#nmap -sP 192.168.1.0/24 might be the most commonly used line of nmap. But it works best on V5.0 and not V5.x+
Have you reported it on the nmap-dev mailing list with packet dumps?
We also felt that the old -sP ("ping scan") option was a bit misleading because current versions of Nmap can go much further (including -sC and --traceroute) even with port scans disabled. We will retain support for the previous option names for the foreseeable future.