After several threads appearing at Airsoft Forum about Dual Pistol shooting, I decided to write this little article with my theories and experience with this often controversial subject. I first tried doing the Dual Pistols thing in the Summer of 04, after reading THIS article at Arnie's Airsoft. When I first tried it, it was out of necessity, because I was having trouble with my new AUG. I used my Western Arms Xcelerator 5 inch Ltd. and my teammates Glock 19. I did so well, that I made it my goal to get myself a 2nd 5" Xcelerator and go Dual Pistols whenever I can. The following is my theories on the subject, some I learned in practice and some I have yet to try out myself.

There are several skills you must master as an EFFECTIVE dual pistoleer playing amongst skilled AEG users. Some of these relate to the actual act of Dual Pistol shooting, but many deal with having the proper equipment and state of mind.

If your going to be in CQB, you can get away with just about any barrel length. A pair of KSC/KWA Glock 19s, Glock 17s or etc... will work great. In the ranges involved with CQB engagements, longer barrel pistols are not required. Also in the closer ranges of CQB, you should use .25 gram bbs rather than .20 gram bbs. The trade off for better bb flight stability in lieu of longer range, is going to help you a lot. You do NOT want to use something with full auto capability (18C, 26C etc.) as you will go through your ammunition to fast. When using Dual Pistols as your main weapon, its more about quality rather than quantity of your shots. This goes for all environments, not just CQB.

For urban and woodland medium-long range, you NEED to have at least a pair of 5 inch pistols. 6 inch is better. The longer barrels are important to your ability to get straight shots at longer ranges. In my opinionthe best choices for this role are going to be the Western Arms Prokiller or SVI series of 1911 framed pistols. They are very accurate and come with the 30 round mags. Their excellent cycle time will also aid in higher ROF. The Western Arms magazine loading tool is also one of the best I have seen. If you can't afford WA's, just make sure you get a set of good quality 5 inchers.

Magazines: If your going to be a real DEDICATED Dual Pistoleer, you NEED to have at least 6 magazines, or 3 for each pistol. Alternatively, you can get 2 normal mags and 2 high capacity mags. For the before mentioned WA series guns, standard mags hold 30 rounds, and high caps hold 50 rounds. What you have to ask yourself though, is whether or not you can hold 2 heavy pistols with heavy extended mags, at arms length for a long period of time. This last year I did my best having only 3 mags, and it was very difficult. At the longer of the games I was in, I was forced to holster one pistol after expending my initial magazines and bring bbs and gas out into the field with me, and try to reload mags...trust me that sucks. There is a new product out that will make in field gas mag reloading easier. That item is the GB Tech TD Distraction Device, which is a fake grenade that houses a refillable gas canister, with which you can fill your pistol mags.

You also will need a good vest that can hold at least one of your pistols and all your mags. I recommend the Blackhawk Industries Omega Tactical Vest or the Blackhawk Omega Crossdraw Pistol Mag Vest. With the standard Omega vest, you can actually carry both pistols, as they can be held in the full size mag pouches. I usually put one in the far left pouch under my arm, and one in the first right pouch as a cross draw. Then I put my pistol mags in the remaining pouches, you can fit 2 in one pouch. So for the total of six pouches you have:

Far Left: 5 inch SVI Xcelerator
Middle Left: Dummy grenade gas refill canister.
Front Left: Two 30 round mags
Front Right: 5 inch SVI Xcelerator
Middle Right: Two 30 round Mags
Far Right: BB Bottle and Reload tool.

This gives me a total of 180 rounds loaded, with the possibility of reloads in the field. To be honest, I don't yet have all my mags, I am considering getting 2 of the 50 round WA high cap mags, which would give me a possible of 220 rounds loaded. I would then use the high caps as a last resort, as 5 inch pistols with high caps would be very heavy to carry around one handed.

To sum up, this is a list of all the items I recommend you have to be a properly outfitted Dual Pistoleer:

* Two identically sized pistols, for best results, two completely identical pistols.
* Six Magazines
* Tactical Vest
* GB tech TD Distraction Device
* BB bottle that fits in your mag pouch
* Reloading tool

When aiming at a single target with both pistols, you obviously can't use the sights. That doesn't mean you cant aim though. How do you aim you ask? Simple, point both pistols at your target, put your target directly in the center of the pistols, and shoot. Bear in mind that this method only works well in close to close medium range. (Less than 70 feet). I'm not saying that it wont work at longer ranges, but it doesn't work well. The key thing you have to realize is, that the bbs fired from both guns wont be traveling in the same direction. Due to the mechanics of the human body, It is very difficult for a person to hold 2 pistols perfectly parallel. Because of this, the trajectory of your bbs create 2 triangles, one pointing away from you, and one pointing towards you. The key thing here, is that if your target is far enough away for it to be beyond the triangle pointing away from you, you have to make sure they do not pass down the sides of the target. This is where knowing your target's range is important. See the diagram below to explain this:

If you think that your target is out of optimal range, then you need to use the pistol in your primary hand, and take an aimed shot using the sights. For this reason, it is very important that you practice one handed shots while target practicing. You wont always be able to use both pistols at the same time, and putting one pistol away, so you can shoot 2 handed for these longer range shots, is not practical.

Shooting around cover with both pistols is also a skill you must practice. You don't don't want to expose over half of your body to take your shots, so you have to lean over far enough that you can point both pistols around the cover, almost so that one pistol is directly above the other. Now when shooting like this, it is VERY important that your hop up is adjusted properly. An overly adjusted hop up, will make the bbs fly way out to the side. This happens because gravity is no longer working to pull the bbs down away from the direction of the hop up.

The other option of course is to simply use only one pistol, the one in the hand on the side you are shooting from. Just remember that this will offset the balance of ammo in the pistols, meaning that one will run out of ammo sooner, causing you to prematurely reload one of them. You can avoid this by, when convenient, taking the same number of single pistol shots, with the other hand.

Split Hemisphere Targeting (SHT) is most often used while attempting to cover two different points of entry or Points Of Contact (POC). It sometimes may be used during a brave yet foolhardy rush into the fray, but this usually does not work that well. If it does work, its very fantastic looking and usually wins you hurrahs and congratulations from both your teammates and your enemy, but as I said, that is rare. So, in this section, I will focus on the use of SHT as a tool for covering dual or multiple POC’s.

I will start with a story of the first time I ever successfully used this technique in the field. Then I will provide an analysis of that event, to help explain what I did right, and what I learned I did wrong.

The Story: It was the first game I had attempted a dual pistol loadout. I had a 5” WA Xcelerator in my right hand and a KWA Glock 19 in my left. I was playing at CPX in Joliet, IL on the field called “Mounds”. This field was approximately 2/3s the size of a football field and is filled with many 6-7 foot tall dirt mounds, each covered with field grass and/or weeds. The round had gone fairly well, even teams made the eliminations happen in close succession on each side. It had come down to 2 vs. 4, (from a 25 vs. 25 total) with the opposing team having the advantage. I was alone, and had just watched our third remaining teammate get eliminated to my left, with the shot coming from the other side of the mound I was currently behind. My last teammate was to my right about 4 mounds (or 15 yards) over. I knew that there was at least one enemy on the other side of the mound I was at, but didn’t know how far beyond the mound he was. Figuring the tango would advance after eliminating my teammate, I waited, holding one pistol towards the left of the mound, and one to the right, all the while trading off right and left guns to point towards the top of the mound, in case he breeched the top. Every 2-3 seconds, I switched my LOS from side to side to sight down each pistol, hoping that I would be looking the right way when the tango came around. I also kept very close attention to sounds from all sides, ready to fire at any sound I heard.

I waited…. After about what seemed like an eternity, I decide he must be holding up, or perhaps has changed position entirely. I decided to make a quick pop up over the top of the mound, to see what I could see. I brought my two pistols together in front of me in that classic dual fire mode, and then sprang up the hill to see….. 3 tangos! They were huddled around the base of another hill, covering all forward angles BUT the top of my mound. I squeezed the triggers of both my pistols about 3 times each, eliminating one of the three. I leapt back down to the back side of my mound and immediately resumed my SHT stance, waiting for one of the two remaining to come for me. Then, to my left, one tango came barreling around the mound, just as I had switched my targeting view to that side, and… pop pop pop! He went down. Now it was 1 vs. 2, our favor, but I couldn’t see my own teammate any more.

I remained in my SHT stance, waiting for the last Tango to make his move. I had just moved my left pistol up towards the top of the hill when the last Tango breeched it, I was so lucky I had changed my left side targeting to the top of the hill! I fired… 1 shot, just missed… second shot... SLIDE LOCKED! Crap… out of ammo! Before I could bring the right hand pistol around to bear, I was dead… and that last Tango went on to eliminate our last man.

OK, good story right? Now let’s tear it down and explain the good and the bad:

My first mistake was one I had no control over, one which I later remedied on future Dual Pistol games. That mistake was using two different sized pistols which had 2 different ammo capacities. That alone is a bad thing. The reason being, it requires that you keep track of one more thing during the game, which is that difference in ammo capacities while counting shots down from each pistol. It was that difference, which aided my failure in the above story. But it was not the only mistake I made. I will get back to that later though. Right now, let’s cover the targeting technique.

The split hemisphere is an even separation of the distance between your right hand pistol and your left hand pistol. It is NOT split down the center of your body. Lets use a clock face as an example. Let’s say that your head is at the center of the clock, and your right and left shoulders are at 3 and 9 o’clock respectively. You are covering a block of cover, or in the case of the story, a dirt mound. You have to worry about not only your right and left, but the top POC as well. This means covering 3 possible POC’s with 2 weapons and only one set of eyes. While covering left and right, your pistols are extended out to 2 and 10 o’clock. In this position, the split in your targeting hemispheres is at 12 o’clock. So while in this position, you must turn your head, just enough to the left and right of 12 o’clock, to see where your pistols are pointing. While in this stance, you are targeting on 2 hemispheres (left and right), AND acquiring on a separate front hemisphere (while crossing the 12 o’clock, you get a view of the top of the hill, but since no weapon is pointed there, you aren’t targeting.) You have to continually switch your view from left to right, it is usually luck that determines if you are looking the right way when a target presents itself but, with a keen sense of hearing, you can increase your chances. Now if the target presents itself, and you happen to be ready on the side it comes from, you pop off 3 rounds in that direction, no sights, just point and shoot. Pretend the pistol is the tip of your finger and squeeze the trigger. IF your first 3 shots with one pistol miss, and you have not yet been eliminated, it is a good idea to swing the second pistol around to target and go Dual Pistol alternating fire with the left and right. Now, if the target were to appear at the top of the hill rather than on your left or right, and you see it happen in time, you merely bring both pistols together at 12 o’clock and fire.

Now if you are fast enough, you can shift your LOF from left to right and back, to increase your chances of hitting a target coming from the top of the hill at 12 o’clock. This makes for a much more complicated system, but if you can do it, it makes covering such multiple angles more efficient. In this system your targeting field is halved, but your separate acquisition sphere is larger. With the above mound environment, you would have your left pistol pointed at 12 o’clock, and your right pointed at 2 o’clock. You look right, (Targeting for both 12 o’clock and 2 o’clock) then look to the left, (Acquiring 10 o’clock while still targeting for 12) then right again , while at the same time swing your left and right pistols over so that your left pistol is now pointing at 10 o’clock, and your right pistol is pointing at 12 o’clock.

Confused? So am I… Since that first time using the shifting LOF system, I have since avoided it whenever possible. But now that we have covered the SHT Targeting and Acquisition systems, I will get on the the mistakes I made. You already know about the equipment mistake, and the misjudging of ammunition mistake cause by having pistols with different ammo capacities. Now for the ultimate cause of my failure: I had already had the lower capacity magazine in my left hand, but what compounded my mistake, was my failure to switch up after using my left pistol to fire on my last target, knowing that the left pistol had less capacity, AND knowing that I had already used that pistol for more shots, earlier in the game, before my story started. I should have realized that my left pistol was most likely short on ammunition, holstered or dropped it, and switched to a single pistol configuration with my right hand pistol.

What isn’t covered in the above story is simultaneous fire with both pistols, at separate targets. When this happens, you are apt to, by instinct, fire one first, then the other, alternating. Unlike firing both pistols at one target, this act can get you shot. You will need to train yourself, in that situation, to squeeze both triggers at the same time, to ensure the separate targets are fired on at the same time, otherwise, the target that gets that 1 second delay… gets the advantage over you.

Dual Pistols is more than just shooting with 2 pistols at the same time, it’s a system… and you have to be smart enough, skilled enough, and practice enough, for that system to work well.

Reloading 2 pistols at once is a tricky thing, but with practice you can do it in a fairly short amount of time. The factors that will contribute to how easily you can do it are:

The size of your pistols
The Size of your hands
Your degree of manual dexterity
Where you keep your magazines

The following instructions, assume that you are in the heat of battle, and that both of your slides have locked back after running out of ammunition on both pistols. I wont worry about non emergeny reloads in this article.

1.) After your slides have locked back, immediately crouch down on one knee behind cover, if you are not crouching behind cover, it would be best if you went and found some. Call for reload cover fire if your team is able.

2.) Once you have crouched, lower your pistols close to the ground. (about 6-10 inches) With your best degree of manual dexterity, reach for both magazine releases (one with your first finger and one with your thumb) and drop both your magazines out of your pistol simultaneously (this works best if your pistols mag drop easily, if they dont, try lubricating the inside of your mag wells)

3.) Place the pistol in your weak hand next to the pistol in your dominant hand and hold both pistols in the dominant hand (one on top of the other) so that both mag wells point towards your body center (I usually rest my arm on my knee)

4.) With your weak hand, retrieve one magazine from it pouch. This works best if you have both magazines in one large pouch, so you dont have to open two pouches. Take one magazine and slide it into one of the pistols, then retrieve the second and slide that one into the other pistol. (If your REALLY good at it, you can try to grab both magazines out of one pouch at the same time, and slide BOTH magazines into both pistols at once.... I cant do that very well)

5.) After both fresh magazines are inserted, transfer the second pistol back to your weak hand, then again.. with your best manual dexterity, hit your slide release to close the slides.

At my best, I can accomplish this in about 8-10 seconds (From the time my slides lock back till I am reloaded and ready to fire again) I really have not been practicing enough though, and I am sure that I... and you.... can do better with enough practice.

Below is a demonstration video of Dual Pistol Reloads in Windows Media format.

Dual Pistol Reload Video 1.8 Mb, streaming or right click/save as