Caster use shield?

Hi,
I was looking at all the monk screenshots and saw a lot of monks with sword/spear (i guess +5 and +20%) and with a shield. But I was wondering; is there a use for a monk to get a shield in PvE and what should the stats be. Cause I thought a offhand would be much better

For pve only, doesn't matter that much or not at all imo. But +30 health, +8 armor, and armor vs whatever is always good (20/5 is rubbish though). The casters should have more than 1 set of weapons to switch out anyway.

Shield on an Elementalist - Same idea for any caster.

It depends on how good your energy management is.

If you find yourself rarely tapping into the extra 12 energy from your focus, then a shield combo is probably more desireable, in case that your enemies break aggro and go after you.

The most common shield for casters is one with +30 health and +10 armor vs. slashing.