How does the different types of armor and shield affect your performance? Do you take a loss on weapon and movement speed and what not? I am also baffled on the shield thing. The descriptions of the large shield says that it will not allow you to do anything else with that hand, yet my cleric and still cast spells. Other than giving the +1 AC and +2 missle defense (benefical) effects, do the shields do anything?

AFAIK, there are no penalties to movement/speed while wearing armor. As for shields, magical types can offer a lot of benefits, including more AC, resistances, immunities, etc. And don't believe everything you read in the descriptions, they're just trying to get the point across that a shield takes up one of your hands, therefore disallowing the use of 2H weapons.

-Wrath

Thanks for the help.

Along the same line - how about bracers? If I put on some Bracers of Defense say AC6 but do not see a change in my overall AC of -2, do they do anything for me? Do they help prevent loss of limbs or something?

putting on bracers of defence AC 6 is same thing as wearing chain mail. Bracers don't give you AC bonus, they change your base AC. So, the best use for bracers is to put them on your mage because bracers don't interfere with spellcasting.
About cleric casting spells with shield. Clerical spells are not really spells, more like prayers and shield does nto interfere with praying.

To answer your earlier question if your character is shield equipped then that arm can take nothing more (Other than a ring). You cannot weild any two handed weapon while wearing a shield.