duel wielding warriors viable ? or does sacrificing shield hurt too much

i know lots of people go either one-handed weapon with shield OR two-handed weapon, so i suppose both work fine.  the real question may be whether dual-wielding is any better than two-handed weapons.

Is warrior and rogue the only two classes that can have dual wield?

warrior and hunter get dual wield at 20 but rogue gets it at 10

is dual wield really worth it for hunter..or the chance to miss is too high ?

if u dual wield, do u just add the dps's together? or how does it work

what is the difference in miss percentage between dual wielding, 2H, and 1+shield?

dual heartseakers blows away any 2h weapon

what effect does dual wielding have on the attack speed/damage per second?

Rogues can learn Dual Wield at Lv 10.
Hunters can learn Dual Wield at Lv 20.

Here's an interesting article:
http://wow.tentonhammer.com/index.php?name=PNphpBB2&file=viewtopic&t=535
This supposedly provides official Blizzard comments on Dual Wield.  I haven't confirmed this information, but it sounds right.

Basically, when Dual-Wielding, you miss more often, plus your off-hand weapon damage is reduced.  This basically evens the odds, so that OVERALL you are doing about the same DPS as a 2h weapon, or the same damage per HOUR as a 1h weapon plus a shield (due to reduced downtime).

HOWEVER, note that Rogues can devote talents to decrease these negative effects of the Dual Wield.  Specifically, starting at level 15, they can increase their hit percentage by 1% per rank (up to 5 ranks), and starting at level 25, they can increase their off-hand damage by 10% per rank (up to 5 ranks).  Muahaha...

I am level 27 Night Elf Hunter with Dual Wield. I bought two identical cutlasses, but can only equip one. Is there a reason for this? Do I have to have a certain skill level to dual swords?

If you DW does your chance to Parry attacks increase?

That's something I've also been trying to get some concrete info on but I haven't found any. I haven't noticed a change at all.

I'm thinking it may be possible that Parry is only performed with main hand and remains the same with or without a second weapon.

no 1 has  said were u can get it... where can a gnome rouge get it??

Where can a nightelf learn dual wield????????

Can anyone confim the fact that druids can dual wield? I've seen the comment about "someone seeing a dual-wielding druid",.. but is this true?

(I'm a druid myself)
And when I want to equip the 2nd weapon it says that I can't dual-wield "YET",... so I figured I might be able to sometime.
But I'm lvl 31 atm, do you think I'd get it at a higher level?
I'm a little puzzled here..

Druids can never duel wield, I have played a druid up to level 60 and never seen the skill avaiable from weapon or class trainers. Nowhere suggests at all that they can duel wield. and more than likely the rumour was created from a "Held in off-hand" items being mistaken for a secound weapon.

Held in off-hand items are simply, held in your off-hand. You cannot hit with them, but they give stats about equal to that of a normal 1-handed weapon.

I'm a level 20 Human Warrior and i just learned Dual Wield in SW, but i can't equip 2 swords even though both are 1 handed weapons.. i dunno y.. it still would only allow me to equip the main hand.. can never equip a sword in off hand.

Pros-
1.Adds 50% of the offhand weapon, which does not mean adds 50% total damage

2.You attack more often with your offhand, which means:
-higher rage generation for warrior
-higher poisoning chance for rogue
-longer target spellcaster's cast time while damaging

3.Your weapon skill improve faster, which makes up part of the accuracy lost

4.Off-hand weapon stats benefits more than other off-hand eqs

Cons-
Reduce melee chance to hit, which means alot to rogue and warrior. This is a myth since nby know what the percentage is.

Others-
1.You train it from your class trainer, not weapon trainer.

2.Because it's in special skill tree, you might not find it right away. Try to click "display - All" on your skill trainer window then search it.

Make sure that both weapons are not main hand weapons. 

50% + 50% of the original 50% is 75%...

Anyway - to answer some of the other ?'s...

Your horde warrior can learn dual wield from your class trainer.  You should get it at lvl 20. 

Why dual wield is better than 2H for soloing:

1.) OVERPOWER - Every time a mob dodges an attack, you can launch 'overpower'.  This is like getting a free attack that cannot be blocked and rarely misses.  The more frequently you attack, the more dodges you'll get - thus the more overpowers you can smack down. >o)

2.) CASTERS - as mentioned in a previous post.  Whenever you hit a caster, his/her casting timer bumps down a little.  Therefore the more often you hit them, the longer it will take them to get their spell off.  Caveat:  The RIGHT way to fight a caster your lvl or higher is with a shield and 1h weapon.  When they attempt to cast, shield bash.  This stops the cast and prevents them from casting any spells of the same school for 6s.  Particularily handy when fighting a class that heals frequently.

I duel wield Swords with my rouge, gave up some abilities but it was worth it when you look at the  damage difference, that and there are alot more better looking swords then daggers

One reason u miss so much is probably that u hav lyke 100 skill level on your daggers but like 23 on ur swords so u miss alot since u fight high lvl monsters i reccomend goin back 2 Stormwind if u human rogue or Auberdine if u night elf rogue n fight monsters there until ur sword skill level is nearly the same as ur daggers

Are there any armor sets avalible to low lvl hunters and wut is the lowest lvl requirement for a hunter armor set (im lvl 39)

ahhh i wish we cud duel wield guns or bows or sumtin lol wuz difference between crossbow n bow? and im a NE hunter (urrently) using guns shud i change back to bows or shud i use crossbows which i paid money to lern but nvr actually used it :( and my profession are leatherworking and skinning so i kant make newer guns n stuf so...shud i go back 2 bows or stay wit guns or shud i change 2 crossbows? AND my frigin pet is wierd previously i had a bear n it had a move called "claw" dat added lyke 20 damage to his attacks but when i released it (newbie move) n tamed a new one it duznt hav da move how kan i get it back or how kan i teach my new bear dis move(*sigh i wuz newb then n thought da thsitle bear wuz weaker than grizzled thistle bear so i released old one n tried 2 tame the "stronger" one)

You have been owned by English.  Thank you, come again.

can rogues use one handed swords and shields or is it only one handed wepons X2.

Rouges cannot use Shields or 2 handers.  So it would be pointless to only wield one weapon when you can increase both your stats and overall damage by 25% with the addition of another weapon.

i need to still get duel wield cause it looks cool

I'm one of those 'max out your skills in everything' type, and remember that there would be druid dual-claw weapons available.

I trained in all the available forms, and some vendors are now stocking such weapons - left hand and right hand.

Unsure whether Blizzard got around to this in a patch or not, but it makes sense.

BTW, I think Hunters not having access to thrown weapons is a HUGE mistake. The thought of the bandoliered hunters of the jungles is just supercool.