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[Uzu Bash]

Webbers should only be able to immobilize prey that they can hold in front of them and focus their spinning on. Webs spread out over a wider area can be used to obscure view and reduce movement speed based on moving creatures' strength and/or momentum.

Kobold-sized creatures may be slowed to such a crawl that a webber would be able to catch up to each one at leisure, unless they do some quick thinking. Creatures approximately demihuman sized would be able to push or hack through with less difficulty, but their progress would be slowed and they could become disoriented by the shortened range of visibility. A webber would have great tactical advantage, but not a hopelessly overpowering one.

[Vattic]

I like the way you fall into their trap and are stuck; It's dramatic and fits the idea that for a big spider you are but a fly. In the same vein it makes sense for powerful creatures to be less caught up.

[Uzu Bash]

Have you ever survived a giant spider or other webber? Was it a dramatic experience, or just an extended game-ender?

[Vattic]

I mostly play fort mode; Almost mentioned this in my previous post as I realise losing an adventurer to something so one sided would be much worse than one of your dwarves. Then again you can mitigate it the same: bring allies.

Perhaps a compromise where you get stuck to varying degrees depending on chance and other variables. Maybe treat it like a multi part wrestling grab against you. What luck an arm is free and you can hack the various grasping strands to free yourself?

[Dyret]

Yeah, innate attack in general need to be rebalanced. Webbing is massively overpowered (which is fine, but any one creature perma-stunlocking your entire military is too much) while dragon fire is useless against anything with a shield. In the case of webs you could probably set the refire timer to something higher and/or let sufficiently strong characters break free. Dragonfire just needs to transmit heat to shields.

[IndigoFenix]

I'm guessing that webbing is currently a placeholder for more elaborate 'stickiness' mechanics.

The strength of a web and the difficulty of breaking out of it should be based on both the strength of the web's material and the strength of the captured creature (the same mechanics could be used by a creature that shoots sticky globs that are flmisier than giant cave spider silk).  You should also be able to damage the webs by attacking them directly with weapons.

[Uzu Bash]

I mostly play fort mode; Almost mentioned this in my previous post as I realise losing an adventurer to something so one sided would be much worse than one of your dwarves. Then again you can mitigate it the same: bring allies.

That works in dwarf mode, where you can have one or more full squads prepared, and have some control over coordination. Fortress marksdwarves also get longer range visibility to support from a distance.

In adventurer mode, there are effective tactics for fighting titan webbers, and demons depending on light conditions, but giant spiders will always catch you flat-footed. No amount of preparation will counter the web, and allies' AI isn't sophisticated enough to make up the strategic shortfall. Webbing FBs have a similarly insurmountable advantage because they only appear in such low-visibility environments that they can't be detected until too late.

I do believe their webbing should be used to great advantage, and groups should have better opportunity than solo fighters to overcome it, but it shouldn't be a guaranteed game ender. Without a fight, there's no gameplay.

EDIT: Also I should add that it's impossible to hunt GCS in adventurer mode, so you never encounter them due to your own efforts to catch one. Even if you see all the signs of one, you still aren't likely to see the spider itself. When you do run into them it's completely at random and unawares, and there's no remedy for that.

[Vattic]

Fair enough; As said I've not much experience with adventure mode since 40d and none with webbers. I vaguely remember fighting a GCS back in 40d when I visited a dwarven site and there were loads of cavern critters fighting on the surface for some reason; The fight ended badly for me, but I can't remember what killed me in all the chaos.