, but having another weapon's enchantments can be quite useful.
  • Recently, an Item Of The Month is a "Disembodied Hand" that acts as your Familiar which can wield a third weapon for you.
• ... Which is pretty obviously a reference to the barbarian in Diablo 2, noted for his ability to dual-wield (and throw) all kinds of things, included weapons that normally require both hands to use at all.
  • Also the expansion pack character class of the Assassin could dual-wield claw class weapons and wrist blades, and had a specific skill to enable her to use them defensively too, comparable to a decent shield.
• Red Steel replaces a broken sword for the dagger, which isn't used offensively anyway.
• Heavy Metal: F.A.K.K. 2 was notable for overlapping with Guns Akimbo through Julie's ability to dual-wield almost any combination of several different guns, swords and shields at the same time.
• Lucia of the unmentionable Devil May Cry title dual-wields daggers, while Dante does this in the third game with the Agni & Rudra fire and wind scimitars. Vergil takes it a step further with his Yamato katana and Force Edge broadsword, although quasi-realistically enough he doesn't try to strike with both at the same time.
• Various characters in Samurai Warriors and Dynasty Warriors dual-wield. On the Dynasty Warriors side, Lu Xun in previous installments fought with two short swords and Liu Bei's revamped moveset in 6 gives him two long swords. After Cao Pi got his own moveset and character design he used a "dual blade" which split into two long swords that he dual wields for some of his special attacks. Probably the most over the top is Pang De who dual-wields pair of halberds.
  • Note that a number of characters (most notably Liu Bei and Miyamoto Musashi) from the games are known for having dual wielded in Real Life, or at least in folklore and fictionalized historical novels.
• Karim from Eternal Darkness can wield two talwars at the same time. Not surprising, considering he's strong enough to wield a zhanmadao.
• Sengoku Basara (or the localized version Devil Kings) had several of these. Most notable are Sanada Yukimura (Scorpio) and Date Masamune (Azure Dragon). Yukimura dual-wields spears as tall as he is. Masamune typically fights with a single katana, but carries five more. His limit break lets him temporarily use "Dragon Claw" stance, where he wields all six swords, by holding them in between his knuckles. His special moves also allow him to wield three or six at a time.
• One of the skills of the Blademaster in Hellgate:London lets them Dual-wield. Unusually for this trope, this is actually much slower and clumsier than fighting with one weapon, or even a sword and an off-hand pistol - the advantage is that you're hitting them with two weapons, which, unsurprisingly, does a lot more damage than just one, as well as being able to hit with two different damage types and stack mod effects.
• Voldo and Talim follow this in the Soul Calibur games, although with relatively light weapons (Katars and elbow blades, esoteric tonfa-like weapons, respectively). Taki has two ninja-to, but is typically swinging only one at a time. Meanwhile, Cervantes also follows this trope, wielding one of the Soul Edge swords and a piratey custom-made pistol-sword.
  • Soul Calibur III Bonus character Li Long uses two Nunchuks, but like Taki, only a few of his attacks have him actually using both at the same time.
  • Hilde in Soul Calibur IV trumps Cervantes with her use of a sword and a lance.
    • She is actually surprisingly effective with them. There is also the Bonus Character, Shura, who uses two katanas.
  • Despite a default of single wielding, Yoshimitsu has a handful of moves that use two swords, and apparently has a third sword hidden in his flag despite not using it. SC 4 boss and unlockable Algol double wields Soul Edge and Soul Calibur.
    • Technically, he is the swords.
• Tracy from Battle Arena Toshinden 2 uses a pair of tonfa to good effect. Rachael, her Evil Counterpart from Toshinden 3 uses a much larger set.
  • Sun Ce from Dynasty Warriors has them, too.
• City of Heroes introduced the Dual Blades powerset in Issue 11. It features a combo system where using attacks in the proper sequences will cause various effects. The player can also choose what type of sword they want in each hand the same way they design their costume.
• In Fire Emblem, assassins wield dual daggers in combat (they are swords in the item menu in the Game Boy Advance games (replaced with actual knives starting with Path of Radiance), but when you see the battle animations, they are clearly daggers). They are used to great effect in the games the assassins appear in, where each time an assassin attacks, there is a chance the unit will instantly kill the target. This skill is unnamed in Fire Emblem for the Game Boy Advance (the first game to have the assassin class), but is called Silencer in The Sacred Stones and Lethality in Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn. The Pirate class also dual-wields axes.
  • And in the Tellius saga (Path of Radiance and Radiant Dawn), there was Altina, one of the Three Heroes and first Queen of Begnion, who Dual Wielded two BFSs (Ragnell and Alondite).
• Black Whirlwind, the Ax Crazy brute from Jade Empire, wields two axes about half your size. Naturally, he is Badass.
  • This Older Than Most People Think: He is based on and named after a character from the novel Water Margin (known in Japanese as Suikoden). Another version of the character shows up in the anime Giant Robo.
• Quite a few of the classes in World of Warcraft can dual-wield various weapon types. In some cases, it's the best way to go, especially for Rogues, who can apply Poison to both weapons and can't use shields or two-handed weapons. They could use offhand items instead, but those hardly provide better stats and don't deal any damage. There is a certain amount of realism here, however; the offhand weapon is penalized to do half of its normal damage and the chance to hit on both weapons is lowered severely.
  • Warriors, Rogues, Shamans, Hunters, and Death Knights are the dual-wield classes, and with the exception of Hunters they have talents or spec bonuses that increase their hit chance (ranging from 3% to 6%) and reduce the damage penalty of their off-weapon. Considering that the chance to miss while dual-wielding is 24% (only 5% for single weapons, ranged weapons and special attacks) against targets your level (increasing by 1% for each level above you to 27%/8% against 3-level higher enemies and raid bosses), those skills/bonuses are very helpful, as it is nearly impossible get enough to never miss at all.
  • In Warcraft 3, Rexxar and his brethren Beastmasters fight with twin axes, as do most of the untamed Troll creeps (though trolls usually throw them).
  • Not to mention Illidan Stormrage dual-wielding his so-called warglaives, which are also examples of Double Weapon, which means Illidan uses four blades at once. Yeah.
    • Players can get those. It's crazy to see a rogue with them, and then he whips out Thori'dal.
  • The Wrath of the Lich King expansion pack allows Warriors to dual-wield two-handed weapons. It really has to be seen to be believed. They can still use all of their skills, which include a whirlwind. That's right, some Warriors kill things by flailing about with weapons bigger than they are. Hilarious when it's a gnome doing it.
    • • Is this not a warrior's job? Where I come from, the entire point of playing Warrior is to get the biggest weapon you can find, put on the thickest plate armour you can get your greedy little hands on, and go whack the holy fuck out of people, monsters, the nearest living tree, your grandma...
    • This particular ability comes from the Fury talent tree, which is essentially The Berserker.
    • Also worth mentioning is the Death Knight class as they have the option to Dual Wield as well. There were also some builds that allow you to tank with two one-handed weapons instead of a single two-hander given how Death Knights can't use shields.
  • As a note, Hunters bring out the "Lloyd Irving Postulate" (see quote above). As Hunters don't actually Melee... ever (instead they shoot you. Sadly no Guns Akimbo.), only the stats of their melee weapons matter- and if one battle axe has 100 Attack Power and 50 critical strike rating, 2 of that battle axe does indeed have 200 Attack Power and 100 crit.
  • And then, there are shivarra demons, who take it Up to Eleven.
• The R-Blade in Super Robot Wars Original Generation 2 has dual-bladed tonfas. The ART-1 in Original Generations/Original Generation Gaiden upgrades to chainsaw tonfas (and carries two knives for good measure). Both also use dual pistols. Not surprisingly, their initial pilot is one of the biggest Ascended Fanboys ever.
• Dual Wielding is a skill in Wizardry 8, with several different daggers, swords, axes, sticks, and maces being usable in the off-hand (though these are all smaller weapons). Notably, however, without the skill, off-hand weapons take a huge hit in accuracy, making a two-handed weapon or a shield a generally better idea. Those skilled in dual-wielding, however, gain the usual benefits (extra attacks, and possibly extra status effects).
• Super Smash Bros. Brawl has characters do this with certain items, if they already use a weapon normally (such as Link or Marth). One of the more hilarious versions has King Dedede swinging two hammers around like a kid hopped up on 50 tons of sugar, all while a tinny 8-bit song is playing.
  • Pit also dual-wields normally, using two blades that can be combined into a bow.
  • And subverting the spirit of the trope while following the letter, the player actually can use two weapons at once if they're playing as the Ice Climbers. Having a Beam Sword and a Star Rod at the same time is amazingly awesome.
• The metal defenders in RuneScape are a pseudo version of this Trope. They are knifes that go in the shield slot, but aren't actually used in the fight, they just give strength bonuses instead of defense.
  • The Barrows weapon "Torag's Hammers" are a straight example, though.
• In Super Robot Wars W, the Valhawk uses its Laser Blade to effectively maul the enemy. Then it finishes by pulling out a second sword and slashing through the stunned target before flying off.
• The Emperor from Legend of Dragoon dual-wields broadswords.
• Hawkeye from Seiken Densetsu 3 dual-wields a pair of daggers. Since they each count as a separate hit each time he swings, he tends to build up hits for his tech bar faster than most characters.
  • Kevin "dual-wields" his fists (!?) to the same effect.
• Link usually stays clear of this trope, but in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, he can dual-wield clawshots. Not for fighting, but for puzzles. And for playing Spider-Man. Wheeeeeeeeeeeee! Too bad it can only latch onto metal grating. It would be awesome to use them anywhere like that.
  • The elite Gerudo, including Ganondorf, can also wield dual sabres.
  • And in Skyward Sword there is Stalfos and Ghirahim in his second battle. Koloktos, however, gives General Grievous a run for his money with Hex Wielding, six scimitars with six arms.
• The Sigma Updated Rerelease of the Xbox Ninja Gaiden remake introduced the paired katana set known as the Dragon's Fang and Tiger's Claw. The proper sequel added twin tonfa and the wrist-and-foot-claws Falcon's Talon. Near the end, Ryu also uses the True Dragon Sword and the Blade of the Archfiend together the same way he does the Dragon's Fang and Tiger's Claw.
• Lao from Bujingai Swordmaster dual wields swords: a large, yellow saber made for physical attacks and a longsword used for channelling magic, which can also turn into a bow.
• Nethack is another game where your character can "train up" in dual-wielding skill (wearing a shield or wielding a two-handed weapon is also an option.) The best weapons to combine, if any, depends on which character-class you've chosen. In homage to the historical fact noted above, Samurais start the game with two swords.
• Touhou character Youmu Konpaku wields two swords in the Musashi style.
  • Notably, one of the swords, the Roukanken, is a katana and the shorter one, the Hakurouken, is a wakizashi.
• Captain Homard of La Pucelle Tactics wields twin rapiers.
• The protagonist Byuu and his rival in Bahamut Lagoon are both Cross Knights, whose job title seems to include wielding two swords at once.
• In Killer Instinct 1, Black Orchid fought with twin laser swords, each capable of producing two "blades". When KI 2 rolled around, she'd swapped to a pair of glowing tonfa. One of her opponents in the second game, Maya, was an Amazon warrior with a pair of broad-bladed knives.
• Glenn can do this in Chrono Cross, the reason why many players opt for Razzly to be Lost Forever (until the New Game+ anyway) instead of him; presumably, he picked the trick up from his That One Boss father, Garai.
  • Considering the fact that getting Glenn to join the party requires Serge to be a Jerkass to the one person who's shown him any decency in the alternate dimension, this can be a bit of a Guide Dang It. However, the ability to wield two alternate-reality copies of the ultimate weapons at the same time results in Glenn going from Awesome to God Of Destruction. And he still uses a shield while dual-wielding!
• In the MMMORPG Tales of Pirates, the Crusader class can Dual-Wield. The result of this is that 75% of all PCs are Crusaders...
• Mr. Big and Rody Birts from the Art of Fighting series both represent this trope. Mr. Big uses two rattan sticks while Rody wilds dual tonfa.
• Daggers in Guild Wars are always wielded paired.
  • In Guild Wars 2 every one-handed weapon can be dual-wielded, with some restrictions (for instance, Elementalists, Necromancers and Thieves can dual-wield daggers, but Rangers can only use them in their off-hand). This is especially important for the Thief class, who get a unique attack for every combination of weapons.
• In the original .hack games, the character class "Twin Blade" is known for equipping two daggers at the same time. In the second .hack//GU series of games, the class "Twin Blade" still exists, but other classes also dual-wield weapons. "Tribal Grapplers" can equip certain gauntlets, so they come with paired weapons by default; "Macabre Dancers" wield dual fans.
• Yagyu Jubei in the Samurai Shodown/Samurai Spirits games wields a daisho, the proper Samurai's armaments consisting of a katana and a wakizashi. The shorter wakizashi is held in his left hand and is generally used for quicker attacks while the katana is held in his right and delivers the stronger attacks, including many of the special moves. However, Jubei uses the wakizashi to set up the Yagyu Shingan-to from the second game onwards.
  • Yoshitora from Samurai Shodown 5 easily outshadows him: he carries 7 katanas with him, each of them used with a different special move with the seventh being a nodachi which he can only use after connecting with every other special move at least once. He uses all of them in sequence in his Zetsumei Ougi. On the other hand, he rarely actually uses more than one at a time.
• Rohan Online has this as a feature of the Human Knight, Dhan Assassin and Dekan Dragon Fighter classes. Human knights can use a one-handed weapon in one hand and a dagger in the other (they have to be moved into the shield slot), but the dagger loses about 80% of its power this way. Dekans can do this with their Zhens, as one of their skills allows them to split the Double Weapon into two swordlike halves for dual-wielding, losing a bit of attack power but increasing attack speed. And the Dhans have a special two-handed weapon which is basically a brace of katars, one in each hand. And the upcoming Giant race is going to have true dual-wielding (a one-handed weapon in each hand) as a feature.
• A feature that can be used in Baldur's Gate II and many other games based on Dungeons & Dragons (see above.) Predominately done by the Ranger or Kensai classes.
• The mad Twi'lek Dark Jedi Boc, from Dark Forces II: Jedi Knight, used a single unusually thick lightsaber—which, when he felt particularly threatened, he would split into two slender ones. (See also Star Wars, in Film, above.) He was a very difficult boss, but more because of his mobility.
  • In Jedi Academy, your character has the option of using the two-saber style (with which you can also quench one saber to single-wield if you wish.) You can even make each one a different color. Hypnotic?
  • Also in Jedi Academy was Alora with her two lightsabers.
• In Halo Wars, the Arbiter dual-wields energy swords. However, the first person games, while allowing Guns Akimbo, prevent Duel Wielding energy swords mainly because it would either be redundant or drastically overpowered. Same goes for the Gravity Hammer.
• God of War main character Kratos dual wields his Blades of Athena. Two small swords attached to his forearms with chains.
• The Phantasy Star games sometimes featured this Trope. Several player characters from PSIV, for example, can dual-wield knives. Rune, a magic-user, can dual-wield shields—and still has enough attack techniques and skills to make him a strong fighter.
  • In Online, all Daggers are dual-wielded. The game also has twin Sabers as well. Universe finally allows the character to wield one dagger, and introduces Twin Claws as well.
• During the Final Battle with Dark Emperor Griffon, in Dark Cloud 2, he rips off his own wings and transforms them into swords, wielding one in each hand. Since he's the size of a bear to begin with, these scimitar-shaped swords are as big as oars.
• Aya from the OneChanbara games can switch between single- and dual-sword styles almost instantly.
• Death's Hand in Jade Empire wields two swords. The off-hand weapon is the size of a reasonable sword and the main-hand one is even larger. It is possible for the player character to use these as well, though if memory serves it needs to be modded in.
  • Although there are still at least two other styles in which you dual-wield weapons. Namely, Crimson Tears, in which you dual-wield swords, and Tang's Vengeance, in which you dual-wield axes.
• In The Last Remnant, the hero can be equipped to dual-wield full-sized weapons.
  • Sovani, a reclusive race of four-armed humanoid felines, are able to dual-wield, quad-wield, or dual-wield with two-handed weapons (a pair of great swords, or polearms, etc.).
• Villainous variety: Ubermutant, the boss of Level 16 in Spear of Destiny, wields a knife in each of its four hands—or perhaps, has a knife instead of a hand for each of its four arms; the ancient graphics make this a little unclear. Yes, this is a game where the main weapons are guns. He has one of those, too.
• Fear Mell/Phia Melle in Star Ocean fights with dual daggers. Which she throws simultaneously. And then directs with telekinesis. And then pulls back to her hands. In other words, she gets four attacks when everyone else gets one.
  • In Star Ocean the Second Story Ashton fights with two swords. It's also worth noting that he has two dragons grafted to his back which actually perform one of his most powerful moves so technically he's dual wielding dragons as well.
• Star Wars: Empire At War: Forces of Corruption example: Urai Fen, Zann Consortium Hero Unit, who dual-wields two BFS's. That can kill a light vehicle in one hit.
• In the MMO shooter Gunz The Duel, in addition to blasting off with Guns Akimbo, characters can choose to Dual Wield using Kodachis, shorter versions of the regular katana sword that most melee players use.
• The Hashishin in Gothic 3 are fond of dual-wielding a pair of long, thin curved swords. The nameless hero can also learn to dual wield any two swords of any length, including a flaming sword in one hand and a frost sword in the other. How useful dual-wielding is in combat is somewhat debatable, but it looks very cool.
• Unfortunately averted in Mitadake High, you can only hold one weapon at a time. (though there is a glitch involving the axe...)
• Shaiya's Fighters and Warriors can dual-wield swords and axes as one of their primary styles (the others being weapon-and-shield, two-handed weapon, or spear).
• Skarin from Viking: Battle for Asgard dual-wields an axe and a sword. Rather plausible when you consider he usually uses the sword to deflect an enemy attack and use his axe to beheard them before they can recover.
• Ichiro Ogami from Sakura Wars. This, of course, means to his Humongous Mecha dual-wields as well.
• Maple Story mostly averts this by having everyone wield one weapon, regardless of how many hands it needs to be held. Any off-hand items are shields. However, there are a couple of Bandit shields that are appear to be second daggers. They increase attack power and look like they're also striking the enemy along with the user's main dagger.
  • Now played straight with the Dual Blade subset of thieves.
• In Might and Magic 6 and 7, duel-wielding is available to anyone who can become Dagger Expert (anyone but a Cleric) or Sword Master (varies), either of which skills allows the named weapon to be wielded in the left hand while any one-handed weapon is used in the right. In MM 9, a Gladiator can become a Grandmaster of Spear and so duel-wield spears or even halberds.
• In Mitsumete Knight, one of the Eight Generals of the enemy mercenary brigade Valpha-Valaharian, Rinanore of the Ice and Fire, wields two swords, and she even embues one of them with ice magic, and the other with fire magic, when using her Limit Break.
• Warriors and Rogues in Dragon Age Origins have the option of following a Dual-Wielding path. Both will eventually be able to Dual Wield longswords, axes, and maces. Additionally, this allows rogues to still deal effective damage when Back Stabbing isn't an option. Zevran already has a few Dual-Wielding talents if/when he joins you.
  • Dragon Age II only makes Dual-Wielding available to a rogue using a pair of daggers.
• Knuckles, in the role of Sir Gawain, in Sonic and The Black Knight wields a pair of butterfly swords called Galatine.
• Shania dual wields a pair of hatchets/axes in Shadow Hearts: From The New World.
• Rise of the Kasai features Tati and Grizz, who dual wield knives as their primary weapons.
• While the "left hand" equipment slot in Albion can only be used for a shield, two aliens get a "tail" slot, which can equip either a one-handed weapon or a shield. The numbers on the equipment screen treat the power of both weapons and shields as additive, although in actual combat the animations indicate that each weapon makes a separate attack.
• In Demon's Souls you can dual wield two shields. I'm not kidding.
• Lunia features Asuka, a girl in a school-girl themed outfit who dual-wields two katanas and looks completely Badass when you're playing her. Unfortunately, you have to pay to play as her.
• Super Robot Wars L has the Straybird's Pheasant Cutter attack.
• Lann, one of the main characters of Vindictus, is a dual-wielder who focuses on dodges and lightning-fast combos to deliver serious damage and clear out rooms of mooks. Though he starts out with twin swords, he can upgrade to a twin spear which can be separated for even deadlier attacks.
• In No More Heroes 2: Desperate Struggle, Travis gets a beam katana two-set called the Rose Nasty. The one he holds in his left hand is shorter than the right hand one. It's also the fastest beam katana in the game, although it's also the weakest.
• One of the weapon options in Rune Factory 3 is Dual Blades. Seriously awesome. Especially since you can dual wield a pair of leeks. Though its effectiveness is called into question by the fact that it completely negates all defense gained from a shield. On the other hand, it's also the fastest weapon.
  • Returns in Rune Factory Oceans as Azel's default weapons skill. One cutscene has Azel hold off a monster with the dual blades and then kick it in the chest Leonidas-style. Shame you can't do it in-game, of course.
• Considering that every fighting character uses swords in Eien no Aselia, you'd expect more people to dual wield. But due to how Eternity Swords work, there's only one minor character that you actually see use two of them. Tokimi does have two, but she fights using a fan and sword instead.
• This is the style of the appropriately-named Dual Swords class in the Monster Hunter franchise.
• In Rift, all warriors technically can dual-wield, but it's paragons who are the masters of the art. And as rogues can only use one-handed weapons, dual-wielding is also their basic set-up.
• Star Wars: The Force Unleashed 2 lets you dual wield lightsabers in Reverse Grip.
• Castlevania: Symphony of the Night 's Alucard can equip any weapon in either hand (save two handed weapons, obviously). Though his swing speed doesn't pick up any, it can be convenient to not have to go into the sub menu if you're using elementally aligned weapons.
  • The series Prequel, Castlevania: Lament of Innocence had the bonus character, vampire Joachim Armster, who wielded five broadswords using his telekinesis.
  • Pit in Kid Icarus: Uprising does this. He has a bow that can be split into two swords.
• Septerra Core. Marduk does this with his Daemon Swords in the game's lore (but Corgan and Selina don't when they get them in the endgame), and Badu does this with his giant knives as well.
• Annah from Planescape: Torment dual-wields punching daggers (and, judging by the combat animations, her feet, though the game rules don't cover that).
• Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain: Kain can wield the axes Havoc&Malice at the same time, but he needs a free hand to use spells or other items.
• The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim is the first game in The Elder Scrolls series to feature Dual Wielding. This can either be dual wielding 2 melee weapons(swords, axes or maces) or dual wielding magic spells. Or both. A fun fact is, that the programmers initially did not plan the Dual Wielding of melee weapons. But when a mistake in the programming allowed this to happen, they liked the idea, so expanded on it.
  • It does come with the drawback of not being able to block, however, as this is normally assigned to your left-hand button. One of the tomes you can find scattered throughout the game does give an in-character explanation to this, though: blocking with a shield is most effective, but if you're going to block with a weapon, you need to put both arms into it or it just plain isn't going to work. (Why this stops you from simply crossing your weapons to block remains a mystery.)
• Some heroes in Dungeons dual wield weapons, usually daggers, swords or even mallets.
• This is an ability in Monster Girl Quest Paradox, and is considered among the fandom to be extremely powerful. Dual wielding characters have very high damage output.

Web Animation

• In the web animation Unforgotten Realms, Rob is fond of having his character "Sir Schmoopy of Awesometon" dual-wield nunchacku. As the game he's playing is a parody of Dungeons & Dragons this means, of course, he takes fairly serious penalties (his character isn't even specced to use nunchacku, much less dual-wield them). To his DM's chagrin, however, he often rolls 20s.

Webcomics

• Variant: Belkar in Order of the Stick uses twin daggers. This is because he's a Ranger, and gets the ability for free. He uses daggers instead of swords because of his size, although possibly also because, as a Halfling, he has a penchant for thrown weapons. In the same comic, Miko Miyazaki wields the standard Japanese Katana/Wakizashi pair (as well as her feet), and Zz'dtri, an obvious parody of Drizzt, wields two scimitars.
  • Well, holds two scimitars. He's a wizard, and there's no indication of him actually using them to attack anyone in melee. They seem to channel his magic when he's blasting V.
• The title character of The Adventures of Dr. McNinja dual-wields katanas when assaulting a ninja-laden stronghold to save his sidekick. Yeah. It's awesome.
  • Then there's the Uber-ninja, whose custom-made nunchaku basically mean he's dual-wielding two roped-together chainsaws
• Eight Bit Theater's Fighter has four swords and wields a pair of them on a regular basis. On one occasion he even used all four at once when sufficiently pissed off (He is the only person in history to have mastered the sword-chucks, let alone dual-wielding them). Black Mage and Thief have also been known to use paired daggers to deadly effect (although Thief seems to really more on his ninja skills later on), leaving Red Mage as the only main protagonist to simply resort to a single sword.
  • Not to be outdone, Ranger dual-wields bows. And then he attempts 'the mythical art of quad wielding and its dodecarrow storm!' which is dual-wielding the dual-wield... ultimately somehow aiming four bows and twelve arrows with two hands. He does note that "Its' not easy. Really hurts the neck."
    • Note that he can do this because he's a Ranger/Ranger, which lets him double up his dual-wield.
• Bernadette of Flipside fights with two swords in a style called "split rose". One sword parries and the other counter-attacks.
• Both Oasis and Kusari from Sluggy Freelance dual-wield their bladed weapons (large knives for Oasis, small scythes for Kusari).
• Kei of Circumstances of the Revenant Braves wields two swords.
• Zeetha, from Girl Genius, uses dual katars.
  • When called upon to fight Boris, the Baron's secritary, wields four swords, one in each arm.
• Cale An'non, from the webcomic Looking for Group dual-wields curved elven swords... with varying effectiveness.
• Kit from Fey Winds.
• In Goblins, Thaco fights with a sword-cane which consists of 2 swords.
• In YAFGC, There Is No Kill Like Overkill, apparently.
• El Goonish Shive has fun with Susan dual wielding cleaner bottles. She used to triple-wield Hammers. Well, almost.
• Schlock Mercenary: The four-armed Andy attempts to impress Thurl by quad-wielding pistols. Thurl promptly puts him in his place by saying that he still has a humanlike eye arrangement, so he can't possibly be getting good sight pictures on those pistols-the result would be ammo-wasting, collateral-damage-causing A-Team Firing.

"That's all right, I'll put you down as 'very enthusiastic' and 'seen too many John Woo movies. You're in."

• • Schlock, with his arbitrary anatomy, successfully dual and triple wields plasmacannons and antitank rifles. Or everything he can carry at once.
• Zokusho Comics: Raziel of the Wayward Cross uses a pair of short swords.

Web Original

• In The Gamers Alliance, Ismail, Khalid and Vaetris all dual wield swords.
• Post-Mission That Dude in the Suede with his katana in one hand, and the sheath in the other.
• Iron Liz has herself a nice pair of breasts, I mean swords!
• Done briefly in Survival of the Fittest, where after the machete-wielding Andrew Klock is wounded with a corkscrew in his fight with Cole Hudson he pulls it out of himself and attacks Cole with both weapons, eventually lodging the corkscrew in an artery.
• Enriqueta-2856's fighting style takes a hint from King Bradley in the v4 of Open Blue. From v2, Janice Cervantes.
• Artist John Su has recently created a Dual Dual Wielder Wielder A guy that dual wields his sisters who in turn dual wield swords and guns.
• Ktk, the titular bug in Pay Me, Bug!, has three prehensile tails that are each strong enough to pick up a full-grown human. Its favorite tactic during a melee is to triple-wield its enemies.

Western Animation

• Ulrich of Code Lyoko upgrades to two Samurai swords in his Lyoko form in Season 4.
• Zuko and Jet of Avatar: The Last Airbender—the Evasive Fight Thread Episode was inevitable.
  • Suki and the other Kyoshi Warriors with twin fans.
  • In one episode, Aang has a sleep-deprived hallucination that Appa (a six legged flying bison) stands up on his back legs and wields no less than four swords, one in each of his other "legs". (And has a samurai fight with Momo the flying lemur, who only has one.)
  • Furthermore, in the episode "Zuko Alone," Zuko and his dual swords faces off against an Earthbender who wields dual hammers.
• Quite a few Transformers do this when combat gets up close and personal. For example, Beast Machines gave Cheetor a pair of yellow scimitars that looked like nothing so much as Ginsu bananas. Optimus Primal did this with two of his bodies in Beast Wars: swords for his first body and maces as a Transmetal.
  • Wing Saber, in Cybertron, does it a litle differently: his swords attach to his forearms rather than being held, though his combined form with Optimus Prime follows the trope normally.
  • Starscream from Armada can turn one of his wings into a sword, but sadly only one. Fortunately, after the Star Saber is constructed, he gets a chance to wield it alongside his normal weapon. His fellow Armada Decepticon, Wheeljack, follows the trope with a pair of, um, sticks (which the anime reinterpreted as really unergonomic guns).
  • The Animated version of Jazz actully uses a pair of nunchaku, and post-resurrection Megatron turns each of his helicopter blades into swords.
• Justice League Unlimited, episode "Dark Heart": Batman fends off a bunch of robot tigers and spiders by using a pair of giant batarangs. Yes, they were batarangs the size of swords, and he still pulled them out of his utility belt. Even collapsibility will only take you so far, folks. But Rule of Cool was all over the place in that episode, anyway.
  • Possibly inspired by a Batman / Planetary crossover where Batman does the same thing. The connection? Both were written by Warren Ellis. (Ellis is also fond of nanotech, which showed up heavily in his Transmetropolitan series and was the Big Bad in Dark Heart.
  • Reused in The Batman vs. Dracula. Except those were actually his normal 'rangs.
  • Then in Batman: The Brave And The Bold he dual-wields a Light-Sabre and a stolen Demon Blade against some summoned fire demons.
• At least once in Teen Titans, Robin traded in his usual staff for a pair of smaller sticks and wielded them using the Filipino martial art of escrima.
  • That was a hint regarding the "Which Robin?" controversy—Dick Grayson eventually adopts escrima sticks as his weapons of choice when he nails down the Nightwing costume. So Robin in TT using them = hint as to where it was all going.
• The remake of He-Man has Skeletor using a broadsword that can separate into two longswords when needed.
• Done by every one of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles except for Donatello, who wields a Simple Staff.
• Used in Star Wars: Clone Wars with General Grievous, who in his introduction fought with two lightsabers, one in each hand, then added a third partway through the fight, wielding it with his foot, then in the series finisher, dividing his arms into a total of four to fight with four sabers, one in each hand. Combine that with his foot, and he could've been able to use five lightsabers at once!
  • Though she doesn't have as many arms, Asajj Ventress also fights exclusively with a pair of lightsabers. They can also attach at the hilt to form a double-bladed saber with a curvy handle.
  • In Star Wars: The Clone Wars, as of "Heroes on Both Sides", Ahsoka Tano now wields another lightsaber with a shorter blade alongside her normal one.
    • Bonus points for still preferring the inverse grip for both weapons.
  • Jedi General Ripper Pong Krell takes this Up to Eleven, using not one but two double-ended lightsabers in battle. Being Multi-Armed and Dangerous as well as a legitimate brute in combat makes him a nightmare to fight, as Captain Rex and his men found out the hard way when Pong turns out to be a traitor aiming to join Dooku as his apprentice.
• The Mickey Mouse short Through the looking glass saw Mickey duel a card, the King of Hearts, after being spotted dancing with the queen of hearts. The torso's at each end of the card grab a sword to might Mickey with, who parrys with a needle.
• Skips from Regular Show in "But I Have a Receipt".
• Shane Gooseman from Adventures of the Galaxy Rangers usually dual-wields his blasters.

Real Life

• Sixteenth century samurai Miyamoto Musashi developed and employed a fighting style using a katana and a smaller wakizashi (companion sword) simultaneously. Incidentally, it is said that he only used two swords when facing groups. When fighting single strong opponents, he preferred to use only a single katana.
  • It'd really be fair to say that when fighting anybody Musashi used whatever worked. That was, after all, the core tenet of his fighting style, and he was plainly badass enough to carry it off (often called the greatest swordsman in history). The Wind Book in the Book of Five Rings is pretty much a breakdown of why other schools of swordmanship at that time failed by being too attached to a particular method of fighting and generally lacked flexibility. At one point, Musashi even suggested that on some occasions it might be good to use two long swords when fighting large groups, and towards the end of his life, he indeed designed a fighting style that involved dual-wielding katana. This fighting style is employed by a few video game characters: the monstrous Akatsuki Musashi from The Last Blade, the titular character from Brave Fencer Musashi, and Musashi Miyamoto in Samurai Warriors 2. As their names imply, all are based loosely on the original Musashi.
  • The dai-sho technique of using long-and-short swords was not exclusive to Miyamoto, he was just arguably the best at it.
    • Well, it wasn't so much being exclusive to Musashi as it was the fact that he perfected the fighting style.
    • Musashi on dual-wielding: "This is a truth: when you sacrifice your life, you must make fullest use of your weaponry. It is false not to do so, and to die with a weapon yet undrawn."
  • In the Japanese-only PS2 version of Tales of Symphonia, Lloyd gets an alternate costume which is apparently intended to represent Musashi.
  • Musashi invented the nito-ryu school when he saw a Portuguese soldier fighting with sword and dagger
• Kendo has a style nito-waza of fighting with two shinai, one long and one short.
• The Western equivalent of the wakizashi was the main-gauche, a dagger wielded in the off hand. Unlike in the popular portrayals, it was, however, used primarily to aid in parrying (and its guard made it unsuitable for throwing), not to attack... and it fell out of favor for exactly the issues of balance and stance impracticality that critics of Dual-Wielding bring up, as lighter, faster swords became more popular. They were actually quite commonly used as main weapons on ships due to their shorter length as were other similar short sword designs, until they were supplanted by reliable small firearms.
  • There are several European dual-wielding techniques. There is the aforementioned Florentine style, there's a German dagger style that uses a pair of cleaver-like weapons, the use of a variety of daggers (not just the main-gauche) in fencing from the decline of shields down to the smallsword (it truly became useless with the foil, as the foil was too small and light to effectively parry with a dagger. Most modern knives are heavier than a foil would be anyway), and whole schools of combat around sword and buckler (or sword and cape) that utilize the normally defensive weapon as an offensive weapon in specific cases. Dual-wielding is the entire basis for fencing in "double-time", which is defending and attacking simultaneously (rather than in "single-time", where only one action is taken in any exchange; an attack or a defense.)
    • Some schools of swordsmanship taught double-time fencing with a single short sword. The key was a combination of range, footwork, and timing, to deliver a counter that interrupted the blades attack, and land one's own blade on some flesh. The counters to these counter attacks used binding principles, and then things get complicated, fast. Single time fencing seems to be a relatively modern invention, popularized by the right-of-way rules of the foil, Flynning, the lack of material for sword-and-shield techniques, and a variety of reasons when it comes to Dagohir, LARP groups, and the like. (Note: Nothing wrong with these, just pointing out historical distinctions.)
  • In terms of using two actual swords at once, there is an master named Di Grassi who wrote on the subject, using rapiers. His conclusions were the following: Teach only to the most experienced, who have to be practically ambidextrous. Don't use in war or against armored opponents. In general, defend with one and strike with the other. It's often argued that he only put this in as a curiosity for the rich, but YMMV.
• Filipino eskrima (also known as arnis, kali, or escrima) systems teach users how to fight with two sticks first and then work their way down to empty hands, unlike most martial arts that teach empty hands first and then work their way up to weapons. Eskrima users don't just use sticks either. Many eskrima systems teach the users how to use stick and dagger, whip and dagger, twin knives, and many other weapon combinations.
  • Also the off hand weapon is not used solely for parrying. A lot of the training in eskrima is meant to develop the off hand to be as efficient in both attack and defense as the dominant hand. This is justified by the fact that unlike European fencing with sword and dagger, which was developed to use a long bladed weapon as the main form of attack, eskrima was developed to use short swords as the main weapon. The smaller length of both blades, offsets many of the disadvantages of dual wielding long swords, while also forcing the wielder to use both blades in attack and defense, to offset the main disadvantage of fighting against a longer bladed opponent, namely, the shorter reach.
• Thailand's Krabri Krabong has a form called Daab Song Mue that uses two swords. It appeared briefly in The Man with the Golden Gun.
• Ancient China had plenty of paired weapons.
  • Perhaps most famous, Butterfly Swords.
  • Also including the "Shaolin Pens" (a pair of needle-like weapons, usually attached to rings worn on the middle finger of both hands), fans (also used singular), dao (also used singular), axes (also used singular), maces (also used singular), and on rare occasions (mainly demos by Northern Shao Lin) dual spears, staves, or chains.
  • The most versatile and deadly dual wielded Chinese weapons were the twin hook swords and the chicken sickles. While they're often thought of as Awesome but Impractical, they have several advantages that many European and Chinese weapons have. The hooked ends are used to hook and trap the opponent's weapon, and effectively counter shields and slashing weapons such as dao, the tail ends are used as daggers, the crescent knuckle guards predate most European knuckle guards and are sharpened, meaning you could slash with them as well. And of course the rest of the weapons are used like a normal swords or sickles to great effect. The hooks can be used to link the two weapons and then swung, making them a mid-range soft weapon (soft meaning flexible in this case, such as a rope dart or meteor hammer). Though the last application, like most soft weapon styles, is extremely dangerous to the wielder, who is more likely to cut themselves than their opponent, and shouldn't be used without extensive training.
• The Sikh martial art, Gatka, teaches the dual wielding of staffs for the purpose of fending off large crowds.
• Knives are quite easy to dual-wield compared to larger weapons.
• A modern branch of Japanese swordsmanship called Shinkendo apparently has techniques for dual-wielding katana, reserved for advanced students only.
• While not usually combat, all ice-climbers and mountaineers become extremely proficient at dual-wielding ice-axes, in other words a pair of 50–60 cm long pickaxes with hammers or adze-blades on the other side.
  • While wearing up to 12 3 cm long spikes ^{[dead link]} on each foot...
• If electric guitars were weapons, then Zack Kim will be one of its masters.
• Kobujutsu includes dual sai, dual jitte, and sai/jitte styles. This makes quite a bit of sense, since an important quality of these weapons is to be able to trap swords in their tines. Once you've trapped the sword, you stab or bludgeon the enemy with the other weapon.
• The Dimachaeri, a type of Roman gladiator that wielded two knives or gladius. Given they, like all gladiators, were entertainers, this trope Rule of Cool stats can be inferred to date back to at least ~200-300 AD.
• In Haedong Kumdo (a Korean sword art) once you master the thirteen "ssangsu kumbup" with one sword, you have to learn them with two. Done properly, and with well-polished swords, the effect is epic.