Gauntlets and Armor


Advice


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Gauntlet

Benefit: This metal glove lets you deal lethal damage rather than nonlethal damage with unarmed strikes. A strike with a gauntlet is otherwise considered an unarmed attack. Your opponent cannot use a disarm action to disarm you of gauntlets.

Note: The cost and weight given are for a single gauntlet. Medium and heavy armors (except breastplate) come with gauntlets.

Weapon Feature(s): cannot be disarmed

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So here is the question. Does a set of gauntlets, which explicitly are included as part of a suit of armor, use the material the armor is made of? In other words, if I invest in a suit of adamantine armor, and punch someone with my gauntlet, does my strike count as adamantine?


Yes it would, as far as I know.


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Seems like it should, but allow me to play Munchkin's Advokate for a moment. Adamantine medium armor is 10k, weapons are 3k, 2 gauntlets per suit. So if I sell the two free gauntlets you just gave me, I save 30% off of retail. Or can I skip the gauntlets entirely and save all 6k?


Most likely not. It is a balance issue.

There are medium armors with gloves. medium adamantine armor costs +10,000 the base price. A single adamantine weapon costs +3000.

So this would give you a free pair of adamantine weapons (a +6000 value) for free. That is most of the price of the armor.

If you need an logical explanation, then just assume that the armor is not entirely admantine, and just choice pieces are. The gauntlets would be made out of lesser materials.


lemeres wrote:

Most likely not. It is a balance issue.

There are medium armors with gloves. medium adamantine armor costs +10,000 the base price. A single adamantine weapon costs +3000.

So this would give you a free pair of adamantine weapons (a +6000 value) for free. That is most of the price of the armor.

If you need an logical explanation, then just assume that the armor is not entirely admantine, and just choice pieces are. The gauntlets would be made out of lesser materials.

Hrm. I understand the point, but to be fair, you'd be limited to a 1d3 weapon that can't be two-handed. I'm really asking for a RAW interpretation.

Grand Lodge

Java Man wrote:
Seems like it should, but allow me to play Munchkin's Advokate for a moment. Adamantine medium armor is 10k, weapons are 3k, 2 gauntlets per suit. So if I sell the two free gauntlets you just gave me, I save 30% off of retail. Or can I skip the gauntlets entirely and save all 6k?

Your armour comes with gauntlets. If you remove the gauntlets, you no longer have a complete set of armour. Ask your GM what armour bonus the remaining random collection of objects gives you, whether you are proficient with it and what, if any, price it fetches if sold.


CryntheCrow wrote:
lemeres wrote:

Most likely not. It is a balance issue.

There are medium armors with gloves. medium adamantine armor costs +10,000 the base price. A single adamantine weapon costs +3000.

So this would give you a free pair of adamantine weapons (a +6000 value) for free. That is most of the price of the armor.

If you need an logical explanation, then just assume that the armor is not entirely admantine, and just choice pieces are. The gauntlets would be made out of lesser materials.

Hrm. I understand the point, but to be fair, you'd be limited to a 1d3 weapon that can't be two-handed. I'm really asking for a RAW interpretation.

Pointless and pedantic it is! No, because they come with "gauntlets". Not "gauntlets made of the same material", just gauntlets. Which default to steel. Doesn't matter if it's dragonhide, the gauntlets are still steel. A more permissive reading says yes, they're made of adamantine, but only when used as armor. Since you bought adamantine armor, not adamantine weapons. You would need to pay the 3k to make a gauntlet an adamantine weapon if you wanted to use one that way. So, RAW says no.


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So a druid who equips medium Hide armor... immediately loses their druid powers since the leather armor came with metal gauntlets?


no, it comes with hide gloves
or no hand covering at all since those are not even mentioned in the armour description.


All medium and heavy armors (except breastplate) come with gauntlets, according to the gauntlet write-up. No need for them to be mentioned in the armor description.


armor types that include gauntlets normally mention it, so where's the source for your sweeping statement? (book+page please)


It is literally right there in the Core rulebook equipment section, under "Gauntlet".

PRD equipment section wrote:
Medium and heavy armors (except breastplate) come with gauntlets.

I don't know why it matters, though. Gauntlets are weapons, not armor, so Druids can use them just fine.


I never said gauntlets were armor. Just, if adamantine plate mail comes with free adamantine gauntlets, they would only be adamantine for the purpose of being armor, not as a weapon. Since you pay for "adamantine armor", not "two adamantine weapons". And that was the permissive reading, the stricter reading was just that you get two standard gauntlets with the armor, regardless of what the armor was.

Again, I'm well aware this is weird and dumb, but the OP was told "no, because balance" and said "I'm really asking for a RAW interpretation." And by RAW, the best you get is "adamantine armor gauntlets". It doesn't suddenly make them armor, it doesn't make them count as "adamantine weapon gauntlets", but possibly there's some obscure corner case where it would matter. As I already said though, much simpler (and stricter RAW) to just assume that all the listed armor come with a special "buy this armor and I'll throw in a couple gauntlets for free" deal. Not +1 gauntlets, not masterwork gauntlets, not silver gauntlets, just plain bog-standard gauntlets.


Heavy Armor and some medium armors comes with gauntlets, so if the armor is made of special materials, the gauntlets as part of the armor are made of special materials, as nothing else is written against this...
Are they masterwork armor ? Yes
Are they masterwork weapon ? I'm not sure of it as they were build as armor not weapon ( shields are also the case of having a offense and defense function, and need separate "masterworking" to be a weapon and an armor)
Are they of special material ? Yes, as they are part of a special material armor.
So saying they are not because it's OP, it is not RAW but only interpretation.


CryntheCrow wrote:
Hrm. I understand the point, but to be fair, you'd be limited to a 1d3 weapon that can't be two-handed. I'm really asking for a RAW interpretation.

They could still be used by TWF users. A ranger could easily just drop whatever weapons he TWFs when he finds that there is DR adamantine. IT would likely just be a slight loss of DPR due to lower dice/crit range, which is made up for the fact that he isn't losing a ton of damage on every hit due to DR.

DR is an even more important issue for TWF than it would be for 2 handers, who can just power through a lot of DR, and don't have as many hits which would raise the number of times DR is used.

Note: rangers/slayers seem like the archetypal characters that would benefit from this. They use str based TWF, and can use medium armor. Although, admittedly, even dex based TWF users might prefer a nice mithral medium armor if their game doesn't go to high levels (since you usually have to go until 30 dex until it is really worth considering pure dex options for AC).


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The way I see it is the price includes the gauntlets. So I see gauntlets as factored into the AC the armor gives you. To sell them, assuming the can be removed, would mean the armor wouldn't function as intended. So I don't see this as way to get cheaper adamantine armor. I'd let a player do that but I'd lower the AC by 1 for compromise the arm piece.

Piecemeal armor grant AC for arms, legs and torso. Full plate would be 1, 1 and 6 for total 8. You get 9 for fully fitted suit of full plate. So the -1 makes sense.


Well said, Yoska


So would you give me 1ac for adding gauntlets to my chain shirt? Which magic gauntlets or gloves do or do not justify this ac bonus?


Yondu wrote:

Heavy Armor and some medium armors comes with gauntlets, so if the armor is made of special materials, the gauntlets as part of the armor are made of special materials, as nothing else is written against this...

Are they masterwork armor ? Yes
Are they masterwork weapon ? I'm not sure of it as they were build as armor not weapon ( shields are also the case of having a offense and defense function, and need separate "masterworking" to be a weapon and an armor)
Are they of special material ? Yes, as they are part of a special material armor.
So saying they are not because it's OP, it is not RAW but only interpretation.

For me it comes down to:

1) Objects of a particular material aren't 100% that material. The rules for special materials state that they need to be majority of said material. That means the "business" parts for it's function have to be, but nothing else. Can you take your gauntlets off and still maintain your AC? Not integral to the armor's operation then. It follows that parts that aren't integral to the operation of the object would not be of the expensive material.

2) Did you pay the appropriate "cost" for the advantage provided by it?
In this case no, you did not pay (or otherwise invest) for the advantage you seek for free. The game tells you when you get something, once there is a line stating "this counts as a special material when you attack with it when acquired with a suit of armor" or some such, you get it. There is no such line.

Those two points, hit on both the pertinent "rule" (special materials don't mean 100% construction of that materia) and intent (free stuff because it doesn't say it doesn't work that way and makes "sense").

If it mattered enough to make a difference for s build I was planning, I would just make sure to toss the extra gold value onto the armor for both gauntlets to be of the particular material when I bought it. No questions at all on that case.


So, if I want the gauntlets of my Adamantine Full Plate armor to be adamantine, do I have to pay 6K gp in addition to the 15K and some that the armor already cost me?

If the armor is magical, do I have to get them enchanted separately to be able to punch with magical bonuses?


Weapon and armor enchantments are already called as separate, the rulings on shield spell that out pretty well. The material question is the one that the forum seems to have some disagrement over.


Klorox wrote:

So, if I want the gauntlets of my Adamantine Full Plate armor to be adamantine, do I have to pay 6K gp in addition to the 15K and some that the armor already cost me?

If the armor is magical, do I have to get them enchanted separately to be able to punch with magical bonuses?

If you want to punch things and have the damage go through DR adamantine, yeah.

The game already has a precedent for something that is both armor and weapon, shields. You don't get a discount or to ignore the costs associated with using it one way or the other. You have to "pay" for your advantages gained. A +2 shield isn't a +2 weapon, unless you invested into making it that way (either through buying the effect or investing in class features which facilitate it functioning that way).

6002gp would cover being able to TWF with gauntlets. Tack on whatever magical enhancements you wanted per gauntlet as written now (barring an FAQ/errata).

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