Spells. Can they only be cast with an "empty hand"?

If so, do you like that?

Spell take up a hand, so instead of like oblivion when you can cast equipped, you have a spell taking up the spot similar to morrowind only you can use a sword with the other hand in skyrim

Well, your hand's not empty, because you've equipped the spell in it. If you're asking if you can have two weapons/sword+shield/a two hander and still cast spells, then no, no you can't. You also can't block with a one-hander while you've equipped a spell. It's a balance thing. They want you to carefully consider your options and not just be a barbarian who for some reason throws fireballs all over the place.

In before Mod that removes "slot" restrictions so one can equip an item ontop of a spell hand and cast spells with reduced effectiveness and only enabled through perks called "Combat Casting"

Thanks. I kinda wish it wasn't that way, but the added realism is there.

if you played bioshock, its that except you can choose which hand the plasmid is in

I wonder if you're running around with a blade and sans shield/buckler, could you parry with said blade while having a spell ready?

Yeah, played it. I thought it was meh. My only problem is, let's say I have a shielding spell but I'm playing a dual-wielding character. I don't want to have to actually put away a weapon to cast my spell. Maybe Skyrim will have some sort of hotkeys for this? I'm confident that Bethesda will work it out in a way that pleases me (like they always do).

That's a bad scenario considering I mostly play with the classic ole' sword & shield.

That's what I meant.

Well, you have to actually think during combat this time...

It seems to be the consensus on a couple forums that you can not - but I can't find the details on how exactly it works (ie does your spell simply become unequipped/unavailible while holding down block or does block not function at all with a spell equipped).

But in terms of "equipped" actions you still have 3. While in morrowind you had to "equip" the spell (pair of empty hands posed in front of you as though you were preparing to give someone a vicious groping) Oblivion had done away with that. You basically had the "block", "attack", and "cast" options at the ready whenever. While you would stop blocking when you cast something for just as long as the casting animation was going, you could perform each of them on their own without getting the gropey hands out to cast a spell.

In Skyrim you still have 3 or more actions at the ready too (once you learn a word or two). You have left hand, right hand, and shout. One of the more basic of those shouts tosses your enemies away from you - a good deal more useful for a mage. Some spell effects also have their kinetic effects beefed up a bit -they're not just for http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llCJg5LiKo8. While it does kind of seem a little heavy handed to completely disable blocking while a spell is readied, dragon shouts and spells that repell enemies (by force or by fear) mean the spell-sword will simply defend themselves in a very different way.

Instead of locking the attacks of a couple enemies with a shield or weapon, a spell sword would keep their enemies at a distance or disable them (slow them as Todd Howard did in a recent demo or toss them against a wall with a dragon shout or even slow time to dart behind them) and slash them to ribbons when they're otherwise rendered hilarious. I mean helpless.

I think it has potential - the game-play for someone who goes with sword and spell most often will be significantly different than someone who wades into combat with a sword and shield. Depending on how two weapon combat works (in terms of block, speed of attacks, ability of enemies to block one or both weapons etc.) even the various combinations of melee options could play very distinctly too. Think about it, you'll actually have to approach combat differently as a guy wielding fireballs and a pointy utensil than you will if you're wielding a medium sized spruce or two pointy utensils.

That's the hope though. Kind of depends on the how well certain spells can do all that and how often you can shout. If you could have a modestly damaging medium ranged last that also staggered foes for a second that would be about as good as blocking and do some decent damage when combined with something metal and pointy or bashy. I'm sure working out a diminished blocking ability when wielding a spell and a sword would be more complicated and harder to balance, but I would have liked that to be a kind of perk. It would be nice to parry a farmer... err bandit's shovel and follow that right up with some fire to the face. Maybe a unique finishing move for "bandits" armed with shovels, hoes, brooms and other dastardly implements of poverty.