I wear lacrosse gloves, but I did my best to get the most maneuverable one I could. I know a lot of people prefer no gloves, and that's fine for them, but I've had too many hand injuries to take any further chances. The (non-martial-arts-related) cut I got from my Cold Steel kukri cost me about $4000, maybe $5000, after all the surgery to reattach the tendon and the nerve and all the occupational therapy. So in short, I'm not able to take those kind of chances any more--it's just not worth the possibility of more surgery if I break a finger, since they told me I'd likely not be able to heal it again.
As far as learning to protect your hands, I'm sure it helps. But just because something physically doesn't hurt/injure me doesn't mean I ignore it. I made an effort to train myself to notice impacts, draw cuts, snap cuts, etc. that hit or threaten the fingers and to call them when I get hit. But that's me; I know many others don't call it if it isn't a painful impact, which is certainly unrealistic (I especially notice this tendency in dagger play). But Shane is absolutely right--it is kind of a personal decision how much risk you want to take, and what trade off for historicity you want to take. In our group many of us wear gloves, and many don't, but everyone's pretty good about calling (and trying to avoid) the hand hits.
Jason
One big point is that no manual for blossfechten of any kind that I know of shows the fighters wearing gloves. You see gauntlets in armored combat manuals. At most I use simple leather gloves for long sparring sessions to prevent too many injuries, most of the time I don't use any, it really teaches you to protect your hands.
Good point. Remember though that the manuals don't show fencing masks either so one must be knowledgable enough to decide what level of risk he's willing to accept for himself and/or take direction from his Study Group Leader on the matter.
I wear thin leather gloves with cuffs most of the time.
I'm impatient with stupidity. My people have learned to live without it.--The Day the Earth Stood Still
Still the cost is much lesser than that of a broken hand or finger. Cheap insurance I think.
Of course, I haven't broken any fingers so badly that I couldn't just splint them myself and go on without a doctor. (knock on wood)