D&D 5E - Wall of Force - Incorporeal creatures ?

May 2024 ยท 2 minute read

No because the Wall extends into the Ethereal plane. Which is how incorporeal creatures move around.


That was the 3.5 rule. The Incorporeal Movement trait no longer says it is ethereal. In fact, a Ghost can be either in the ethereal plane or the material plane, but it has the incorporeal movement ability regardless. Other incorporeal creatures have no tie to the ethereal plane at all mentioned in the RAW. Take Will-o-the-wisps, which are incorporeal yet nothing in the description even mentions the ethereal plane.

Plenty of creatures and spells do expressly mention ethereal travel and so those would be blocked by a wall of force, but by RAW nothing suggests that incorporeal movement trait can be thwarted by force effects or the Wall of Force specifically.

Even the description of the Ethereal Plane in the SMG does not mention incorporeal creatures in general (it mentions the ghost specifically, but the ghost expressly can move into the ethereal plane as a special ability listed in the Monster Manual which other incorporeal creatures lack). This means if you were ethereal, you could spy on a wraith and it could not see you, because it does not have the ability to see ethereal creatures.

Obviously, your DM could rule that in his game world "force" effects black incorporeal creatures, but RAW suggests that those creatures would just treat them as difficult terrain as they do with any object.

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