>Being a player character is a whole rigmarole. Unless they
>added one in the fourth or fifth editions, there is no "ordinary mook"
>character class in D&D; all adventurers, even first-level scrubs, are
>far better than the Common Folk at whatever they're doing. To that
>end, there are
>plenty of
>historical precedents
>involving melee weapons. They all require specialized training, but
>then, so does picking locks.

Well, sure, but there is a lot of difference between "better than ordinary folks" and "able to utilize a very rare and difficult combat method." And sure, there are two-sword methods, but they're, well, rare and difficult. Using a main-gauche is rather different than swinging two swords around, the dimachaerus trained long and hard and literally did nothing else, on the premise that dying in the arena would be bad, and Niten-Ichi is the single "formalized" form that I know of, ANYWHERE, that really does the two-sword thing. As best I know, there is nothing even remotely like it in any fecht-bucher.

>With guns, not so much, but for different reasons; with any ranged
>weapon, the typical human visual field only has one small field of
>foveal vision, and so can allow for only one point of aim. This is
>why fictional characters who can effectively dual-wield with
>simultaneous fire (as opposed to ambidexterous alternating fire)
>generally have some kind of shtick going on where they don't need to
>aim or even be able to see what they're shooting at (e.g., the gun
>kata in Equilibrium).

That being entirely my point, yes, about shooting.

In all honesty, unless you're essentially Japanese, who didn't do the whole shield-thing, as a personal bit of kit(there were Pavis-like ones, as I recall, but...) there is no reason what so ever to do two swords when a sword and a shield is much more efficient. Thus, "rule of cool" which, sure, it's a game, but all the same, it should require a bit more than "I bought two swords instead of one sword and a bow".

As noted, my opinion, worth what you pay for it, etcetera etcetera etcetera.

...!
Stoke Mandeville, Esq & The Victorian Ballsmiths
"Nobody Want Verdigris-Covered Balls!"