You want a shield with Parry, do not use the tower shields, slows and no parry are worthless and will get you killed. Once the npc swings, block just before the hit and you will get the parry bonus which then open the enemy up for attack, first attack will be a damage bonus and then one or two more hits and there dead, roll dodge/jump or WALK/RUN away and let stamina regen and back at it if needed, also the black metal ATGEIR will be important weapon to learn to use, very useful against multiply npc's, to include wolfs/furlings, easy killing trolls and furlings and anything else once you learn the timing. Block parry works the best.

You want Black metal shield once you can craft it, until then the Iron buckler works just fine.
do not forget proper buff food, stamina =life.
really once you learn how to kills things, its easy, sometimes the plains will be punishing if your caught off guard, other then that take time to learn and grow in the game and things do get a whole lot easier, pretty chill game really.