I'm curious as to other GMs' preferences concerning bestiary design standards and related miscellany.
1 - Would you prefer creature layouts (non-animal, non-construct) built at 0HD (or close) in order to allow for maximum customization?
2 - Do you advance creatures as needed or prefer to stick with whatever published builds are available?
3 - If you advance or modify creatures, what is the preferred method (standard HD advancement, class levels, etc.)?
1 - Yes. Alterations would be much easier and many other playstyles could be addressed without sacrificing anything.
2 - A good sixty percent of enemies in my games are humans, which means custom builds outside of whatever I can dig up in the GMG.
3 - I strongly prefer to use class levels if I've got time to prepare.
1. No. I like creatures to be different; many special abilities found on monsters would be far too powerful and/or wouldn't really work on a 0 HD creature. I can't really imagine what a 0 HD Pit Fiend or Tarrasque would look like :)
2. I advance creatures as needed, but pre-published builds frequently suffice.
3. Both. Some creatures are more appropriately advanced by HD (most animals, constructs, magical beasts, oozes, plants, undead and vermin fall into this category), while others are more appropriately advanced by class levels.