Does any have any further clarification to this?
Universal Monster Rules: Incorporeal.
Nonvisual senses, such as scent and blindsight, are either ineffective or only partly effective with regard to incorporeal creatures.
What would determine if a given detection ability was either ineffective or only partially effective, and what would occur if it's partially effective?
What would determine if a given detection ability was either ineffective or only partially effective?
Your GM.
what would occur if it's partially effective?
Ask your GM.
If the above answers sound flippant, they're not meant to be. It's just the rules don't have an answer for this. Or at least, I'm not aware of any answers.
It seems to be assumed that you can see an incorporeal creature (unless it has an additional ability like Invisibility, but that is a separate issue). Mainly because the game assumes by default that all creatures can see all creatures - any variance from this default must be explicitly spelled out. Incorporeal rules don't explicitly spell out being invisible so they're not. Therefore everyone can see them, subject to other vision-based concerns like concealment, cover, distance, etc.
Can you smell them? The rules don't say - Scent could be ineffective or only partially effective (whatever that means; it's not defined). Me, I rule that there is some weird otherworldly ozone smell that accompanies incorporeal creatures - it's so faint that normal noses miss it completely but creatures with Scent can pick it up, but it all smells the same so even a creature with Scent cannot identify two distinct sources (they would think it was just one) and cannot recognize individual incorporeal creatures by their unique scents (the way a dog can tell its owner apart from other people by scent) because the weird ozone smell is the same for everything. Ergo, partially effective by my take which is totally not RAW, just one GM's stab at making sense of the rules in a lore-friendly way.
Does Blindsight work on them? Nope. Not in my game. Incorporeal creatures can be completely silent if they want to be and they don't cause breezes or changes in air flow when they move. They might, for fun, lower the temperature near them, but that's not enough to attack and parry in combat. Again, just my take.
|
Blindsight (Ex) This ability is similar to blindsense, but is far more discerning. Using nonvisual senses, such as sensitivity to vibrations, keen smell, acute hearing, or echolocation, a creature with blindsight maneuvers and fights as well as a sighted creature.
Just highlighting for context, your GM may need to evaluate the type of blindsight and decide if it is relevant to the creature. I once had a special cave troll with blindsight who became effectively blinded by a player casting silence because it was echolocation based.
Does the creature make noise? or have a smell becomes a very subjective question from monster to monster. There is some incorporeal cloud thing that drains blood, while maybe it is invisible to blindsight before it drains someone, but afterwards gives off a metalic scent that a blindsight from "keen scent" or a creature with scent might detect.
So really, what Blake said...
Excellent concepts and ideas. Thank you so much everyone!
The specific encounter is between a monster summoned shadow demon (the Incorporeal creature), and a creature with Blood Sense.