Oy...
This thread is still going on?
All 2her elitism aside, and 1her waaaah: Are 2h/polearms significantly faster than 1h weapons? No
They're faster than 1h+shields. The problem lies in the shield speeds. The fact that using a shield somehow gimps your melee effectiveness is crazy to be perfectly honest, it's counter intuitive. Leave 2her/polearm speeds alone. Leave 1her speeds alone. Fix shield speeds. Hell, make us have to manual block with them, that's fine. Most of us decent shielders can manual block just fine anyways and duel 1her no shield. Personally I like playing 1h+shield because I think it looks cool, and makes far more sense on a battlefield*. When I think of warriors at battle I think of guys with some kind of 1h'd weapon and a shield on the other arm, which btw is used more as an offensive tool than something they cower behind.
It's just a style preference.
*I'd like to avoid realism arguments and just talk about gameplay because if we bring in realism 2hers have no place on the battlefield really other than hollywood highlander/anime bullshit.*