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Q: Are the movement penalties listed under the Invisibility special ability only applicable to creatures not using stealth while invisible? The same table contains a row showing that creatures "Using Stealth" have a perception DC to get noticed equal to "Stealth check +20", and we all know that using stealth requires a creature to move at half speed.
Effectively, is the DC to notice a creature using stealth while moving equal to "stealth +20" or is the DC further modified with the -5 penalty listed when creatures are "Moving at half speed."
(NOTE: several abilities in the game, such as the Fast Stealth rogue talent, allow creatures to use stealth at full speed without any penalty to stealth, and thus if the ruling above is a flat "stealth +20", such creatures would be harder to notice or pinpoint while they are invisible -- i.e. moving at full speed is normally a -10 penalty to the perception DC to notice an invisible creature)
Any help would be greatly appreciated!
My understanding is that they combine/stack. Invisibility creates a sort of buff to stealth. If you were moving at full speed, that would inhibit how effective that buff is, even if you can still use stealth while moving at full speed. After all, stealth is about more than just sight, but also sound. Speaking completely negates the idea that "nothing is there", thus eliminating that +20 buff you would get.
For example, remember that Pathfinder is based on 3.5, which had "Move Silently" and "Hide" as two separate skills and (a decision I agree with) chose to combine them into the single "Stealth" skill. There's more to hiding than just not being seen. This is also why they talk about scent ability within the Invisible status section. You still evoke things detectable by the other senses (hearing, smelling, touch, and the hopefully never finding out, taste).
I'm pretty sure you add the tables together.
There is a base DC 20 perception check to detect an invisible creature within 30 feet of you. The table describes ways that DC 20 is modified. If the invisible creature is actually trying to go undetected, they can replace that base DC 20 with a stealth check + 20, then add any modifiers.
So an invisible creature moving quickly but with stealth, first rolls a stealth check (+6 ranks, trained, 3 dex = +12, d20 = 11, normal speed = -5) and gets a 12+11-5 = 18. Since they are invisible, add 20 for a 38. Moving at full speed means -10. So their final number is 18 + 20 - 10 = 28. This is the DC needed to detect the person within 30 feet assuming no other modifying situations. If it had the 'fast stealth' talent, that would negate the -5 from the stealth check, but not the -10 from the invisibility table.
If the creatures slows down to half speed and roll a 15 on the stealth d20, they'd now have a 15 + 12 + 20 - 5 (half speed) = 42. If they start running, they can no longer make a stealth check, so the number is 20 (base for being invisible) - 20 (for running) = 0 (easy to know someone is around they are running by you, even if you can't see them).
Now, if you have this creature standing perfectly still and they roll a 3, it is 3 + 12 + 20 + 20 (still) = 55. Hard to detect a still and invisible creature. However, if they talk, it will negate the +20 for standing still.
Another way to think about it is that there are stealth check modifiers taken by the person making a stealth check defined by the stealth skill. Then there are perception check difficulty modifiers defined by the invisibility chart. So you use stealth to decide how quiet you are, then you use the invisibility chart to decide how hard it is to detect you.
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As you can see, if the movement penalties indeed combine/stack, then it can quickly become a bit of a nuisance at the gaming table. But I agree they should stack: someone WITHOUT the fast stealth feature would suffer a penalty to stealth checks anyway when moving at full speed, plus movement penalties. Someone WITH fast stealth suffers no penalty to stealth checks, but still retain the movement penalties.
Basically, we all seem to be in agreement that the movement penalties are a hard set feature of the invisibility condition (i.e. invisibility "falters" when a creature is moving, as if struggling to keep up, and when running/charging, the light visibly bends around the creature thus negating the +20 with a -20 penalty...)
I speak of light "bending" or "creature outline" becoming somewhat visible here, the faster a creature moves, because the table movement penalties are not associated to sound or scent; in fact the table has other penalties related to noise (i.e. combat or speaking -20). This seems to be supported by the table's other entry (i.e. not moving +20) which somewhat indicates that invisibility is optimal when a creature or object is at rest, in an stationary position.
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Ah but the movement penalties listed under the Invisibility special ability are a different set of penalties associated to how the Invisibility spell functions. The "Stealth +20" assumes you've already penalized your stealth check with whatever is listed under your stealth skill.
The -10 is the movement penalty to the Invisibility buff, not to the stealth score. Moving at increased speed within Stealth may have it's own penalty (in which case, yes, it penalizes twice). Stealth is an opposed check; not just arbitrary success or failure. You could be stealthy against enemy A because he rolled crappy, but be visible to person B because he didn't roll crappy.
If you want further example, look under http://paizo.com/pathfinderRPG/prd/skills/stealth.html#stealth. There it says that you gain a +40 to your stealth check if you aren't moving, but +20 if you are.