Well, like 2 or 3 months ago I thought removing shield forcefield was a good idea.
But the problem was, I never played shielder for longer time, it was class I never really tried, I just checked it, that's all.
Right now, when I started to play shielder with my alt, I changed my opinion about shielders, and there is good reason for that.
You can't take shielder as single class and "balance" it just like that. You have to remember it's one of melee classes. On the other side is of course 2h/pole.
So let's compare 2h to shielder:
Weapon length: 2h is better here
Weapon speed: 2h (without shield in hand 1h is faster, but with shield it's completely different story)
Blocking reaction time, attacking after block: 2h
Blocking easiness: shielder (don't need to choose direction of a block, but still need to watch out for side hits through shield)
Speed of movement: 2h (shielder need to carry additional weight)
Weapon damage: 2h
Blocking multiple opponents same time: shielder
Blocking arrows/bolts: shielder (with 5 shield skill, I still can get hit by ranged, so forcefield isn't unbeatable)
Avoiding arrows/bolts: 2h
In all crutial things, in my opinion 2h is much better than shielder. Shielder has just few advantages, and one of them is possible because of forcefield. If you remove it, it will be easier for ranged to kill shielder than 2h! Why? Because shielder can't avoid arrows/bolts effectively. It's basically standing target, covered only by his shield. If you remove forcefield, every ranged will just aim shielders legs or head, which isn't that hard. It's even possible now, but much harder thanks to forcefield.
I really like my alt shielder, but I think it has plenty of disadvantages comparing to 2h, especially since devs nerfed melee thrusts/overhead attacks. I think it nerfed shielders hardest of all, thrust is now almost useless (too risky), overhead is risky as well, left swing is short, right swing is slow. You don't have many options here as shielder.
I don't think shielder is weak class, not at all. I also don't say shielder is hard to play class. I just think 2h is so much better class in crpg, too good in fact. Nerfing shielders in any way would be like death penalty for this class. Even now it don't have many advantages over 2h, taking some of them would be just stupidity.