Book of the Dead - Monster Manual by Mesh Hong

[Mesh Hong]

I also like the island side adventure you've built in and I think I can use it.

Good stuff, this was actually a side quest in my main campaign and was designed with my PCs in mind. If you plan to run it I have the following advice:

1: Double check that the Hydra isn't too strong, it should be alright but it depends on the size and composition of your party.

2: Give plenty of thought to the final encounter with teh Flesh Prince, when I ran it he was pretty much locked down so wasn't as dangerous as I had hoped. You might consider planning some reinforcements for him that could come come through the portal to the shadowfell at a dramatic moment if necessary.

If I come up with any questions/concerns/comments once I start putting the monsters into my adventure, I'll be sure and let you know. I'll also try to post something after I've run them here.

Thanks, any feedback (positive or negative) is always helpful.

 

[Jindy]

Thanks for the tips. I've got a party of 5 (Dragonborn Fighter, Human Warlord (with throwing shield named "Steve"), a Human Rogue, an Eladrin Wizard and a Dwarf Cleric). The Fighter does a pretty good job of locking foes in place, so I may want to bring in some additional backup to help the Flesh Prince.

As for the Hydra... I think I'll change the Withering Blast to ongoing 10 necrotic instead of the lose a healing surge every round thing. Last encounter I ran where the players lost a healing surge from a creature's attacks was almost the end of the adventuring day.

 

[sfedi]

Very nice work! At last some quality made monsters! (yes MM, I'm looking at YOU!!!)

I've just donwloaded it and I'm taking a look at the different monsters.

Some observations:

Bone Blade Skeleton:
- He is a Skirmisher, yet it doesn't have any movement related abilities.
- His Double attack has a damage potential as that of a Brute.
- Sly Stab screams "Brute", and Speed of the Dead "Soldier".
- Necrotic Advantage adds more damage to the above, making him more Brute-ish.

Clutching Zombie:
- Why does Sleeper Hold specifies that "Target must be grabbed at start of Zombies turn"? (it already says "grabbed target only" on the keyword section of the power)

Corpse Catapult:
- The Offal Shot doesn't state how long the zone lasts.
- I'd recommend it to have Perception trained

Crawling Hand:
- It has a "spiderclimb" speed listed, instead of a "climb" speed
- It has no Basic Attacks
- Unnatural Reaction has no frequency (At-will, Encounter, etc.)
- It feels strange that a Tiny Hand can Immobilize you (via Grab)

Fidget Tick:
- The Latch On wording is tricky here. The way it's worded, the Tick would damage with it, then the victim would take 10 acid damage before it has any chance to escape, then the victim would have only one chance to escape (because it is Dazed) barring any allied help.

So, potentially, on a hit, this creature delivers 1d6 + 14 damage and eats up one character's action trying to free himself (much like Stunning) and heals 10 on it's turn.

Seems EXTREMELY powerful. It's feels more on the side of an Elite.

I'll add more comments later.

Good job.

 

[Mesh Hong]

Very nice work! At last some quality made monsters! (yes MM, I'm looking at YOU!!!)

Thank you, I created this some time ago and the art of monster making is a continual learning process so there may be some inconsistencies in it. There are probably some things I would do differently now, but I welcome any feedback and will enjoy answering any questions or concerns.

Like all creatures though, each has to be weighed against the PCs it is facing and the composition of the encounter it is to be placed in. I generally create creatures on the strong side and like to consider them all serious threats, if you want more mundane threats there is always the MMI.

Bone Blade Skeleton:
- He is a Skirmisher, yet it doesn't have any movement related abilities.
- His Double attack has a damage potential as that of a Brute.
- Sly Stab screams "Brute", and Speed of the Dead "Soldier".
- Necrotic Advantage adds more damage to the above, making him more Brute-ish.

The Bone Blade Skeleton was my attempt at a mini “Tomb Guardian”, now it is worth noting that I consider the MMI Tomb Guardian to be hideously overpowered for a standard creature. Personally I would use a maximum of two of these in an encounter as they are pretty efficient.

- Skirmisher is pretty much the default creature type, not all skirmishers need to have movement related powers.

- I agree that the damage potential of his double attack is strong, it is 2 attacks at the low damage expression. Personally I don’t see a problem with this (and it is slightly less accurate when using its double attack), but you could lower each attack to 1d4+4 if you felt it was necessary.

- Sly stab seems like a skirmisher or lurker power to me. It is an encounter power that targets Will (I doubt many brute powers target will) and deals skirmisher or lurker level damage. For this creature standard skirmisher damage would be 1d8+4 (standard attack) + 1d6 (sneak attack); this attack is slightly weaker in damage at 2d6+4 but adds the loss of a healing surge. To me this seems reasonable as an encounter power.

- Speed of the Dead is very much a skeleton power in my opinion and I quite often use it, with the additional +1d6 damage removed as it doesn’t fit the balance of this creature.

Clutching Zombie:
- Why does Sleeper Hold specifies that "Target must be grabbed at start of Zombies turn"? (it already says "grabbed target only" on the keyword section of the power)

This is a good example of how my opinions have changed. For some reason I used to strongly believe that it wasn’t fair for a creature to be able to grab someone then have another attack at them before the target had a chance to escape. This belief gripped me so much that I felt compelled to add “Target must be grabbed at start of creatures turn” before all stage two grabbed attacks, even when it was a standard creature and had no way of doing this (in theory only an elite or solo could do this). Needless to say I rarely use this phrase now as it is completely unnecessary.

Corpse Catapult:
- The Offal Shot doesn't state how long the zone lasts.
- I'd recommend it to have Perception trained

- The zone should last until the end of the encounter

- The way I envisioned the Corpse Catapult was that it needed support, and part of that support would be allies telling it where to target. I don’t see it as a guardian or soldier, I see it as a siege engine or tool and the lack of perception in a small way enforces this.

Crawling Hand:
- It has a "spiderclimb" speed listed, instead of a "climb" speed
- It has no Basic Attacks
- Unnatural Reaction has no frequency (At-will, Encounter, etc.)
- It feels strange that a Tiny Hand can Immobilize you (via Grab)

The Crawling Hand was designed before Open Grave came out that contains the Crawling Claws. The Crawling Claws may be better designed creatures, and it is probably worth noting that my Crawling Hand came from a ideas thread (it looks like I should have given it a more thorough examination before putting it in the book!)

- Yes it should be climb 4 (spiderclimb)

- Hand Grab should be a basic melee attack

- Unnatural Cunning is an immediate reaction, and should state at will, when missed by a melee attack

- The immobilised comes from the hand jumping up and grabbing your throat, you are so busy wrestling with it that you can’t move. I admit it doesn’t make a great deal of sense, but then it is a crawling hand.

Fidget Tick:
- The Latch On wording is tricky here. The way it's worded, the Tick would damage with it, then the victim would take 10 acid damage before it has any chance to escape, then the victim would have only one chance to escape (because it is Dazed) barring any allied help.

So, potentially, on a hit, this creature delivers 1d6 + 14 damage and eats up one character's action trying to free himself (much like Stunning) and heals 10 on it's turn.

Seems EXTREMELY powerful. It's feels more on the side of an Elite.

I really like the Fidget Tick, for all its failings it has a lot of personality (in my mind anyway).

- The Latch on power possibly needs a rewrite for clarity (it’s a little bit fiddly but still reads quite logically to me), if I did it now it might be something like:

M Latch On (standard, at will) s acid
Attack +9 vs. Reflex; 1d6+4 damage; on hit target is grabbed, dazed and takes 10 ongoing acid damage (escape ends all); also see Feeding hold

Feeding Hold s healing, While using Latch On
When Fidget Tick has a target grabbed with its Latch On power it cannot take any actions and cannot make opportunity attacks; Fidget Tick gains regeneration 10 and a +4 bonus to its AC defence until its target escapes the grab

As to it being EXTREMELY powerful, I actually think the opposite. I think one of its failings is that it is underpowered!

A lurker of its level should be dealing 1d10+4 (standard) +1d6 (sneak attack) damage on a standard attack with combat advantage. This creature deals 1d6+4 damage on its attack, then deals 10 damage on subsequent rounds. The daze effect and regenerate 10 compensate for this but PCs have lots of ways to extricate their allies from grabs e.g. any push, pull or slide attack. Also regenerate 10 isn’t that significant when compared to PCs attacks.

An encounter with Fidget Ticks should be a chaotic affair with them jumping around all over the place and latching on to PCs in an almost comical manner. To me they are very very lurker like and should provide an entertaining and memorable encounter.

I'll add more comments later.

I look forward to it, it’s a good excuse to revisit some of my old creations and question my creature design philosophy. I put these out as a resource for people so it is always good to get honest feedback to improve my creations.

 

[sfedi]

Thank you, I created this some time ago and the art of monster making is a continual learning process so there may be some inconsistencies in it. There are probably some things I would do differently now, but I welcome any feedback and will enjoy answering any questions or concerns.

Would you prefer me to comment on your more recent work?

Like all creatures though, each has to be weighed against the PCs it is facing and the composition of the encounter it is to be placed in. I generally create creatures on the strong side and like to consider them all serious threats, if you want more mundane threats there is always the MMI.

I'm not sure what you mean by "each has to be weighed against the PCs it is facing". Those this mean that they are optimized to fight your PCs?

The Bone Blade Skeleton was my attempt at a mini “Tomb Guardian”, now it is worth noting that I consider the MMI Tomb Guardian to be hideously overpowered for a standard creature. Personally I would use a maximum of two of these in an encounter as they are pretty efficient.

Yes, Cascade of Steel is the offender there.
It should be an encounter power.

- Skirmisher is pretty much the default creature type, not all skirmishers need to have movement related powers.

I strongly disagree. From the DMG, page 55:

Skirmisher
Skirmisher monsters use mobility to threaten the
player characters. Their combat statistics define the
baseline for monsters, but their mobility is their defin‑
ing feature.

But this discussion should have it's own thread.

- The way I envisioned the Corpse Catapult was that it needed support, and part of that support would be allies telling it where to target. I don’t see it as a guardian or soldier, I see it as a siege engine or tool and the lack of perception in a small way enforces this.

Well, that makes sense.
Having a second look at it, a hidden enemy may not be a particular difficult problem for the Corpse Catapult (which is why I recommended it to have Perception trained).

As to it being EXTREMELY powerful, I actually think the opposite. I think one of its failings is that it is underpowered!

A lurker of its level should be dealing 1d10+4 (standard) +1d6 (sneak attack) damage on a standard attack with combat advantage. This creature deals 1d6+4 damage on its attack, then deals 10 damage on subsequent rounds. The daze effect and regenerate 10 compensate for this but PCs have lots of ways to extricate their allies from grabs e.g. any push, pull or slide attack. Also regenerate 10 isn’t that significant when compared to PCs attacks.

Mmm, I'll show you my math, to see where we diverge.

First, let's see the Sneak thing.
For creatures that use Sneak, they usually substract 2 from the average damage, but add 3.5 (1d6) for gaining combat advantage. So whether a creature uses Sneak or not is irrelevant, since it can be easily factored in or out.

Now, on the expected damage.

In general it's quite complicated to do the math of Lurkers, and the Fidget Tick in particuar.

A normal Lurker of the Tick's level is supposed to do 2d8+4, which is an average of 13 damage. Factoring the usual 50% chance to hit, this is an effective 6.5 average damage.

In the case of the Tick, let's see these scenarios:
(I'm assuming an 8 average damage from the Tick and 10 from the PCs)

Target gets help

- Tick attacks
- Target's ally turn: attacks the tick and if hit, Tick looses grab
- Target's turn: attacks Tick if free

Assuming 50% chance of each event to occur:

- Tick expected damage: 6.5 (4 from attack + 2.5 from Ongoing Damage)
- Tick expected healing: 2.5
- Tick received two attacks (expected damage: 10)
- Tick consumed the actions of two party members
- We are assuming a forced movement attack from the ally, which should lower the damage taken by the Tick. And not all groups have it.

In this scenario, the damage the Tick is doing is in line of a Lurker, but in addition he's healing and consuming the attention of two foes. He will last less because he receives two attacks per round (although the healing compensates this somewhat).

This scenario seems balanced IF there's a reliable source of forced movement.

Target tries to escape

- Tick attacks
- Target takes 10 damage if grabbed
- Target's turn: Tries to break free or attacks if free

Assuming 50% chance of each event to occur:

- Tick expected damage: 9 (4 from attack + 5 from Ongoing Damage)
- Tick expected healing: 5
- Tick received 50% of one attack (expected damage: 2.5)
- Tick consumed the actions of one party member

This scenario is clearly unbalanced.
But it's ok, because the player can easily choose not to take this action and do the next scenario.

Target strikes back

- Tick attacks
- Target takes 10 damage if grabbed
- Target's turn: he attacks the Tick

Assuming 50% chance of each event to occur:

- Tick expected damage: 9 (4 from attack + 5 from Ongoing Damage)
- Tick expected healing: 10
- Tick received one attack (expected damage: 5)
- Tick consumed the actions of one party member

Ok, this other scenario is unbalanced as well and the player ran out of options.

Note that in these calculations I never considered the +4 AC the Tick gains when Latched On.

Now let's see these scenarios again, but assuming the Tick is already Latched On:

Target gets help

- Tick heals 10
- Target's ally turn: attacks the tick and if hit, Tick looses grab
- Target's turn: takes 10 damage and attacks Tick if free

Assuming 50% chance of each event to occur:

- Tick expected damage: 5 (from Ongoing Damage)
- Tick expected healing: 10
- Tick received two attacks (expected damage: 10)
- Tick consumed the actions of two party members
- 50% chance that Tick can't repeat this scenario (because he is not grabbing and must attack again)

This scenario clearly favors the Tick, not only is he almost cancelling the damage taken, but he manages to damage one party member and consume the attention of two.

Target tries to escape

- Tick heals 10
- Target's turn: takes 10 damage and tries to break free

Assuming 50% chance of each event to occur:

- Tick expected damage: 10 (10 from Ongoing Damage)
- Tick expected healing: 10
- Tick received no attacks (expected damage: 0)
- Tick consumed the actions of one party member
- 50% chance that Tick can't repeat this scenario (because he is not grabbing and must attack again)

Another scenario that favors the Tick

Target strikes back

- Tick heals 10 damage
- Target takes 10 damage
- Target's turn: he attacks the Tick

Assuming 50% chance of each event to occur:

- Tick expected damage: 10 (from Ongoing Damage)
- Tick expected healing: 10
- Tick received one attack (expected damage: 5)
- Tick consumed the actions of one party member

Another clear advantage for the Tick.

This is why I think this creature is extremely unbalanced.
As an Elite (doubling it's hit points and leaving his powers as they are) it should be ok.

Note that I didn't consider the +4 to AC, or any focus fire by the strikers.

But I'm sure a 5 member party against 5 Ticks is a TPK.

An encounter with Fidget Ticks should be a chaotic affair with them jumping around all over the place and latching on to PCs in an almost comical manner. To me they are very very lurker like and should provide an entertaining and memorable encounter.

Oh, they definetely look fun to fight

 

[Mesh Hong]

Would you prefer me to comment on your more recent work?

No, not at all, its all useful and all part of the learning process. Discussions like these are probably very useful to other monster builders as well as being invaluable to myself. Your time is very much appreciated.

I'm not sure what you mean by "each has to be weighed against the PCs it is facing". Those this mean that they are optimized to fight your PCs?

I just mean that before you use any creature you have to consider it in the context of the PCs that will be facing it and the composition of the encounter it is part of (just common sense really). This is especially true with creatures designed by people online because their game style and idea of balance might be different from your own.

As an example I DM for a 6 PC group that has 3 strikers and a lot of healing. This has probably had an influence on the creatures I create and my expectations of what constitutes a reasonable threat. The reason I started creating my own monsters was that I found the MMI offerings both dull (to run and fight) and not threatening enough for my players.

I strongly disagree. From the DMG, page 55:

Skirmisher
Skirmisher monsters use mobility to threaten the
player characters. Their combat statistics define the
baseline for monsters, but their mobility is their defin‑
ing feature.

But this discussion should have it's own thread.

Highlighted for consideration

Yes I am aware of that, and this might be an interesting idea for a thread in its own right.

But what do you use when you want an average baseline for a creature? If you use brute then you have a creature with lower accuracy and defences, if you use soldier you have a creature with higher defences etc.

In my opinion it is acceptable for a skirmisher creature to not have any special movement abilities. But like all things that is just my opinion.

Some skirmishers from the MMI that do not have movement powers are:

Berbalang
Cyclops Battleweaver
Spined Devil
Doppleganger Sneak
Elf Scout (unless you count wild shape)
Abyssal Ghoul
Hyena
Wererat
Orc Raider
Rat Swarm
Gray Wolf
Dire Wolf

Mmm, I'll show you my math, to see where we diverge.

First, let's see the Sneak thing.
For creatures that use Sneak, they usually substract 2 from the average damage, but add 3.5 (1d6) for gaining combat advantage. So whether a creature uses Sneak or not is irrelevant, since it can be easily factored in or out.

Now, on the expected damage.

In general it's quite complicated to do the math of Lurkers, and the Fidget Tick in particuar.

A normal Lurker of the Tick's level is supposed to do 2d8+4, which is an average of 13 damage. Factoring the usual 50% chance to hit, this is an effective 6.5 average damage.

In the case of the Tick, let's see these scenarios:
(I'm assuming an 8 average damage from the Tick and 10 from the PCs)

Target gets help

- Tick attacks
- Target's ally turn: attacks the tick and if hit, Tick looses grab
- Target's turn: attacks Tick if free

Assuming 50% chance of each event to occur:

- Tick expected damage: 6.5 (4 from attack + 2.5 from Ongoing Damage)
- Tick expected healing: 2.5
- Tick received two attacks (expected damage: 10)
- Tick consumed the actions of two party members
- We are assuming a forced movement attack from the ally, which should lower the damage taken by the Tick. And not all groups have it.

In this scenario, the damage the Tick is doing is in line of a Lurker, but in addition he's healing and consuming the attention of two foes. He will last less because he receives two attacks per round (although the healing compensates this somewhat).

This scenario seems balanced IF there's a reliable source of forced movement.

Target tries to escape

- Tick attacks
- Target takes 10 damage if grabbed
- Target's turn: Tries to break free or attacks if free

Assuming 50% chance of each event to occur:

- Tick expected damage: 9 (4 from attack + 5 from Ongoing Damage)
- Tick expected healing: 5
- Tick received 50% of one attack (expected damage: 2.5)
- Tick consumed the actions of one party member

This scenario is clearly unbalanced.
But it's ok, because the player can easily choose not to take this action and do the next scenario.

Target strikes back

- Tick attacks
- Target takes 10 damage if grabbed
- Target's turn: he attacks the Tick

Assuming 50% chance of each event to occur:

- Tick expected damage: 9 (4 from attack + 5 from Ongoing Damage)
- Tick expected healing: 10
- Tick received one attack (expected damage: 5)
- Tick consumed the actions of one party member

Ok, this other scenario is unbalanced as well and the player ran out of options.

Note that in these calculations I never considered the +4 AC the Tick gains when Latched On.

Now let's see these scenarios again, but assuming the Tick is already Latched On:

Target gets help

- Tick heals 10
- Target's ally turn: attacks the tick and if hit, Tick looses grab
- Target's turn: takes 10 damage and attacks Tick if free

Assuming 50% chance of each event to occur:

- Tick expected damage: 5 (from Ongoing Damage)
- Tick expected healing: 10
- Tick received two attacks (expected damage: 10)
- Tick consumed the actions of two party members
- 50% chance that Tick can't repeat this scenario (because he is not grabbing and must attack again)

This scenario clearly favors the Tick, not only is he almost cancelling the damage taken, but he manages to damage one party member and consume the attention of two.

Target tries to escape

- Tick heals 10
- Target's turn: takes 10 damage and tries to break free

Assuming 50% chance of each event to occur:

- Tick expected damage: 10 (10 from Ongoing Damage)
- Tick expected healing: 10
- Tick received no attacks (expected damage: 0)
- Tick consumed the actions of one party member
- 50% chance that Tick can't repeat this scenario (because he is not grabbing and must attack again)

Another scenario that favors the Tick

Target strikes back

- Tick heals 10 damage
- Target takes 10 damage
- Target's turn: he attacks the Tick

Assuming 50% chance of each event to occur:

- Tick expected damage: 10 (from Ongoing Damage)
- Tick expected healing: 10
- Tick received one attack (expected damage: 5)
- Tick consumed the actions of one party member

Another clear advantage for the Tick.

This is why I think this creature is extremely unbalanced.
As an Elite (doubling it's hit points and leaving his powers as they are) it should be ok.

Note that I didn't consider the +4 to AC, or any focus fire by the strikers.

But I'm sure a 5 member party against 5 Ticks is a TPK.

Well I am not going to argue with your maths.

If I understand the gist of the maths you have laid out correctly I think the two areas of concern are the Daze effect and the Regeneration counteracting any damage the PC may or may not do.

Do you think something as simple as changing the daze effect into an immobilise effect would balance things out?

If they are only immobilised they can still make an escape attempt and make an attack if they are grabbed, or make 2 escape attempts if they want. (I have also been thinking that the Fidget Tick should really move into the targets square when the are grabbed).

If the above isn't enough the next thing I would suggest is halving the regeneration from 10 to 5 (actually it would be better if the Fidget Tick just healed 5 HPs when it applied its 10 ongoing damage).

I am loathed to lower the actual ongoing damage from the grab, but I agree that 10 ongoing damage is a very large amount for a level 6 PC to take. My original thinking was that it was balanced because the Fidget tick cannot take any actions while grabbing, including attacks and opportunity attacks (Ahhh, maybe instead of increasing its AC when grabbing it should be lowered 2 instead as it is helpless, or maybe it could provoke combat advantage against all enemies except the target it is grabbing?)

Oh, they definetely look fun to fight

Cool, that at the end of the day is what I'm after.

 

[sfedi]

I just mean that before you use any creature you have to consider it in the context of the PCs that will be facing it and the composition of the encounter it is part of (just common sense really). This is especially true with creatures designed by people online because their game style and idea of balance might be different from your own.

That's highly true.

One thing that could be useful is to have a lot of the design decisions that drove the creation process to be at the DMs disposal.

A declaration of intent, really.

In fact, all rules should have that.

As an example I DM for a 6 PC group that has 3 strikers and a lot of healing. This has probably had an influence on the creatures I create and my expectations of what constitutes a reasonable threat. The reason I started creating my own monsters was that I found the MMI offerings both dull (to run and fight) and not threatening enough for my players.

I know what you mean.

That's why I try to DM more than one group or design monsters and adventures in a general way, so I can reuse them without much thought.

But what do you use when you want an average baseline for a creature? If you use brute then you have a creature with lower accuracy and defences, if you use soldier you have a creature with higher defences etc.

In my opinion it is acceptable for a skirmisher creature to not have any special movement abilities. But like all things that is just my opinion.

Ok, now I understand what you are doing.

You want a new kind of creature, that doesn't clearly falls into a role (Skirmisher, Soldier, etc) and you have to use the Base creature.

Some skirmishers from the MMI that do not have movement powers are:

Berbalang
Cyclops Battleweaver
Spined Devil
Doppleganger Sneak
Elf Scout (unless you count wild shape)
Abyssal Ghoul
Hyena
Wererat
Orc Raider
Rat Swarm
Gray Wolf
Dire Wolf

Yes, some of them don't have movement related powers.
But not all of those you cite.
Some have movement related powers. But instead of they been very mobile, they condition the movement of their foes: Cyclops Battleweaver for exemple.
Others don't gain mobility themselves, but act as if they had, the Berbalang for example.

Well I am not going to argue with your maths.

If I understand the gist of the maths you have laid out correctly I think the two areas of concern are the Daze effect and the Regeneration counteracting any damage the PC may or may not do.

Yes, those are the main areas.
Although this monster has several subtleties, and thus, it's threat could be regulated adjusting several things.
But those you note are the more obvious ones.

Do you think something as simple as changing the daze effect into an immobilise effect would balance things out?

Well, grab could be better.
This way, all expected damage and healing that depend on him been Latched On, drops by half.

If they are only immobilised they can still make an escape attempt and make an attack if they are grabbed, or make 2 escape attempts if they want. (I have also been thinking that the Fidget Tick should really move into the targets square when the are grabbed).

Exactly.
I'm not sure about the move into the target's square thing. It's something that haven't been done in any MM, and for a good reason I think: it doesn't involve any new rules.

If the above isn't enough the next thing I would suggest is halving the regeneration from 10 to 5 (actually it would be better if the Fidget Tick just healed 5 HPs when it applied its 10 ongoing damage).

I should have to do the numbers again.
But I think that either dropping regeneration and damage by half, or making the Tick grab instead of dazing should be enough (they kind of effectively accomplish the same thing).

Although the escape rules are somewhat broken.

I am loathed to lower the actual ongoing damage from the grab, but I agree that 10 ongoing damage is a very large amount for a level 6 PC to take.

It really depends on the chance of this ongoing damage to happen and not much on the amount.
The amount of damage regulates the variability (or spike damage) the monster has.

For example, you can have a monster that does 20 damage at level 1.
But the monster has to hit twice to do so (an expected 25%).

My original thinking was that it was balanced because the Fidget tick cannot take any actions while grabbing, including attacks and opportunity attacks

Well, you are right about that.
The problem is the amount of that.
Doing 10 damage automatically is more than the expected damage of a monster of that level.
And 10 regeneration is almost like cancelling a PC attack.

It's doing both at 100% chance that get's unbalanced.

(Ahhh, maybe instead of increasing its AC when grabbing it should be lowered 2 instead as it is helpless, or maybe it could provoke combat advantage against all enemies except the target it is grabbing?)

This really depends on the flavor of the creature. Whatever you choose can be balanced.

Some grabbing creatures should be more difficult to hit (like a Stirge)
Others could be more easily hit.
And others simply more dangerous to be hit (like when they split the damage taken by half between them and their grabbed target).

Each scenario can be balanced in a different way.

 

[Zaphling]

LOVE THIS! Good thing you DnD 4eed the zombies in Left 4 Dead! Damn cool! My players will Love this!