being able to hold 2 shields would be nice for mages/priests as well (Shroud's idea)

being able to hold 2 shields would be nice for mages/priests as well (Shroud's idea)

I'll note that two shields thing wasn't actually a suggestion. I simply said that if modifying equipment slots that's logical thing to look at implementing along with dual wield. I don't consider it my idea in any shape or form and it's not something that particularly interests me. To start with shields usually don't have really good stats and prots at high levels don't scale well so it's practical usage is already limited

I'm afraid Smacky is making it up as currently staffs that increase magic damage don't exist (however I'd like Smacky to be right!). In fact currently there are no items whatsoever that exist that increase magic damage. Only exception is attunements and they don't stack so it's a one off thing. I have mentioned things like having a spelldam+ stat, modifying attunements to make them stackable and making pow or int increase spell damage but that's all suggestions that haven't been implemented.

Personally way I imagined spells are cast are as follows
1. Speaking aloud incantations
2. Mental image/imagination
3. Magic power channelled through specific equipment(e.g. a rod or horn) or a magic crest (i.e. a set pathway engraved in body/soul to reproducibly produce specific magics)

I'll list what I consider to be main differences between prayers and spells
1. Energy from prayers comes from a god. Energy from spells comes from internal energy produced in body and from environment.
2. Process is different.
Prayer: Faith/Devotion is sent to god, god processes devotion and converts it to divine energy, miracle returned.
Spell: Energy is converted to another form using caster's knowledge.
3. Limitations are theoretically different. For example for a prayer as vessel for storing energy is god it is possible to exceed caster's limits to produce a miracle beyond what priest is capable of achieving. As energy transfer is done by god things beyond priest's knowledge are possible. If favoured by god you could get a favorable equivalent exchange.
4. A mage is entirely self reliant. However a priest could theoretically be abandoned by their god at any moment and then their power is useless as it's all borrowed power. If they lose contact with their god or go to a place that is unholy god's reach may not be able to get to them. A mage can store mana externally while a priest can only use god.
5. A god's miracles are limited to a god's aspect. A mage's spells are limited by their knowledge
6. A pact with devil or a demon would probably be a hybrid form of two. Summoning a familiar would also probably be between two

You could argue that all prayers should fail when a priest is holding anything as they need to join their hands together to pray for a miracle 

Having said all that I think I've gone spectacularly off topic and perhaps drifted into a monologue of sorts. Either way I consider that skills, stats and modifers are a lot more important than equipment that can be tweaked to suit balance. To be honest limitation on mages being able to use weapons is rather pointless since all the weapons usable are absolutely useless so weapon is equipped solely for the stat boosts they give and are never actually used

Actually I'd say magic activated by hand gestures alone is pretty rare. It's not unusual to see ninjas use hand gestures nor is it unusual to see priests use hand gestures, especially in buddhist chants but also even things like cross etc

As far as sword and shield wielding mages I'd say that characters that use shields at all are fairly rare on basis that normally characters focus on offence so shields aren't used outside of large scale battles. Having said that it's not at all uncommon for mages to wield swords as often swords complement

Looking at it logically if we used hand gestures then shouldn't we have animations for every spellcasting mob and playerdoll with hands moving. I guess you also have issue of are hand gestures possible while holding a staff?

It's maybe possible to have all three to some extent
1. Incantations - Very high power but very slow casting. Can maybe be interrupted like rest. Good for groups when mage can be protected.
2. Mental Imagery - Quick casting. Requires high int to retain mental image. Maybe could be reliant on mental fortitude or something like it to avoid overuse. Practical in melee usage
3. Hand Gestures - Less mental strain but as hands are used in casting magic it prevents equiping anything on hands

As an interesting thought it's also possible that XP values for each skill can be tweaked. For example let's say Mental Imagery is superior to Hand Gestures but that Mental Imagery gains XP at a much slower rate than Hand Gestures. Then choice could be determined by ease of training as well as power. It's also possible if you want to give choices that once a person learns magic using a certain method they're incapable of using a different method as original method has been linked to all their mana

Personally I'm not a huge fan of gestures idea. Simply put it has massive drawback that it limits combat extensively. For example let's say you have a magic swordsman (that is one of proposed guilds). They would be unable to cast magic and wield a sword at same time since logically speaking you can't have hand gestures and hold a sword at same time.

This means that entire branch of self support magic is instantly eliminated. So if let's say you wanted a spell to cover your sword in flames you need to unequip your sword. Place it on ground. Then with hands liberated do appropriate gesture and then pick it up once spell is cast. If it runs out mid combat you repeat process.

As far as disrupting goes mental image has an obvious method. If you're confused then you lack focus to form image.

Before people start obsessing about gestures and start making other gestures I think it's worthwhile to highlight one slight imbalance with damage calculations. It's that dam+ is proportionally a lot higher at low levels that can influence damage a lot. dam+ is mostly a static increase. Usually people figure that if a player deals 500 damage and dam+1 is +20 damage (made up figure) then it's a 4% increase so there is no problem. However if you have a noob character who only does 5 damage normally who equips it his damage would increase to 25 dmg meaning he has received a 400% increase in damage. wearing two then doubles effect. Is this desirable or should dam+ be % based?

Actually now that you bring up 1h weapons (I'll note that a lot of hand gestures use two hands) imo there is a problem with weapons in general. So far daimonin has operated under the assumption that weapons are ranked as follows

2h >> 1h > polearm

This basically means that worst 2h weapon will always be better than best 1h weapon and polearms are well.... useless

What we should instead have is level requirements for weapons with high level weapons of any type being roughly equivalent. Since they all use dps anyway having a weapon with half the dps makes it junk no matter how quick/slow it is.

Here's maybe what I would class as roughly equivalent weapons
2h - 40 dps, wc+50 (max power, less accuracy)
1h - 35 dps, wc+60 (i.e. lower damage, higher accuracy, assassin type weapon)
Polearm - 30 dps, wc+40, ac+40, 10% universal prot (defensive weapon)

Then if you want to add to things here are a few additions
Shield - 15% prots, wc-20, ac+20
1h dual - 20 dps, wc+10, ac-20 (extreme offence abandoning defence)

Admittedly a lot of these figures are made up on spot so probably need modified a bit but hopefully you can see how every weapon strategy could theoretically have uses. At the moment I know no one that uses a polearm in daimonin and 1h weapons aren't used for attacking.

You could then also have guilds affecting things. So perhaps if an assassin guild exists and they can't take damage but can evade then they gain ac to make dual wield's weakness less of an issue but might in exchange lack resistances or con