⚔️ Balrond Dual Mastery - Mod Documentation

Overview

Balrond Dual Mastery introduces a new combat mechanic to Valheim that allows players to dual wield two one‑handed weapons simultaneously while progressing through a dedicated Dual Wield skill.

Inspired by the Smoothbrain's DualWield mod and Rusty's Dual Wielder mod, this implementation focuses on separate weapon calculations, skill-based scaling, and a custom attack animation system designed specifically for dual wield gameplay.

Players can equip two one‑handed weapons and perform attacks using a special dual wield animation that combines both weapons into a single combat flow that speed,rang and angle depends on weapons used.

As players gain experience with the Dual Wield skill, the effectiveness of the off‑hand weapon gradually improves.

⚠️ This mod must be installed on both the server and all clients for multiplayer environments.

✨ Key Features

• ⚔️ Dual wield two one‑handed weapons
• 🧠 New Dual Wield skill that improves off‑hand weapon damage
• 🎬 Custom dual wield attack animation
• ⚖️ Independent damage calculation for each weapon
• 🔋 Secondary attack with increased stamina cost
• 🗡 Off‑hand penalty that improves as the skill levels up
• 🌐 Translation support
• 🔧 No configuration required

⚠️ This mod is not compatible with other dual wield mods.

⚔️ Dual Wield Skill

The mod introduces a new skill called:

DualWield

This skill determines how effective the off‑hand weapon becomes during combat.

Off‑Hand Damage Scaling

When dual wielding, the left‑hand weapon receives a damage penalty.

• At Skill 0 → Off‑hand damage = 50%
• At Skill 100 → Off‑hand damage = 75%

The scaling increases gradually as the skill improves.

This system ensures that dual wielding starts weaker but becomes more effective with practice.

⚔️ Combat Behavior

Primary Attack

• Uses a custom dual wield animation
• Both weapons attack in sequence
• Damage from each weapon is calculated independently
• Off‑hand weapon damage is reduced based on the skill modifier

Secondary Attack

The secondary attack changes behavior when dual wielding.

• ❌ Weapons lose their original special attack
• ⚡ Secondary attack is same as primary but removes the off‑hand penalty
• 🔋 Higher stamina cost is applied

This creates a risk vs reward mechanic where players can spend additional stamina to deal full dual weapon damage.

🗡 Weapon Rules

• Players can equip two one‑handed weapons
• Both weapons will participate in the attack animation
• Off‑hand weapon damage is reduced by default

Spear Exception

Spears behave differently when used with dual wielding.

• If a spear is equipped with another one‑handed weapon:
  • The spear becomes the dominant weapon
  • Combat behaves like vanilla spear usage
  • After throwing the spear, the off‑hand weapon automatically moves to the main hand

This prevents conflicts with Valheim's spear mechanics.

⚠️ Compatibility Notes

• ✔ Works in singleplayer
• ✔ Works in multiplayer
• ✔ Requires installation on server and clients
• ✔ Compatible with translation systems

Not compatible with:

• ❌ Other dual wield mods

Running multiple dual wield systems at the same time will cause conflicts.

📂 Installation

Install using your preferred mod manager or manually place the files into:

BepInEx/plugins

If the mod includes translations:

BepInEx/config

Restart the game after installation.

💬 Support & Feedback

Join the community:

Balrond's Den Discord
https://discord.gg/Jfp8T5N7Pv

Support development:

https://ko-fi.com/balrond1020

Balrond Dual Mastery — Changelog

v0.3.14

• compatibility fix for SkillsReworked
• hotfixes

v0.3.11

• console spam fix

v0.3.10

• skill save fix
• initial attack lagspike save

v0.3.8

• animation swap and hotfixes

v0.3.7

• tooltip fix

v0.3.6

Equipment / input

• Added configurable local Pair Swap Grace Period.
• Default grace window is 1.0 s, configurable from 0 to 3 s.
• While already dual wielding, two quick weapon selections can replace the complete pair in click order.
• Added configurable local Replace Offhand Modifier.
• Default modifier is LeftAlt.
• Modifier + supported one-handed weapon replaces only the left-hand item.
• Modifier + shield or torch replaces only the left-hand item.
• Modifier + bow/crossbow/2H/tool/incompatible item falls back to normal Valheim equip behaviour and ends the pair.
• Pair-swap grace and off-hand modifier are local settings and are not ServerSync-locked.

Animation

• Added runtime handling for authored SPEED AnimationEvents in Dual Mastery clips.
• SPEED can use float, string, or integer event parameters.
• Multiple SPEED events in one clip are supported.
• Primary/Secondary Animation Speed config values now act as additional tuning multipliers on top of authored clip speed.
• OdinHorse mounted cadence and Windstride bow cadence retain ownership when active.

Targeting

• Primary paired attacks now use cursor/crosshair-facing logic.
• Cursor-facing is refreshed immediately before the attack trigger to reduce misses caused by character-facing direction.
• Existing mounted OdinHorse ownership exclusions remain in place.

Documentation / resources

• Clarified that the balronddualmastery AssetBundle and dualwield.png skill icon are required mod resources and must not be removed from the project/build pipeline.

v0.3.5

OdinHorse 1.8.x compatibility

• Updated OdinHorse compatibility for the 1.8.x branch.
• Added capability handling for the new mounted lance/jousting functionality.
• OdinHorse lance states are reserved for OdinHorse and are not treated as Dual Mastery pair weapons.
• Compatibility discovery now prefers the actual OdinHorse.MountedAttacks surface instead of relying on overly broad reflection matching.
• Preserved soft/version-agnostic compatibility where possible.
• Adjusted initialization ordering around OdinHorse/BetterArchery/Windstride animation ownership.

v0.3.4

Equip transition stability

• Unified transitions from a valid pair to non-pair equipment.
• Pair -> bow, crossbow, 2H, tool, Hammer, staff, shield, and similar transitions no longer intentionally replace the runtime AnimatorController merely because pair intent ended.
• Dual Mastery melee overrides are restored in-place so vanilla EquipItem/equip_hip can complete on a stable controller.
• Corrected the regression that could enter the sitting animation when switching from dual wield to a bow.

Death / tombstone handling

• Made Humanoid.UnequipAllItems an atomic operation for Dual Mastery normalization.
• Prevented the left-hand weapon from being promoted back to the right hand while vanilla death processing is moving equipment.
• Kept vanilla Player.CreateTombStone and world modifiers authoritative.
• Added stale off-hand/orphan reference cleanup after inventory ownership changes.

Diagnostics

• Guard/idle clips are no longer incorrectly required to contain a Hit event.
• Attack clips can copy normalized Hit timing from another valid captured attack source if the exact source clip has no usable event.

v0.3.3

Bow animation ownership

• Added stronger WindstridesBowAnimations ownership handling.
• Prevented Dual Mastery from continuously rebasing/restoring controllers during active bow posing.
• Added bow ownership grace to avoid one-frame ownership thrashing during draw/release.
• Prevented Dual Mastery Animator-speed control while Windstride owns bow cadence.
• Preserved OdinHorse as the highest-priority mounted animation owner.

v0.3.2

Animation transition fix

• Fixed a regression where ending pair intent could swap the runtime AnimatorController in the middle of an equip transition.
• Restored the stable model of keeping the same controller instance while only enabling/disabling Dual Mastery melee overrides in-place.
• Corrected pair -> Hammer/tool transitions that could fall into the sitting state.

v0.3.1

Compatibility merge

• Merged the stable runtime ownership model with the newer version-agnostic compatibility branch.
• Preserved BetterArchery live-controller sharing.
• Preserved Windstride bow ownership.
• Preserved OdinHorse exclusive mounted ownership.
• Preserved Harmony ordering required by the animation compatibility layer.
• Added/retained ConfigurationManager metadata and BepInEx acceptable ranges.
• Added SkillsReworked attribute-level ownership support.
• Added Skill ID collision protection for Dual Mastery skill 874298.

v0.3.0

Version-agnostic compatibility groundwork

• Added capability-oriented discovery for external compatibility mods.
• Added earlier Dual Mastery skill registration support for SkillsReworked cache initialization.
• Expanded compatibility work for BetterArchery, Windstride, OdinHorse, and SkillsReworked.

v0.2.11

• Improved BetterArchery, Windstride, OdinHorse, and SkillsReworked arbitration.
• Added stronger ConfigurationManager metadata/range support.
• Added additional AnimatorOverrideController nesting safeguards.
• Confirmed DualMastery can operate with SkillsReworked without BalrondExtraSkills.

v0.2.10

• Added SkillsReworked compatibility for Dual Mastery skill 874298.
• Added accepted skill aliases including DualMastery, Dual Wield, and 874298.
• Kept native Dual Mastery progression when SkillsReworked is absent.

v0.2.9

• Introduced central external animation ownership/arbitration.
• Improved BetterArchery live-controller handling.
• Added OdinHorse and Windstride compatibility groundwork.

v0.2.8

• Fixed skill gain issue.
• Fixed targeting / missed-hit issue.
• Fixed special attack trigger issue.
• Added damage scale configuration.
• Adjusted damage scaling.
• Fixed animation transition issue.

v0.2.7

• Added BetterArchery integration.
• Fixed sitting animation issue.
• Fixed leftover left-hand activation when the pair is no longer valid.

v0.2.6

• Fixed multiplayer animation synchronization.

v0.2.5

• Animation adjustments.

v0.2.4

• Mod rebuild.

v0.2.3

• Deep North fix.

v0.2.2

• Fixed spear usage.
• Fixed animation handling.
• Adjusted damage.

v0.2.1

• Fixed skill gain issue.

v0.2.0

• Initial release.