Simplifying all the rules, feats and abilities for dual wielding.
As with many other things, dual wielding has undergone something of an overhaul in D&D 2024. Not only have the rules changed slightly, but where they can be found has changed, and there are new and tweaked feats and properties that alter how duel wielding works. These feats and properties are all inter-related to make a complex web of rules to master if you want to become a dual wielding maverick like Drizzt.
I’ve had to dig into a fair bit of detail to wrap my head around it all and know others have struggled too. So I’ve put together this guide that brings all the information into one place, makes it easier to understand, and will allow you to optimise your character around two weapon fighting if you want.
What’s so complicated about dual wielding?
There are 2 main issues. The first is that there’s no separate entry for how dual wielding works in the 2024 Player’s Handbook. It’s squirrelled away in the details on the light property.
The other issue is that to make dual wielding truly worthwhile (over say using a two handed weapon), you need to beef it up with feats and other abilities. And there are multiples of these and they stack in effects. There’s also some very careful wording to avoid abuse cases, but also, that allows two weapon fighting to be much better than it was in the previous rules.
All of this makes it a little complex to understand, but I’ve delved through the Player’s Handbook to source all the information you need in one place.
How dual wielding works
Lets start with how dual wielding works at its most basic level. You’ll find the rules for it under the light weapon property. This is because you rely on using light weapons to engage in dual wielding. The Player’s Handbook says:
“When you take the attack action on your turn and attack with a light weapon, you can make one attack as a bonus action later on the same turn. That extra attack must be made with a different light weapon, and you don’t add your ability modifier to the extra attack’s damage unless that modifier is negative.”
Player’s Handbook 2024 p213
So the basics are that any character can use dual wielding as long as they’re wielding 2 light weapons. This allows them to make an attack with their bonus action with the other weapon but can’t add their ability score to the damage (but note that you can add it to the attack roll). That is unless it’s negative which should be rare.
So far, fairly straightforward, but let’s complicate things a bit by adding weapon masteries and feats into the mix.
Nick weapon mastery
If you don’t know what weapon masteries are, you can check out my weapon masteries guide. But essentially, they’re abilities associated with different weapons that martial classes can use to enhance their attacks.
The nick weapon mastery interacts with dual wielding as it does the following:
“When you take the extra attack of the light property, you can make it as part of the attack action instead of as a bonus action. You can make this extra attack only once per turn.”
Player’s Handbook 2024 p214
So that’s pretty good and new to D&D 2024. Now you can make two weapon fighting extra attacks as part of the attack action. It no longer needs to consume your bonus action
This gives you the flexibility to be a rogue for instance (who has a lot of demands on their bonus action). Use two weapon fighting to make 2 attacks (to ensure you land that precious sneak attack) and still have your bonus action free to hide or disengage with your cunning action. Not bad!
Two weapon fighting style
But what if you want the bonus damage from your ability modifier on the attacks you make with your 2nd weapon attack. There’s a fighting style for this called two weapon fighting which is available to fighters, paladins and rangers at level 1 or 2. It says:
“When you make an extra attack as a result of using a weapon that has the light property, you can add your ability modifier to the damage of that attack if you aren’t already adding it to the damage.”
Player’s Handbook 2024 p210
If you have a decent strength/dexterity, this should equate to an extra 3-5 damage per turn (depending on your ability score, but as a martial class, it should be a priority). This is fairly equivalent to the +2 damage per attack for the dueling fighting style, as long as you’re operating with 2 or less attacks per turn (it’s a little inferior for high level fighters with lots of extra attacks though).
Dual wielder general feat
Once you hit level 4, you can also take a general feat called dual wielder which adds a few more benefits to dual wielding. The feat says:
“Enhanced dual wielding. When you take the attack action on your turn and attack with a weapon that has the light property, you can make one extra attack as a bonus action later on the same turn with a different weapon, which must be a melee weapon that lacks the two-handed property. You don’t add your ability modifier to the extra attack’s damage unless that modifier is negative.”
Player’s Handbook 2024 p203
There’s a few things in here. First off, you get to make a bonus action attack with a second weapon. You might point out that you already get that when dual wielding, which is true, but this ability is intended to work alongside the nick property which turns your normal extra attack from a light weapon into part of your action. With dual wielder, you now get another attack from dual wielding if using a weapon with the nick property.
on top of this, you can make this attack with any melee weapon as long as it doesn’t have the two-handed property, so longswords and battleaxes are in for dual wielders.
You can also make an extra draw/stow of a weapon which can allow you to throw more weapons, for instance.
How do all these feats and properties combine?
Now this is where things start to get complicated! To help, I’ve broken down below what you get with different combinations of feats and abilities when dual wielding:
- Nick + two weapon fighting: 2 light weapons – 1 extra light weapon attack as part of the attack action with ability modifier to damage.
- Nick + dual wielder: 2 light weapons* – 1 extra weapon attack as part of the attack action and 1 extra attack as a bonus action, both made with no ability modifier to damage.
- Two weapon fighting + dual wielder: 1 light weapon and 1 other melee weapon that doesn’t have the two-handed property – 1 extra attack as a bonus action with ability modifier to damage.
- Nick + two-weapon fighting + dual wielder: 2 light weapons* – 1 extra weapon attack as part of the attack action and 1 extra attack as a bonus action, both made with ability modifier to damage.
*In the above, I’ve not complicated things with drawing and stowing other weapons to throw into the mix, but dual wielder lets you make 2 draws/stows of weapons as part of the attack action. This allows you to theoretically use a non-light weapon for your bonus attack action when using nick and dual wielder, but this does get complicated! Basically, the above is what you can do without constantly drawing and stowing.
How has dual wielding changed from D&D 2014?
At its most basic level, dual wielding remains the same, allowing you to make a bonus action attack when wielding 2 light weapons, but losing your ability score modifier from the damage of that extra attack.
But, with the introduction of new weapon mastery properties and some feat changes, things have definitely changed and been enhanced.
- Nick – Weapon masteries don’t exist in the 2014 Player’s Handbook so dual wielding always meant making an attack with your bonus action leaving dual wielders with a bit of a balancing act for action economy. Nick gives you a way to preserve your bonus action.
- Dual wielder – You no longer get +1 AC when dual wielding, instead, you get an option of another extra attack that can stack with the nick property to give you 2 extra attacks from dual wielding.
- Two weapon fighting – Nothing other than slight wording changes to grant the benefits to attacks made using the nick property.
Between the options of another extra attack and freeing up your bonus action, dual wielding has definitely improved in D&D 2024! What do you think? Let me know in the comments below.
Spotlight on D&D 2024
All the latest updates on what’s changing with the 2024 rules revision.
Please show how this combines with Sneak Attack for Rogue and Hunters Mark for Ranger
Not a problem. Rogues are really reliant on landing their sneak attack to do any kind of decent damage. With a single weapon, you make one attack per turn (which you might miss). By dual wielding, you can have 2-3 attacks per turn depending on your build. This ups the odds of landing your sneak attack so could be a valuable tactic.
For rangers, hunter’s mark adds damage to each hit you make. If you’re a level 5 ranger with a single weapon, you make 2 attacks per turn which is a potential extra 2d6 damage from hunter’s mark per turn. If you use nick mastery and the dual wielder feat, you can now have 4 attacks per turn for a potential extra 4d6 damage per turn from hunter’s mark.
Think both these classes are good candidates for dual wielding.
very nice…how does this stack with the fighter in that they get extra attacks w/ levels? If a fighter has 2 attacks does that mean the gets his duel attack on each of those attacks (say the fighter has two attacks per turn-if he had duel, would it be 4-6 depending on duel?) or because its by turn he has to wait until his next turn?
It doesn’t matter how many extra attacks a class has, your offhand attacks are tied to your bonus action or, if using the nick weapon mastery property, are made as part of the attack action (but not for each extra attack).
In your example, if a fighter has 2 attacks through the extra attack feature, they can still only use their bonus action once for the offhand attack. Or, if they have the nick weapon mastery property and the dual wielder feat, make their offhand attack using the nick property as part of the attack action and another offhand attack using their bonus action from the dual wielder feat. This means 3 or 4 attacks.
The thing to be aware of is the attack action encompasses all your attacks from the extra attack feature (it’s not 2 attacks actions, but one attack action where you get to make 2 attacks).
Hope that helps!
The funny (broken) thing in 2024 dual wielding is that you can make all the attacks with the same hand. You could hold a torch in your left hand and make an attack with your right hand, sheath/draw another weapon, and attack again with your right hand. lol