I have a rogue player who like to use 4th level invisibility so that he doesn't become visible when he attacks. He claims that he can attack someone several times in the round and is still undetected at the beginning of his opponent's turn. I contend that he is instead hidden, since he clearly isn't being stealthy any more. Even if I perform a seek against him by his adjacent target, technically it uses his stealth DC, even though he is busy hacking away at his target and not trying to hide.
I think that he should have to spend an action sneaking away from the square he was attacking from to become undetected again. I think he should become hidden as soon as he attacks in melee (maybe just on a hit) or makes an obviously visible ranged attack, like a ray of frost. I can't find any rules stating that though, so I may be bringing in things from other systems.
Greater Invisibility (make sure he's using Greater and not regular Invisibility). I'm not even sure how a rogue would get Greater Invisibility, unless he's playing the caster archetype.
So, when he attacks the enemy is definitely aware that they've been attacked though they might not be sure who.
Unless your player is sniping, they automatically becomes "detected". Generally your player also isn't going to walk around with Gretaer Invisibility running, since it's duration is rounds per level, so the enemy will start of aware of location, and move to aware of presence when he casts Greater Invisibility.
States of Awareness: In general, there are four states of awareness that a creature can have with regard to another creature using Stealth.
Unaware: On one end of the spectrum, a sneaking creature can succeed at Stealth well enough that the other creature isn’t even aware that the creature is present. This state allows the sneaking creature to use abilities such as the vigilante’s startling appearance. The Stealth skill description in the Core Rulebook says that perceiving creatures that fail to beat a sneaking character’s Stealth check result are not aware of the sneaking character, but that is different from being totally unaware. This is also true of a creature that has previously been made aware of the creature’s presence or location (see below) but is currently unable to observe the sneaking creature. In those cases, the sneaking creature can’t use abilities such as startling presence.
Aware of Presence: The next state is when the perceiving creature is aware of the sneaking creature’s presence, though not of anything beyond that. This is the state that happens when an invisible creature attacks someone and then successfully uses Stealth so the perceiving creature doesn’t know where the attacker moved, or when a sniper succeeds at her Stealth check to snipe. A perceiving creature that becomes aware of a hidden creature’s presence will still be aware of its presence at least until the danger of the situation continues, if not longer (though memory-altering magic can change this).
Aware of Location: The next state is awareness of location. This happens when a perceiving character uses an imprecise sense, such as hearing or tremorsense, to discover what square a hidden or invisible creature inhabits.
Observing: The final state is when the perceiving character is able to directly observe the sneaking character with a precise sense, such as vision. This is generally the result when the perceiving character rolls higher on its opposed Perception check than the sneaking character’s Stealth result while also having line of sight to the sneaking character and the ability to see through any sort of invisibility or other tricks the sneaking character might be using.
That would be the Aware of Presence state.
What the 4th level invibility does is a) to make him invisible and b) to not end the spell once he attacks.
While being invisible as per the conditions description it tells us that:
"You’re undetected to everyone. Creatures can Seek to attempt to detect you; if a creature succeeds at its Perception check against your Stealth DC, you become hidden to that creature until you Sneak to become undetected again."
which however mandates that you have a stealth DC to beginn with.
Imprecise senses gives us:
Hearing is an imprecise sense—it cannot detect the full range of detail that a precise sense can. You can usually sense a creature automatically with an imprecise sense, but it has the hidden condition instead of the observed condition. It might be undetected by you if it’s using Stealth or is in an environment that distorts the sense, such as a noisy room in the case of hearing.
So in my humble opinion he only is undeteced if he spends his last action a round on a successful sneak action.
It is hard to keep people guessing on your whereabouts when you are producing a lot of noise while keeping stationary, even when invisible.
Ubertron, State of Awareness rules were later released in...I forget which book...which kind of rewrote the whole rules on Stealth.
Even if the player succeeds on a stealth check the enemy would still be aware of presence. If the player failed the enemy would be aware of location.
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Your interpretation is correct, at least, that's how I run it. Attacking makes him Hidden until he successfully Sneaks again.
Invisible
A creature with the invisible condition (by way of an
invisibility spell or invisibility potion, for example) is
automatically undetected to any creatures relying on
sight as their only precise sense. Precise senses other than
sight ignore the invisible condition.
You can use the Seek basic action to attempt to figure
out an invisible creature’s location, making it instead only
hidden from you. This lasts until the invisible creature
successfully uses Sneak to become undetected again. If
you’re already observing a creature when it becomes
invisible, it starts out hidden, since you know where it
was when it became invisible, though it can then Sneak to
become undetected.
Other effects might make an invisible creature
hidden or even observed but concealed. For instance,
if you were tracking an invisible creature’s footprints
through the snow, the footprints would make it hidden.
Similarly, throwing a net over an invisible creature
would make it observed but concealed for as long as
the net is on the creature.
Undetected
If a creature is undetected, you don’t know what space
it occupies, you’re flat-footed to it, and you can’t easily
target it.
Hidden
A creature that’s hidden is only barely perceptible. You
know what space a hidden creature occupies, but little
else.
In addition, the rules for both Hide and Sneak both state that Striking makes you Observed. Things with the Invisible Condition, that become Observed, become Hidden or Concealed instead.
Striking an enemy is an "other effect" that makes the creature Hidden. You clearly know what square the thing that just stabbed you is in.
If he continues to argue, try stabbing him in the ribs and see if he thinks you're Undetected. (Please don't really do this. I take no responsibility for your actions.)
I want to chime back in and say that for some reason I thought I was in a PF1 thread here and the information I posted isn't accurate for PF2 but the result is similar.
Attacking someone while Invisible means they know you exist and often what square you are in, making you not undetected.