Shifter natural weapons: primary attacks or secondary?

[ChupacabraJohn]

I'm looking at a Shifter race with Longtooth and Razorclaw shifter traits, do those all attack at full attack bonus, or do some of those attacks revert to secondary attacks?
Also, if I go weretouched master (assumed unerrata'd) can I use my shift ability in my alternate form? And does my longtooth elite feat apply to bite attacks I have in my alternate form?

Thanks.

[Keldar]

When in doubt, go with the basic rules.  Typically this means the bite attack would be primary, and the claws would be secondary.  Even if the wizard polymorphs you into a 12 headed hydra.  Chasing the rules down the rabbit hole of "As Polymorph" using the alternate form¹ would indeed bar you from using your shifter traits, as with Alter Self.²  Longtooth Elite doesn't specify bite source, so it should work with any bite, and its a feat so it keeps working despite the form changing.



¹Mind, I haven't looked around for errata or faqs on the subject which might change that.
²That's half the reason Polymorph is such a mess in 3E.  Idiots just kept chaining references and made it impossible to keep track of what the hell everything did.  It was like they were writing a bill.   

[ChupacabraJohn]

Because polymorph functions like alter self, and alter self says you retain supernatural [and spell-like abilities] from your normal form wouldn't shifter keep Shifting since it's (su)?

[Keldar]

I did not notice Shifting was (Su).  Carry on.

[Argent Fatalis]

To answer your question I would defer to most animal entries and which Shifter trait you had first. For example, Razorclaw being first makes the claws primary (as seen with both the tiger and bear monster entries),  but if Longtooth were first, the bite is the primary. The other natural attacks which are not primary are standard secondary natural attacks (hence why Shifters have access as they do to Shifter Multiattack).

You do also indeed retain your Shifting racial ability as a Weretouched Master in Alternate Form, which still provides its associated benefits by being activated; your Alternate Form does not immediately grant all those benefits if I recall correctly (D&D Tools is giving me errors so I cannot check that given I am away from books).

[faeryn]

Reading through the Shifter race entry and the Shifter Traits I have actually found the answer to your question...

Longtooth (Su): While shifting, a longtooth shifter gains a +2 bonus to Strength and grows fangs that can be used as a natural weapon, dealing 1d6 points of damage (plus an extra 1 point for every four character levels he has) with a successful bite attack. He cannot attack more than once per round with his bite, even if his base attack bonus is high enough to give him multiple attacks. He can use his bite as a secondary attack (taking a —5 penalty on his attack roll) while wielding a weapon.
Razorclaw (Su): While shifting, a razorclaw shifter gains a +2 bonus to Strength and grows claws that can be used as natural weapons. These claws deal 1d4 points of damage (plus an extra 1 point for every four character levels he has) with each successful attack. He can attack with one claw as a standard action or with two claws as a full attack action (as a primary natural weapon). He cannot attack more than once per round with a single claw, even if his base attack bonus is high enough to give him multiple attacks. He can attack with a claw as a light off-hand weapon while wielding a weapon in his primary hand, but all his attacks in that round take a —2 penalty.

It seems pretty clear that the Bite attack from a Longtooth Shifter is a secondary natural weapon, and the claws from a Razorclaw Shifter are primary natural weapons.

[Argent Fatalis]

Longtooth (Su): While shifting, a longtooth shifter gains a +2 bonus to Strength and grows fangs that can be used as a natural weapon, dealing 1d6 points of damage (plus an extra 1 point for every four character levels he has) with a successful bite attack. He cannot attack more than once per round with his bite, even if his base attack bonus is high enough to give him multiple attacks. He can use his bite as a secondary attack (taking a —5 penalty on his attack roll) while wielding a weapon.

Razorclaw (Su): While shifting, a razorclaw shifter gains a +2 bonus to Strength and grows claws that can be used as natural weapons. These claws deal 1d4 points of damage (plus an extra 1 point for every four character levels he has) with each successful attack. He can attack with one claw as a standard action or with two claws as a full attack action (as a primary natural weapon). He cannot attack more than once per round with a single claw, even if his base attack bonus is high enough to give him multiple attacks. He can attack with a claw as a light off-hand weapon while wielding a weapon in his primary hand, but all his attacks in that round take a —2 penalty.

Perhaps I am reading it entirely differently, but the text regarding the bite is inferring that he can still use his bite attack in addition to his weapon attacks. Which is no different than the established secondary natural attack quality. The character with the bite attack does not suddenly lose his ability to make a bite attack if he's not conventionally armed with a weapon; in a way, the sentence about not attacking more than once per round with a bite sort of supports that as that is the typical convention when dealing with a natural bite attack.

Building off that, in regard to the claws, it is no different than the standard rules for a claw and a weapon.

In effect you are "two-weapon fighting" in a way while armed with a single weapon and having two natural claw attacks (one is removed because a hand is occupied). Without a weapon, thus just the claws, it is no different than any other natural claw attack - one single attack as a standard action, or two claws as a full attack action.

I don't want to give the impression that a Shifter suddenly has a bunch of unusual exceptions to fairly (in terms of 3.5e's inherent insanity) standardized functions on natural attacks - at least where claw and bite is concerned.

Edit: I suppose in theory you could force the bite attack to default to a secondary attack in the context of having both claw attacks and a bite - the claws do count as "weapons", albeit natural ones - but there's creatures such as the Smilodon (Frostburn, pg 118) which has a primary bite attack and a secondary set of claw attacks. Sure, degrees of separation and all, but animal types with claw and bite attacks are probably the best frontrunners for examples of execution.

[faeryn]

The main point behind what I found is that the Claws for a Razerclaw Shifter are infact defined as a Primary Natural Weapon, flat out.... The Bite may be able to be treated as a primary attack and becomes secondary when used in combination with manufactured weapons... Should someone combine both Razorclaw and Longtooth (via racial feats or racial class/substitutions) then If you take a literal reding, then the Claws would be Primary and the Bite would become Secondary if used together.

[linklord231]

Just pick one. 

When a creature has more than one natural weapon, one of them (or sometimes a pair or set of them) is the primary weapon. All the creature’s remaining natural weapons are secondary.

The primary weapon is given in the creature’s Attack entry, and the primary weapon or weapons is given first in the creature’s Full Attack entry. A creature’s primary natural weapon is its most effective natural attack, usually by virtue of the creature’s physiology, training, or innate talent with the weapon.

Choose either your bite or your two claws.  One of them is primary, the other is secondary.  In order for them both to be primary, you'd have to have some specific language that would make them be primary attacks even if you already had a primary natural attack.

Personally I'd go with the claws.  2 primary natural weapons are better than 1.