I'm playing a Monk (my favourite class), and due to fortunate placement of a herb patch and a few altars, I've managed to get pre-crowned at level 13 (would have been earlier, but the game generated 'Serpent's Bite' in the Puppy Cave vault) just prior to killing Keethrax. I got 'Protector', which seems very nice as far as shields go, but I'm wondering if I should even use a shield.
I primarily plan to use unarmed until I get a good artifact weapon (preferably polearm, as I'm hoping to go for an Ultra ending and thereby get the Trident of the Red Rooster), and Serpent's Bite doesn't seem good enough to warrant using it. But will using a shield adversely affect my damage output? I checked the manual and found out that the shield skill won't rise on the Berserker setting (which is how I spend 90% of the game, personally), so that's already giving me pause for thought.
I just wondered what everyone else's position on shields was - I typically see two-handed weapons in dumps, so I thought they were perhaps a little out of favour?