Can I use the same weapon for a normal attack and Two-Weapon Fighting in the same turn?

Question

Two-weapon fighting rules, per the Player's Handbook (page 195):

When you take the Attack action and attack with a light melee weapon that you're holding in one hand, you can use a bonus action to attack with a different light melee weapon that you're holding in the other hand. You don't add your ability modifier to the damage of the bonus attack, unless that modifier is negative.

Per my earlier question, I am allowed to use different weapons for an Attack action if I have the Extra Attack class feature. Let's assume I did just that, attacking once each with a hand-axe and once with a shortsword. Am I allowed to afterwards perform a Two Weapon Fighting bonus attack with one of these weapons?

Answer 1

Yes

The bonus action has three criteria for triggering:

• You take the Attack action
• You make an attack with a light one-handed melee weapon
• You are wielding or can draw a light one-handed melee weapon with the other hand

If you have multiple attacks in a single Attack action because of Extra Attack, you only need to consider one of the individual attacks you make when triggering the two-weapon-fighting bonus action, not the entire Attack action and all attacks you made as part of it.

So if you are fighting with a shortsword and a handaxe, and you make one attack with each as part of your Attack action:

• You took the Attack action and made an attack with your shortsword, so you can use a two-weapon-fighting bonus action to make an attack with the handaxe
• You took the Attack action and made an attack with your handaxe, so you can use a two-weapon-fighting bonus action to make an attack with the shortsword

Of course, you still only get one bonus action per turn - so TWF only ever gets you one bonus attack, even if you have a choice of multiple weapons you could use it with.