Actually, I think the spell is just poorly worded regardless of which interpretation the designers intended.
"The strands of a web spell are flammable. A magic flaming sword can slash them away as easily as a hand brushes away cobwebs. Any fire can set the webs alight and burn away 5 square feet in 1 round. All creatures within flaming webs take 2d4 points of fire damage from the flames."
"5 square feet" is equivalent to a section 1 foot wide and 5 feet long.
They should have said a "5 foot square" instead (this happens a lot in the rules).
Ditto for "flammable". There is only a vague reference to how flammable.
But for interpretation purposes, I think the fact that they actually do damage to creatures inside of them indicate that a flaming web is pretty much a blazing fire.
This is not some slight smoldering embers, this is a fire. And if it really is flammable enough and hot enough to do damage to characters, it is flammable enough and hot enough so that it does not simply go out. IMO.
For example, a pint of burning oil (something which is also flammable in the game) does 1D3 points of damage for 2 rounds in a 5 foot square and then goes out. Web burns twice as fast as this and does more damage.
Alchemist Fire, on the other hand, does 1D6 per round for 2 rounds. So, a burning web is somewhere between burning oil and alchemist fire. It sounds to me that it is burning pretty significantly and is flammable enough to do real damage, even to itself.
I think the argument that it does not state that it continues to burn is as ineffective as an argument that it does not state that it goes out. It states neither of these opposite viewpoints, so we have to determine what it does based on what it does say.
It says that "any fire can set the webs alight", the 5 foot section information merely states how fast that occurs.
If the webs are "alight", they are "alight". And like any flammable material, the assumption should be that they stay alight until they either extinguish their fuel, or they are put out.
These webs are flammable. To assume that they are only flammable while fire is applied to them and then only in that location is not specifically supported by the wording of the spell (or by the definition of the word flammable, trees are flammable, if a fire starts in the woods, it typically will not stop until it runs out of fuel or is prevented from continuing in some way).
Also, webs that continue to burn away are more balanced than webs that do not.
S'mon said:
BTW ice melts, webs burn. 'Melt' means turn solid to liquid.
Btw, before you correct me, you should do some research. Webs are a fiber. Many fibers, especially manufactured fibers, both burn and melt when exposed to flame. Some real world fibers like spider webs and silk have those same characteristics. Wax is another example of a material that both burns and melts (and also does more melting than burning). If you can find a source that contradicts this, please post it.
