Dual wieldingFollow

I'm lvl 55 and got the dual wield ability pretty much as soon as I could get it. But I've never done it.

Is it better than a good mace and a good shield? Or a good 2H'er?

What weapons do you think I should DW? A coupla maces? Swords?

if you are dw, you are enhance. Go ahead and try it.

I didn't believe these guys here, and was wary of spending talent points when I could just continue using a two hander. But it makes a huge difference. I got one mace as a quest reward, I bought another, and gave it a try. I like it.

One question though, I don't want to hijack, just a quickie. Does laying totems interrupt your swings? With a 2 hander it was so slow, it didn't appear to. But dual weilding I'm not sure. Usually I like to lay totems first and pull with lb, but on casters that is not possible, and with mobs that sneak up on me.

Edited, Jul 30th 2007 5:43pm by thrashering

How DO you dual-wield?
Where do I get an "off-hand" weapon?

I normally solo PvE, and very rarely PvP/BG. After considerable testing. Dual wielding seems to offer a higher average damage, and drops mobs faster 'on average'
This is probably due to the more 'white damage crits' as am very heavy on Agility, with a lot of Hunter gear equipped.
I also sometimes use a 2Hander for the sheer fun of two shotting mobs with Windfury. However the damage on a 2hander can be erratic, killing one mob with two hits and the next with six.
Dual wield = Constant damage
2Hander = Fluctuating damage.
The choice, as they say, is yours.

The mace you probably tried to put in the off-hand slot would have been a main-hand weapon. You need to look under the name of the weapon for what slot it goes in.

Main-hand = Main hand ONLY
Off-hand = Off hand ONLY
One-hand = Main hand AND Off hand (Ie. Either or)

Example:

Bashguuder
Binds when picked up
One-Hand ...................Mace
49-93 Damage......Speed 1.80
(39.4 Damage per second)
+9 Strength
Chance On Hit: Punchers the targets armor reducing it by 200. Stacks 3 times.

I just picked this at random but it you can see how it shows One-Hand underneath where its BOP or BOE. This indicates that it can go in either hand. Just keep your eyes peeled or go buy something cheap (emphasis on cheap, around your level but don't buy some rank blue.) in the AH that will get you by till you find something better.

*Edit... Keep in mind that there is two definitions to "One-handed". There is the term one-handed when speaking in terms of a one-handed weapon and a two-handed weapon.

Then there is One-handed as in:

One-handed - One-handed
One-handed - Main-hand
One-handed - Off-hand

Just because it's a general 1H weapon doesn't mean that it can go in your OH slot. You have to look at the actual weapon stat to determine what it is and which hands it can go in.

Edited, Jul 31st 2007 11:00am by Sercease

yeah there's a little more to deciding which weapon goes where. most likely in your case you were trying to put a main hand weapon in your off hand.

easiest way remove weapon and shield. put a mace that says main hand or one hand in your main hand slot (left one). Put a mace that says one hand (I haven't seen any offhand weapons yet) in your off hand slot (right).

You pretty much want the higher damage weapon in your main hand. In my case though, my main hand weapon is deisgnated as main hand and does a little less damage than my one handed off hand weapon. I haven't found anything better yet. And don't want to spend the money on the ah, but I may have to. Good weapons are hard to find, and key to survivability. I generally don't buy armor at the ah, but I do buy weapons alot. Having top notch weapons (not necessarily blues, but high damage greens), I consider life saving.

Around that level I believe I was still using the Alterac Valley axe reward.

A quick question for the shamanistic masses..

I have taken dual wield but am waiting until I talent the +6% hit rating before trying it out at level 44.

I have 2 reasonable weapons
Heaven's Light MH http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?witem=13026
Wirt's 3rd Leg OH http://wow.allakhazam.com/db/item.html?witem=9359&locale=enUS;source=live

I have used the Heaven's Light with a shield and it does pretty well although my Illusionary rod hits harder so tend to favor that for the most part.

Due to the randomness of the 2H dmg I would like to DW but am still wondering if it is viable at this level due to the general lack of +hit gear compared to later on when you get the option of gems etc.

Another char of mine is a lvl49 DW fury warrior and he does seem to miss quite a bit , especially vs higher lvl mobs

Any advice is much appreciated !! :)

I used a 2H axe for a while before I finally switched to DW. Now I wish I'd switched sooner. When you count the extra stats you get when holding 2 weapons, and the buffs you can put on both of them, it's well worth it. Also, your DPS will most likely be higher if you have 2 good weapons.

Plus, missing with the 2 hander is teh suck. It's basically 6 seconds wasted with no melee dmg.

on casters it is possible

almost every shammy i ran into dont know about this very very very very very very very important thing: earth shock interrupts spell casting and silences the caster from casting a spell from that class (shadow, fire, ice...) for 2 secodns.

so when u are fighting a caster, LB, then (u must have show target's cast bar on) watch the mob's cast bar, when it has less than 1 second left, use earth shock. then the mob is forced to melee you and will come to u; also in most cases casters have low melee dmg so u have almost no down time when fighting a caster like that

the key is to use earthshock every time u can and when the mob is bout to finish casting