A topic came up in passing when one of my characters was buying new armour, and I'm not sure what the official ruling would be, so I figured I'll see if anyone knows:
If you get a suit of armour that includes gauntlets, and it's made from a special material like Adamantine or Mithral, it would make sense for the gauntlets to be made of the same material. But does that really mean that the (free) gauntlets get all the benefits of being made of the new material, such as being inherently masterwork (in case of both adamantine and mithral), counting as material for overcoming damage reduction, and in the case of adamantine also overcoming hardness.
Just using narrative logic, that seems to be the case. But the numbercruncher in me feels like it might be a bit too much of a mechanical benefit, so I wanted to see what people think.
I'm really wanting to say no, as adamantine gauntlets would/should be another 6,000gp, which obviously is not the case. The armor says it comes with gauntlets, not silver/admantine/mithral gauntlets, so that's all you get.
I'm really wanting to say no, as adamantine gauntlets would/should be another 6,000gp, which obviously is not the case. The armor says it comes with gauntlets, not silver/admantine/mithral gauntlets, so that's all you get.
Yeah, that's pretty much what I'd want to say as well, I just wanted to run it past the crowd so I wasn't "handicapping myself" against the general concensus.
Overall, the gauntlets will probably still be made of the right material, just not in a way that specifically benefits attacking.
I'd say yes....mostly cause gauntlets are included in the price of making the armor not (free). Could you imagine going out and buying expensive adamantine plate and the merchant telling you he is all out of gauntlets but he has an OK pair of steel gauntlets....
But maybe thats because I also don't expect the armor to be their normal weapon so I don't see it as a problem.
The armour is made of material X.
Gauntlets are part of the armour.
Therefore: the gauntlets are made of material X.
At the very least I'd not consider it masterwork weapons, just because a spoon is a masterowrk spoon doesnt mean you get +1 to hit with it.
At the very least I'd not consider it masterwork weapons, just because a spoon is a masterowrk spoon doesnt mean you get +1 to hit with it.
Agreed. The tricky part rules-wise though is that items made from mithral or adamantine are always considered masterwork.
But honestly, unless a GM specifically tells me to do it otherwise, I'll just treat them as regular non-masterwork non-special material gauntlets if I attack with them.
At the very least I'd not consider it masterwork weapons, just because a spoon is a masterowrk spoon doesnt mean you get +1 to hit with it.Agreed. The tricky part rules-wise though is that items made from mithral or adamantine are always considered masterwork.
But honestly, unless a GM specifically tells me to do it otherwise, I'll just treat them as regular non-masterwork non-special material gauntlets if I attack with them.
The armor is masterwork for it's purpose it is not created to be a masterwork weapon as well, if you want it to be masterwork weapons suitable for enchantment you have to buy the gloves as weapons. Otherwise I will count them as adamantine but not masterwork weapons.
Not treating them as adamantine weapons at all would be agreeable for me as well, it makes sense from RAW perspective and since weapons made of adamantine are so expensive it makes sense to cut them if it saves 6,000 gold.
It would be fairly easy to say the defensive structure of the gauntlet is of said material but if you want striking surfaces on the gauntlets then you have to pay the extra otherwise you are as likely to hit with the leather or other materials as the special metal.
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I can certainly understand not wanting to give players who buy mithral and adamantine armor a set of "free" weapons of the same material. However, I may point out that gauntlets, as far as weapons go, are somewhat awful. The only thing a gauntlet does is allow you to deal lethal damage with an unarmed strike. Unless you have improved unarmed strike, you provoke an attack of opportunity with every strike and you're still dealing 1d3 points of damage. Players may still use adamantine gauntlets to punch down a wall, but it will take a very long time to actually get through.
I suppose it would be great if you get swallowed as you already have a light weapon out and AoO wouldn't matter but otherwise, you'd still have to take a feat just to use it properly. If armor suits came with free spiked gauntlets, I would probably agree with you guys. They are considered actual weapons and as such, don't require additional training. Are the gauntlets an advantage? Yes, but I don't think it's as big as an advantage as it might initially seem.
I'd be more concerned about the following abuses if you were to allow it:
- Being able to punch through walls (ignoring hardness 20 or less).
- Being able to purchase adamantine full plate sans gauntlets for only 9,000gp (then having another player be forced to pay 10,000gp for admantine breastplate because it doesn't have gauntlets, which doesn't make any sense and is obviously unintended).
- Being able to sell the full plate's adamantine helmet and adamantine gauntlets for a substantial profit with no real mechanical drawbacks.
A mid level barbarian could punch through multiple inches of stone per round :)