Help with understanding incorporeality

[Max Caysey]

So, I have been going through different online sources describing the interaction between corporeal and incoporeal creatures. As far as I can tell, attacking an incoporeal creature requires a magical weapon/ effect and incur a 50% miss chance onless its a force effect, ghost touch effect or positive/negative energy (including holy water). Furthermore, nonmagical attacks have 100% miss chance.

That part seems fairly straight forward. The not so straigt forward part is when an incorporeal creature attacks a corporeal creature. It says that an incorporeal creature cannot manipulate objects or exert physical force on objects, and cannot make trip or grapple attacks... Its also mentioned that any melee attack an incorporeal creature makes with a magic weapon against a corporeal target has a 50% miss chance, except for attacks it makes with a ghost touch weapon, which are made normally (no miss chance).

So looking specifically at an Allip, which has an incorporeal touch attack, which is (Su), should mean that it has 50% miss chance dilivering this attack right?

[Darg]

An incorporeal creature doesn't have a miss chance on its natural weapons. As the touch attack is made through those natural weapons (generally unarmed strike) it wouldn't have a miss chance either. Also, the subtype only ever mentions magic weapons wielded by the incorporeal creature as having the miss chance which means its abilities aren't affected by it.

[Max Caysey]

An incorporeal creature doesn't have a miss chance on its natural weapons. As the touch attack is made through those natural weapons (generally unarmed strike) it wouldn't have a miss chance either. Also, the subtype only ever mentions magic weapons wielded by the incorporeal creature as having the miss chance which means its abilities aren't affected by it.

Thank you for your answer... Out of curiosity, where does it specifically say that: "incorporeal creature doesn't have a miss chance on its natural weapons"? I haven't been able to find that! Because we know it can't use its natural weapons to pick op a non-magical item... or use its ntural weapons to grapple, its must then be the supernatural part of the incorporeal touch attack that is actually hitting... and that coming from an incorporeal sourse would seem too have 50% miss chance... so how come it can touch someone without a miss chance?

Cheers!

[DarkWhisper]

An incorporeal creature doesn't have a miss chance on its natural weapons.

Citation needed.

An incorporeal creature's attacks ignore natural armor, armor, and shields though deflection bonuses and force effects (such as mage armor) work normally against such attacks. An incorporeal touch attack isn't the same as a melee touch attack - armor can work against incorporeal touch attack if the armor has the ghost touch property.
Non-magical attacks made by an incorporeal creature with a melee weapon have no effect on corporeal targets, and any melee attack an incorporeal creature makes with a magic weapon against corporeal targets have a 50% miss chance, except for attacks made with a ghost touch weapon, which are made normally (no miss chance). (...)

Since there's no mention of any special rulings regarding the incorporeal -> corporeal attacks, the simplest and most consistent ruling would be to apply the same rules as corporeal -> incorporeal attacks, i.e. no damage for normal weapons, 50% miss chance for magical weapons / effects, 100% for force / ghost touch effects.

[Crake]

An incorporeal creature doesn't have a miss chance on its natural weapons.

Incorporeal touch attacks aren't to be categorized the same as natural weapons. An incorporeal touch attack suffers no miss chance, but a ghostly wolf trying to bite you, or a ghostly soldier swinging his sword at you would do nothing.

[Max Caysey]

Incorporeal touch attacks aren't to be categorized the same as natural weapons. An incorporeal touch attack suffers no miss chance, but a ghostly wolf trying to bite you, or a ghostly soldier swinging his sword at you would do nothing.

Where does it specifically say that?

[GrayDeath]

That would interest me as well.

While we always ruled that any Incorporeal being with the ability to become corporeal didnt have a miss chance (RAI interpreted as "it materilizes enough for the attacK") we treaded the other side just as we did ours.

Didnt think about that in...quite some time, thanks for making me remember a rule question I should ahve asked ages ago, Max!

[Crake]

Where does it specifically say that?

Incorporeal touch attacks are listed as special abilities. Natural attacks are not special abilities. Hence they are not the same. Take the allip as an example. It's touch attack is it's wisdom drain ability. Ghosts have at least 2 separate options for their Su incorporeal touch attacks, wraiths have con drain, shadows have strength drain. All their incorporeal touch attacks are supernatural abilities, not natural weapons.

And since Su abilities are not stated in the incorporeal rules as having a miss chance, we must assume they function as normal, which means no miss chance on incorporeal touch attacks.

[Darg]

Honestly, I can't find where I read that definition. I did find a website while trying to google it but it didn't have citation either. The DMG has a pretty vague definition, but that isn't it. Oh well, ignore the natural weapons part.

[The Viscount]

Rules Compendium offers the following, which isn't airtight, but at least heavily implies this.

An incorporeal touch attack isn’t the same as a melee touch attack— armor can work against an incorporeal touch attack if the armor has the ghost touch property. Nonmagical attacks made by an incorporeal creature with a melee weapon have no effect on corporeal targets, and any melee attack an incorporeal creature makes with a magic weapon against a corporeal target has a 50% miss chance, except for attacks it makes with a ghost touch weapon, which are made normally (no miss chance).

Given how touch attack is talked about before normal weapons and magical weapons, it seems likely to me that these are special and separate.

[Doctor Awkward]

If an incorporeal touch attack was subject to a miss chance against a corporeal target, then the description of the attack would say so.

[Ramza00]

Just a quick reminder! Remember that 3.5 and Pathfinder have different incorporeal rules because 3.5 rules are confusing.

[the_tick_rules]

there is also a ghost ward property from the MIC that helps corporeal targets go a long way to getting a decent AC against incorporeal. It's a +1 for shields or armor that adds the enhancement bonus to touch attacks. My first thought when I read this was he this could really help against ranged touch attacks like spellcasters use. In it's original form in Libris Mortis it only worked against incorporeal but in MIC it says all touch attacks including incorporeal.