Still puzzling over the intended player behavior around legendary resistance.

— Matt Colville? (@mattcolville) October 27, 2021

There must be some category of spell, designed to make the choice difficult.

In fact, there must be three categories of spell, right?

1: Spells so low the DM wouldn’t bother using LR.
2: Spells so nasty the DM would ABSOLUTELY use LR.
3: Spells between these two. So the expectation is; the players use Category 3 spells until the DM uses LR 3 times, and then the battle can end when the enemy fails their save against a CAT 2 spell?

— Matt Colville? (@mattcolville) October 27, 2021

I think it’s tempting to imagine LR as not being meaningfully different from just rolling well on saves.

But you CHOOSE to use it. So you ONLY use it on a failed save that would be Real Bad. I think I get it.

We want the players to win. This is the End Boss, we expect you're gonna beat it. So LR isn't there to stop you from winning, we assume you're gonna win.

And it's ok to win on a single failed save. LR doesn't stop that, only postpones it. 1/

— Matt Colville? (@mattcolville) October 27, 2021

So winning from a single failed save is NOT considered anticlimactic. It’s only anticlimactic if that happens at the start of the battle.

LR allows the Boss to live long enough to Do Its Thing. THAT is what LR is for. If the Boss completely wrecks your party, THEN dies from a single failed save, you feel like "HOLY SHIT THANK GOD!"

3/

— Matt Colville? (@mattcolville) October 27, 2021

This does not, however, address the intended player behavior. There probably is none. This is meta-design.

— Matt Colville? (@mattcolville) October 27, 2021

LR feels bad. When LR is used it basically skipped the casters turn. the lack of interaction and feeling the feeling of useless is why it’s bad. I have my bbeg take damage when they use it but usually bump their hp as well to comp. Let’s the caster feel like they contributed. Maybe it takes some flavorful description to make this not the case because it *is* doing something – it's burning down legendary resistances and making it more likely to nail it with a save or suck spell later.

— SlyFlourish.com (@SlyFlourish) October 27, 2021

I think its to prevent the classic, polymorph em into a rat and throw him in a place never to be seen again, approach Yeah but it doesn't prevent this. It only prevents it for as long as the enemy has LR charges.

In other words, it's not intended to stop an anticlimactic ending. It's designed to stop an anticlimactic ending from happening too SOON.

— Matt Colville? (@mattcolville) October 27, 2021