Gauntlets of Heartfelt Blows what book

[Mordante]

Recently I was looking for some good items. Someone suggested the "Gauntlets of Heartfelt Blows". But I cannot find much about this item. I don't want to use Homebrew and I have a sneaky feeling this item is Homebrew.

[Khatoblepas]

I believe it's in Dragon Magazine 314, pg 22. Not something every DM would allow, but still incredibly useful.

[Mordante]

I believe it's in Dragon Magazine 314, pg 22. Not something every DM would allow, but still incredibly useful.

Thank you.

One of the few, if not the only house rule we have use is no Dragon Magazine. As far as I know nothing in Dragon Magazine is balanced or play tested.

[Troacctid]

Thank you.

One of the few, if not the only house rule we have use is no Dragon Magazine. As far as I know nothing in Dragon Magazine is balanced or play tested.
To be fair, nothing in any of the hardcover splatbooks is balanced or playtested either! This is 3.5e; it is what it is. 💁

[Mordante]

To be fair, nothing in any of the hardcover splatbooks is balanced or playtested either! This is 3.5e; it is what it is. 💁

Would you allow Dragon Magazine content in your games? As a DM I would be very reluctant. DR content is hard to verify.

[loky1109]

Thank you.

One of the few, if not the only house rule we have use is no Dragon Magazine. As far as I know nothing in Dragon Magazine is balanced or play tested.

Why did you name this "house rule"?
Taking decision what rulebook use and what not isn't he, it's inherent right and duty of every DM.

[Gemini476]

Would you allow Dragon Magazine content in your games? As a DM I would be very reluctant. DR content is hard to verify.

Personally, as a DM I would just go through the specific content and make an executive decision as to whether or not it's allowed... and that goes for not just Dragon Magazine, but also splatbooks and core books.

There's plenty of busted stuff in Dragon Magazine, but there's also plenty of things that are just fine. The vast majority is less broken than some of what WotC has published - Incantatrix, Leadership (in the DMG!), etc. etc.

In fact, if you come to me with some interesting homebrew that doesn't look immediately busted then that's completely fine! If it ends up being broken, changing that isn't going to hurt any feelings.

[Kaleph]

If its helps, the gauntlets were reprinted in the Dragon Compendium, i.e. the Paizo splatbook with the d&d logo, that provides a selection of some of the best dungeon/dragon magazine resources. Apparently its content was agreed with WotC, which makes this book some sort of semi-official 3.5 publications (as a reference, it is allowed for use in most competitions on these boards, while the individual magazines are not).

[Biggus]

Personally, as a DM I would just go through the specific content and make an executive decision as to whether or not it's allowed... and that goes for not just Dragon Magazine, but also splatbooks and core books.

There's plenty of busted stuff in Dragon Magazine, but there's also plenty of things that are just fine. The vast majority is less broken than some of what WotC has published - Incantatrix, Leadership (in the DMG!), etc. etc.

In fact, if you come to me with some interesting homebrew that doesn't look immediately busted then that's completely fine! If it ends up being broken, changing that isn't going to hurt any feelings.

I do similarly, any content is potentially allowed, but anything from Dragon, the Web, 3rd party, or indeed quite a few of the official splatbooks has to be approved on a case-by-case basis.

[Max Caysey]

Would you allow Dragon Magazine content in your games? As a DM I would be very reluctant. DR content is hard to verify.

I allow everything officially printed. Including Dungeons and dragons magazines… they have great content… why would you? I haven’t found anything more broken in those magazines than in core!

[Gullintanni]

I allow everything officially printed. Including Dungeons and dragons magazines… they have great content… why would you? I haven’t found anything more broken in those magazines than in core!

I think a lot of the reason that Dragon Mag content is often banned is because it's not well play tested. I know that splatbooks dont get any official playtesting, but we, The Playground, have tested nearly every piece of official content to death, and the answers to any question about official content are usually somewhere in this forum's archive.

Dragon Mag is not so heavily vetted. That said, from the issues I've read, Dragon Magazine tends to be underpowered and flavorful, outside of the few famous examples around here. I love Dragon Magazine content by and large.

I'm also in the camp of allowing Dragon Mag on a case-by-case basis.

[schreier]

I agree with allowing Dragon Magazine - from my experience as DM and player, we allow things from any official sources and then balance encounters and actions appropriately. Our party is well above CR for our level (level 13), but so are our encounters. At the end of the day, what keeps the players engaged and interested ... and what is fun for everyone? We're all telling a story together, and the more that is invested in a character, the more that comes out in the games

[Malphegor]

Would you allow Dragon Magazine content in your games? As a DM I would be very reluctant. DR content is hard to verify.


I’m gonna be honest, Dragon Magazine is pretty solid. I was warned off it by the person I first started playing with as something they wouldn’t allow, but so long as there is a communication between player and DM and the DM and all parties involved is willing to tweak things if they go awry, it’s at least less silly than any of the usual gubbins people look at around these here forums.

Plus, the sheer amount of it adds some extra spice and sizzle to a game, and the magazine format allowed em to make a lot of stuff that is maybe too cool to not use.

[Xervous]

The main reason I saw that I agreed with for a blanket ban on dragonmag was the difficulty of acquiring it. Much the same as “I don’t have the book you can’t use it”. That’s a fair rule to have as a GM back then, not that I used it myself. Nowadays if you’re doing 3.5e I’m guessing people have electronic references at which point I say why in the nine hells are you banning the entirety of dragonmag but not reviewing other nonsense? If you can’t tell balanced apart from broken you’ll run into issues with just the PHB.

Ban individual tidbits for being broken, ban them for being against the style of game you want to play, or allow them.

[Troacctid]

Nowadays, magazines are easier to get your hands on than most of the books. Almost the entire run of Dragon and Dungeon has been scanned into the Internet Archive so that anyone can read them for free. OEF versions are also available directly from Paizo. Magazine material is also becoming better documented in fan-made handbooks and reference tools (such as my own spreadsheets), so it's easier to sift through it all.

[loky1109]

I can ban or not ban everything. Doesn't matter is it from PHB, or from Magazine. I look on subjects, not on source.

[Mordante]

If its helps, the gauntlets were reprinted in the Dragon Compendium, i.e. the Paizo splatbook with the d&d logo, that provides a selection of some of the best dungeon/dragon magazine resources. Apparently its content was agreed with WotC, which makes this book some sort of semi-official 3.5 publications (as a reference, it is allowed for use in most competitions on these boards, while the individual magazines are not).

That is good to know. I'll look into it.

[pabelfly]

Like everything else in 3.5, Dragon Magazine does have some overpowered options, but it also has plenty of flavourful, interesting but not overpowered content too. Seems a pity to forgo nearly all of it just for not being proper first-party material.

[Troacctid]

Like everything else in 3.5, Dragon Magazine does have some overpowered options, but it also has plenty of flavourful, interesting but not overpowered content too. Seems a pity to forgo nearly all of it just for not being proper first-party material.
Wizards of the Coast published the majority of both magazines' runs. Most of it is first-party. It was only outsourced to Paizo for about 50 issues.

[Max Caysey]

That is good to know. I'll look into it.

Its basically this: blankety banning something without looking into whether or not the specific thing makes the player happy, or is unbalanced seems unbalanced in itself. I would strenuously advise anyone to look at the specific item/feat/class in any material before accepting or banning said material… most of the time, spells are the problem… but the spells in DR isn’t anything compared to like Shapechange, PaO, Wish… those are generally brokenly good.

What DR does include is a lot of flavorful things… which in the right campaign or for the right character can add a lot of fun and uniqueness… at least in my opinion…

[Keldrin]

Mistake posting, can't seem delete.

[Darg]

No blanket ban here, but as DM I require a copy of the material made so that I have reference material and a talk as to what the person wants to accomplish with that material. If the material is of questionable quality, as dragon material is wont to do, I need to be able to keep the intention in mind if I need to adjust it to fit the table.

[Peelee]

The Mod on the Silver Mountain: Thread closed.