I love homebrewing, and figuring out what makes interesting, balanced custom monsters and encounters for 2E is my favourite way to explore the new system, finding things that seem wrong or work really well. I've made around 60 so far, and want to start sharing them to make some discussion on monster design.
Creature of the Day #1: Wubbleshell
The Wubbleshell is my design of a level 0 creature. It's an elemental animal, frequently found in southern Alay, and throughout Maab. Their claws are prized as a culinary delicacy. In combat, they are generally weak, but can effectively steal items and hamper characters, making them potentially potent ads during tougher combats.
I ran 4 of them in the second combat for my home game. It went great. They provided a good chance for characters to show off a range of their basic competencies, without being overly threatening. +4 to-hit was plenty considering they had three attacks a turn and were meant to be the least threatening tier of creature.
One character wanted to focus on Ray of Frost, which had minimal effectiveness and was kind of a bummer for him, but it still did something and that's probably okay.
After running Doomsday Dawn, I feel the level 0 creatures there were overtuned for 'the weakest tier of enemy statted', and perhaps we need a 'level -1' or 'level -2' tier if they want to keep level 0 creatures at that point.
What else would you like to see in stat blocks? Class DC? Ecology notes? How do you feel about 2E's level 0 design?