Pliers for chainmail that don't scratch the the rings
In addition to your own answer:
Jewelers (and most chain mail workers that I know, including myself) use a type of pliers called &quot;chain nose pliers.&quot;  I don't really know why they have that name, but they have nice pointy tips for getting into the rings and smooth surfaces on the inside.  Here's an article about chain nose vs. round nose pliers:  http://blog.consumercrafts.com/jewelry-main/tool-comparison-round-nose-vs-chain-nose-pliers/
Also, using a glue gun probably won't work well, but you have the right idea there.  Instead you want to look for a product that is designed to coat the metal on tools.  Here is a short article about this concept. The product used in the article, and that I have also used in the past is called &quot;Tool Magic,&quot; but doing a search for &quot;rubber coating for tools&quot; turned up a bunch of different products that could work equally well. I would test whatever you try to make sure you can remove it easily like she mentions in her article, but otherwise use whatever of this type of product that you can find.
The article also mentions using tools like the one that you linked to in your answer, but I, like the author of the article, have been disappointed whenever I have tried those tools--mostly because the additional surfaces made it difficult to work within the fairly restricted confines of the rings used for chain mail.