Offensive use for Mage Armor?

[Gaiden]

This is my fault,

I apologize for the tangent - back to the topic of can mage armor be used offensively.

First, if people would read the thread, it has nothing to do with casting it on someone else. The question relates to can you use the force effect around yourself as a weapon.

Second, the gauntlet's point is moot, I simply brought it up for further evidence for the ruling I would make. In fact it is unnecessary because all one really has to do as look at the equivalent armor, namely a chain shirt, which does not come with gauntlets.

Thus, rule that the mage armor does not effectively give you force gauntlets - something that is most definitely beyond the scope of the spell and would in effect overrule the AoO from an unarmed strike because gauntlets don't count as unarmed. However, there is nothing preventing a DM from ruling that the character could use his body as a weapon. They would just have to impose the appropriate penalties. I think I covered that pretty well.

 

[IceBear]

Well... Scale mail comes with gauntlets:

Scale Mail: This is a coat and leggings (and perhaps a separate skirt) of leather covered with overlapping pieces of metal, much like the scales of a fish. It includes gauntlets.

A breast plate comes with no gauntlets:

Breastplate: A breastplate covers the front and back. It comes with a helmet and matching greaves (plates to cover the lower legs). A light suit or skirt of studded leather beneath the breastplate protects limbs without restricting movement much.

Both weight the same amount. Both have the same arcane spell failure. (25%)

If anything, I'd expect scale mail to have a higher failure because it has gauntlets. But it doesn't. By that, we can deduce (woo Sherlock Holmes terms) that gauntlets don't add spell failure.

Now, the only place I can see this being contradicted is S&F partial armor rules, but I don't have the book at work.

Now, that line of reasoning is much better than the divine spellcasting that you tried first (why are we even talking about this?)

I wasn't the one that said gauntlet's would stop spellcasting by the way (that was someone else). I was just pointing out to that person that if gauntlets stopped spellcasting, then all medium and heavy armor would have a 100% chance of arcane spell failure (and they do not). That's all I was trying to point out.

Can we get this back on topic now?

IceBear

 

[Wippit Guud]

However, there is nothing preventing a DM from ruling that the character could use his body as a weapon. They would just have to impose the appropriate penalties. I think I covered that pretty well.

Are there rules to that effect? (using your body as a weapon)

I would say that no, you can't use your body as a weeapon... however you could use your body to bull-rush and grapple. A mage grappling a ghost would make quite the visual

 

[Hypersmurf]

There is indeed a rule about gauntlets interfering with spellcasting, but it's a very specific circumstance.

A hand in a locked gauntlet (in the locked position) cannot be used for S components. If your other hand is free, you can use it normally.

The gauntlets supplied with plate armor are not locked gauntlets, so no problem.

-Hyp.

 

[Gaiden]

Hypersmurph - thanks, that is what I was remembering (I knew I was not going crazy). Sorry to hijack the thread that way.

 

[hammymchamham]

The problem with that ruling is twofold:

1) This would mean that casting mage armor on yourself should allow you to punch someone (not just an incorpreal creature) as if you were wearing gauntlets. This is mentioned nowhere in the spell, makes a defensive spell into a defensive/offensive spell, and is stretching the fluff text of the spell too far.

2) Imagine a monk fighting incorpreal monsters while wearing bracers of armor.

IceBear

I agree Ice, thats why I would never allow Mage Armor to be used offensively, but some people seem to think perhaps their is away, and I was just throwing out a "house rule" that could be used. Its not something I would ever use IMC ever.

 

[Gaiden]

Wippit Guud,

Have you ever seen drunken boxing? Martial artists practicing this technique do use their bodies as weapons. Moreover, I am guessing that the respective PrC in swords and fist is meant to mimic that fighting style.

Finally, (and again IDHMBWM so hopefully I don't say something stupid again), I beleive that under the monk entry it considers the entire monk's body to be a weapon - hence the lack of stacking with two weapon fighting and flurry of blows/monks unarmed iterive attack rate.

But this would defintely require some DM arbitration. I would allow the body attack but would stipulate that it could only be made after some movement. If you want to rule only grapples and bull rushes it certainly is not counter-intuitive, and ultimately this is under the category of DM - perogative.

 

[DM_Matt]

From the wording of the rules, this is not allowed.

However, from our understanding of the system of magical metaphysics that dnd uses, you can hit an incorporal being with something made of force. Whether or not that something is hard rigid itself does not matter. It can use whatever corporial support or force behind it.

I agree, however, that the AC granted by Mage Armor would give it a coverage about that of a chain shirt, limiting just what offensive use it could ahve.

However, if there were (IIRC, there is) an Improved Mage Armor spell that was AC +10, I would say taht that does provide full coverage and thus gauntlets.

 

[Destil]

From the wording of the rules, this is not allowed.

However, from our understanding of the system of magical metaphysics that dnd uses, you can hit an incorporal being with something made of force. Whether or not that something is hard rigid itself does not matter. It can use whatever corporial support or force behind it.

I agree, however, that the AC granted by Mage Armor would give it a coverage about that of a chain shirt, limiting just what offensive use it could ahve.

However, if there were (IIRC, there is) an Improved Mage Armor spell that was AC +10, I would say taht that does provide full coverage and thus gauntlets.

There's a diffrence between being hit and hitting something, a rather significant one.

By this logic touch range spells could discharge if something makes an unarmed attack against the caster....

(and you may be thinking of ectoplasmic armor a 5th(?) level psionic power)

 

[DM_Matt]

There's a diffrence between being hit and hitting something, a rather significant one.

By this logic touch range spells could discharge if something makes an unarmed attack against the caster....

(and you may be thinking of ectoplasmic armor a 5th(?) level psionic power)

The point is that if the person is encased in a force effect which moves with the person, that force effect, driven by the corporeal person, can hit cometihng that is incorporeal.