# Gauntlets of power

[&nbsp;   [&nbsp;   [&nbsp;   [&nbsp;gauntlets of power

Appearance

random

Slot

gloves

AC

1

Special

strength = 25

Base price

50 zm

Weight

30

Material

iron

The gauntlets of power, often abbreviated to GoP, are a pair of gloves that appear in NetHack. They are made of iron.

Contents

1 Description
2 Strategy

2.1 Identification

3 History
4 Variants

4.1 SLASH'EM

5 References

Description
Wearing gauntlets of power grants 1 AC and sets your strength to 25 regardless of beatitude, auto-identifying them. They apply a -2 to-hit penalty when shooting from a bow. Strength cannot be exercised while wearing gauntlets of power, although actual strength increases will still occur as normal.
Mjollnir can only be thrown by a character with 25 strength, which for all practical purposes requires gauntlets of power. As iron gloves, they interfere with spellcasting.
Monsters wearing gauntlets of power add 3-6 damage to their weapon attacks, with no effect on monsters that cannot wield weapons.[1]

Strategy
Main article: Strength
Strength increases carrying capacity, the chance for attacks to hit, the damage of melee attacks and projectile attacks not involving a launcher, and the range of projectiles other than fired crossbow bolts. However, you can obtain most of these benefits from reaching 18/** strength through other means; the  only further benefits from gauntlets of power in that case are increased carrying capacity, projectile range, and the ability to throw Mjollnir.
While neither necessary to the point of using a wish nor commonplace in ascension kits, gauntlets of power are still a viable choice of armor for the long term. Wizards may still want to wear them to shore up their strength, despite them being metal: A wizard wearing neither a robe nor any other metal armor will have a 4% general spell failure rate with 18 intelligence, or 3% with 19 or higher intelligence, which may be acceptably low.
Less adept casters may experience a much greater increase in spell failure rates, and as such those planning to utilize spells often or in-combat may want different gloves. Conversely, those dedicated to non-magical combat such as Barbarians may prefer gauntlets of power; a strength level of 18/01 or above makes the bonuses of gauntlets of power somewhat more marginal, and is also easy to obtain for non-elven characters.
For characters considering replacing their gauntlets of power at a later point, it may benefit them to remove these gloves while actively or passively training strength (e.g., solving Sokoban), unless doing so severely impacts combat performance.

Identification
Gauntlets of power will always auto-identify when worn; they are additionally the only gloves to weigh 30 aum. Being made of iron allows them to be distinguished from other gloves without wearing them - using a touchstone on unidentified gauntlets of power will produce its distinctive "scritch, scritch" noise.

History
Gauntlets of power were first added in NetHack 3.0.0. The extra damage for monster weapon attacks was added in NetHack 3.6.1.[2]

Variants
SLASH'EM
In SLASH'EM, gauntlets of power instead set your strength to 18/**, and further modify it based on the gauntlets' enchantment: a +1 pair will give you 19 strength, while a -1 pair will give you 18/99. Valkyries can safely enchant gauntlets of power up to +7, which allows them to gain the 25 strength required to throw Mjollnir.

References

↑ src/mhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.6, line 987

↑ src/mhitm.c in NetHack 3.6.1, line 920