Legendary Resistance Is Not Actually Scary

Author: Quetzalcoatlus

Spellcasting is extremely powerful: there’s a reason why we call it the best class feature you can get in nearly every build we create. As such, it stands to reason that enemies succeeding on the saving throws of spells is often considered the bane of spellcaster player characters. Therefore, the resulting common gospel is that you should prioritize increasing your spellcasting ability score to increase your spell save DC, ensuring that your spells stick. 

Additionally, Legendary Resistance is seen as the “fix” for DMs to deal with a spellcaster’s potency in combat. It is a common ability amongst high CR monsters and usually starts showing up in the game around Tier 2. Legendary Resistance allows a monster to automatically succeed a save it would’ve otherwise failed by expending a daily use of the feature, which a creature will often have 3 of. Many believe that these monsters are considered a “counter” to spellcasters, or at the very least necessitate a strategy wherein spellcasters are required to spend many resources (spell slots) to burn away a creature’s Legendary Resistances. 

However, we at Tabletop Builds argue that devoting ASIs to increase your spellcasting ability score is actually not that big of a deal compared to prioritizing various feats. In the past we’ve compared picking up feats with Ability Score Improvements to see how the power of specific spells differs between picking the former or latter, as well as evaluated the power of feats in general. Today, we will discuss some of the best spells in the game that either don’t offer or are not dependent on saving throws at all. In this article, we’re going to be taking a look at each spellcasting class and will analyze their options, searching for their best spells which work well even against monsters with Legendary Resistances or when you have a low spell save DC.

The Bard’s class spell list is full of save-or-suck spells, meaning spells that really suck for the enemy if they don’t succeed, but often do nothing on a successful save. This makes Bards one of the most ability score dependent casters, but they have enough stand-out spells to not rely exclusively on their spell save DC when push comes to shove. Additionally, Magical Secrets allows them to pick a myriad of great spells from other classes, including ones that don’t depend on saving throws, making them even more versatile at high levels.

Heat metal

This one doesn’t work for every monster, but against armored targets such as a Dullahan, it will grant a sizeable debuff with no reliance on the saving throw it offers, since they’re unable to “drop” their armor and will have to cope with automatic disadvantage on their attack rolls and ability checks.

Plant growth

This spell doesn’t involve a saving throw, affects a massive area, and applies an absolutely devastating debuff. What’s not to love? Additionally, the fact that it doesn’t require concentration means stacking this spell with other movement debuffs will essentially plant enemies in place with very few ways to get out. This spell doesn’t have a very clear wording, so we do recommend checking with your DM how it is run at your table.

Polymorph

While this isn’t a huge offensive boon, transforming the Barbarian in a giant ape so that they can throw some rocks at the flying dragon, or a huge giant crab to trade blows with the Vampire and auto-grapple it on a hit while the party focuses it down is a solid way to conserve resources from levels 7 to 10. 

Animate objects

You essentially summon 10 tiny creatures which are moderately sturdy and can deal some good damage over the course of its duration. It is very similar to conjure animals in nature, but isn’t subject to the variance in DM ruling associated with conjure animals.  The animated objects deal nonmagical damage, but depending on DM interpretation, animating adamantine or silver objects can be used to bypass resistance or immunity to bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing from nonmagical attacks that aren’t silvered/adamantine.  Damage solves, and this spell does it.

Forcecage

For Bards that reach 13th level, forcecage is a force to be reckoned with, trapping a creature with no saving throw. The only way Legendary Resistances might save a monster from this spell is in the event that they have a teleportation option, meaning forcecage will be a death sentence for things such as non-gem dragons or a Sibriex. When trapping monsters that do have teleportation options, pairing this with spells like darkness, fog cloud, or pyrotechnics to prevent them from using those if they rely on sight, or Mordenkainen’s private sanctum to deny those altogether, can ensure they remain stuck in the area. 

Mirage arcane

The leeway this spell gives you to decide the nature of the illusion is borderline ridiculous, and it doesn’t offer a single save to evade being affected by your quasi-real illusions. It has a 10 minutes casting time, so plan ahead on how you want to reshape the next encounters. If you want to go more in depth in how illusions can be run in games, check out this article.

True polymorph

True polymorph is a contender for strongest spell in the game along with wish. The things you can pull off with this spell without ever offering a saving throw are many: transform your simulacrum into an adult silver dragon (or another good high CR form) or have it turn itself into that with its own slots, use it twice to make powerful allies out of the party’s pets (an article on that is on its way) and much more! True polymorph is an absolute must pick for preparing your party to deal with high level monsters.

Clerics are very fortunate in the sense that some of the main spells on their standard kit fall into this category. Aside from domain spells (which include many other spells discussed in this article and help the Cleric even more), the base Cleric has a few options which are not affected by Legendary Resistance:

Bless

This is a simple and effective combination of defense and offense, bolstering the saving throws of your party members while raising their accuracy and therefore their expected damage. It’s a safe and cheap option. If the only way you’ll ever be convinced is by hearing it from the lipless mouth of a kobold, here you go.

Spirit guardians

While this spell does offer a saving throw, it does so for half damage, multiple times throughout the combat. (If you want to know the actual impact of this on spells like spirit guardians, and/or will only listen to kobolds, a particularly bright one spoke about it here.) Not to mention halving a foe’s movement speed upon entering the area of the spell doesn’t offer a saving throw at all, which is one of the best parts of the spell. Overall, the effectiveness of this spell is not overly reliant on enemies failing their saving throws and it is a good spell to use against monsters with Legendary Resistance.

Holy weapon

If your party has few attackers but does have a heavy hitting weapon user, then this spell might be worth using over bless. This can be especially effective when used against monsters that don’t have tremendously high AC, such as vampires (which holy weapon is particularly good against due to the radiant damage stopping their Regeneration trait). 

Heal

Sometimes when you’ve got your backs against the wall, this 70 point instant heal is the difference between life or death for an ally. Ideally, you want to use something else on this list to deal with a monster with Legendary Resistances or just generally very high saves, because an active posture will deny more damage to your allies than saving spell slots to heal them up as they go down. But having it on your kit is better than not being able to use it when it becomes necessary, and it is a good option that does not rely on your Wisdom score at all.

Conjure celestial

Use this spell to summon a couatl, or a unicorn or hollyphant at higher levels, and use planar binding to retain its services without requiring concentration. A Couatl in particular is deceptively strong for its CR, so it proves itself to be an ally very much worth its 7th level spell slot cost. We go over what this creature can do in depth in our Spell Spotlight on wish. Unicorns provide a number of utility options, but one of the most important is the ability to cast pass without trace at will, which is among the strongest spells in the game, as we mentioned in our Rules Refresher on hiding and surprise. Hollyphants are notable for their Aura of Invulnerability trait to grant you and your party effectively a mobile globe of invulnerability to deal with enemy spellcasters.

Antimagic field

This is the “If I can’t play, you can’t either” button, for the times you face very powerful spellcasters, or monsters that rely completely on other explicitly magical abilities.

Holy aura

The saving throw this spell provides against fiends and undead typically isn’t important. This is your option to boost your allies’ defenses when there are other party members that are better at going on the offensive than you are. This would help a lot against flyers that have both powerful attacks and saving throw effects such as dragons, for example.

Mass heal

One of the few active combat healing spells that has a big impact, deserving of its 9th level status. This spell can effectively reset your party’s hit points to help turn an otherwise dire situation around.

Druids are unrivaled in their ability to deal with Legendary Resistances in Tier 2. An impressive amount of the best Druid spells do not rely on any saving throw. We have talked about some of them above: heat metal, plant growth, polymorph, and mirage arcane, but they’ve got tons of other additions.

Goodberry

Not an option to cast during combat, but a spell that can be casted the day before and has tremendous impact on resource conservation. The healing this spell provides, especially combined with the Life Domain Cleric’s Disciple of Life feature, results in defending hit points becoming less efficient. As such, taking extra damage becomes less bad, allowing you and your allies to sacrifice hit points to conserve spell slots or other important resources. Besides goodberry, there are a variety of other long lasting spells which can be cast out of combat and provide a benefit that is not reliant on spell save DC. This article will not rehash all of those spells, but interested readers should refer to our guide on rest casting for associated spells.

Fog cloud

This spell does not force a saving throw, but instead creates mass heavy obscurement for the price of a 1st level spell slot. It makes a big difference on a myriad of encounters by neutralizing advantage generation by monsters, working as a mass Disengage, and blocking abilities that rely on sight. It remains useful at high levels, can be upcast to cover a wider area, and not even Truesight can see through the obscurement this creates.

Pass without trace

One of the best spells in 5E (tackled in depth in our article on hiding and surprise) which is also completely unrelated to any saving throw. This spell makes surprise so easy to get that you are expected to gain an extra turn for the whole party on multiple combats with a single casting of this 2nd level spell. Not difficult to imagine how that ends for the monsters.

Spike growth

This spell creates a 20 foot radius circle of difficult terrain that also does damage when creatures move within it. Couple it with forced movement to completely shut down a great number of monsters without ever offering a saving throw.

Conjure animals

This is a great spell to deal with Legendary Resistances for the same reason that animate objects is: damage solves, and this is a lot of damage. Compared to animate objects, it can do more damage depending on the animal you get, lasts for much longer, is only a third level spell, and doesn’t take a bonus action to command, making it one of our top 5 damage spells. There’s a lot of table variance on how this spell gets run, so always remember to talk with your DM about it. Do note that only the animals summoned by a Circle of the Shepherd Druid can overcome bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing resistance from nonmagical weapons.

Sleet storm

Even though sleet storm does indeed offer a saving throw, an enemy still has to get past the massive area of difficult terrain, whether it makes the save or not. Monsters with spellcasting and special abilities are largely neutralized by the heavy obscurement, and most methods of teleportation also require sight. On top of that, your party can provide other movement restricting effects, such as Repelling Blast or ray of frost to gain even more time to kill them off. The saving throw being repeated each turn also means that monsters will eventually fail by the sheer quantity of saves before they can leave the area of the spell. Escaping this spell is a difficult ordeal for most monsters, and you can fully capitalize on that by slowly killing them off while their threats are significantly diminished.

Conjure woodland beings

Whereas conjure animals‘ specialty is damage, this one’s is utility. Dryads can concentrate on pass without trace for you and gain surprise on an encounter, and make goodberries for your party, both of which are of tremendous value. Alternatively, you might just want some damage with fewer creatures than conjure animals because of cramped space, in which case quicklings are a decent choice. There are more uses to this spell that are worth talking about on our Basic Build Druid.

Transmute rock

Similar to plant growth, this spell offers a significant amount of movement impairment without a saving throw and without requiring concentration. Transmute rock is also less subject to variance in DM ruling regarding the use of the spell in environments. There is a saving throw offered, but most of the effect of the spell is not reliant on it. All in all, repeated saves compounded by forced movement effects often ensure that many monsters will become stuck in the area. Overall, this is a solid use of a 5th-level spell slot and its utility is largely independent of saving throws. 

Antilife shell

When you’re fighting creatures that aren’t undead or constructs and don’t have ranged or reach attacks, this spell assures a flawless victory.

Conjure fey

There’s some great summons to be had here, especially if the spell is upcast with a 7th level slot. A lot of the saving throws the best summoned creatures offer are for half damage. We talk more extensively about this amazing spell on our Druid Flagship Build.

Animal shapes

If you have lots of disposable minions, it’s time to put them to good use, and transform them all into CR 4 or below beasts which you can change with your action, making them very hard to kill. 

Shapechange

Can’t beat the high CR creature? Become the high CR creature. While you can’t shapechange into a construct or undead with this spell or pick up a monster’s Spellcasting trait, you do get to retain your own class features, which includes your own Spellcasting feature, ASIs, and feats. Unlike true polymorph, this spell lets you change forms as an action, which can be useful between fights and throughout the duration of the spell to tailor your choice to the situation or an upcoming fight. Some monsters to consider transforming into—provided you’ve seen them by this point in your adventure—include adult gold or red dragons (for good AoE damage, flight, and defenses), beholders (for Antimagic Cone to shut down spellcasters and eye rays that be used in exploration challenges), drow matron mothers (for the ability to summon a retriever), mariliths (for the Reactive trait to pair with reaction options), planetars (for sheer damage output, immunity to exhaustion, and divine awareness), red abishai (for damage output and Incite Fanaticism), and more. 

Sorcerers get a solid list of spells that were already talked about here, such as fog cloud, sleet storm, polymorph, and animate objects. The Divine Soul Sorcerer subclass also gets access to the ones mentioned in the Cleric list. They do however have a few spells that haven’t been talked about yet:

Fireball

Yes, this is a save spell. However, fireball makes it in this list because the legendary monster is still taking damage regardless if it makes its save, meaning fireball still accomplishes its mission of chipping down at the main monster of the encounter while bursting down its minions, and that is a good effect.

Telekinesis

Legendary Resistances don’t work on ability checks, and this provides an ability check against hard control. If it doesn’t stick the first time, keep trying. Bonuses to ability checks are also more accessible for player characters than monsters, such as Emboldening Bond or Bardic Inspiration, which stacks the odds in your favor.

Wish

Potentially the best 9th level spell in the game, this can mimic various other spells both in and out of this list that will work just fine on monsters with Legendary Resistances or great save protection, as well as being able to cast spells with long casting times in an action. See more information on this spell here.

Warlocks are a bit dependent on their subclasses to get a real solid kit against Legendary Resistances, but luckily many of the available patron options drop something for the Warlock to use: for Genie Warlocks, Dao gives spike growth and wall of stone and Marid gives fog cloud and sleet storm; Fathomless also offers the latter while adding Bigby’s hand to the mix, Archfey offers plant growth, Undead offers anti-life shell and the list goes on. While it is true that Warlocks are way more dependent on their casting stat than other casters (except maybe Bard), there are a few spells that Warlock gets that weren’t discussed so far:

Eldritch blast

This cantrip makes it into this list because of how it can be enhanced by the powerful invocations a Warlock gets access to right at level 2, particularly Repelling and Agonizing Blast. This neat package provides damage and control completely at-will, and will serve you greatly regardless of subclass.

Summon greater demon

You get to summon a potent ally for a relatively low cost, such as a dybbuk, a barlgura, or a babau. The save those monsters get is irrelevant because they always target the closest non-demon, so just drop them in the middle of the enemies. More info on those and other creatures can be found on our Wizard Flagship Build.

Danse macabre

While the basic undead are nothing spectacular at the level you can cast this spell, you can arm them with magic stone or pass around a necklace of fireballs for a lot of extra damage from their action economy. The bonus to their attack and damage rolls ensure that they’re very accurate magic stone throwers, and that they will hit relatively hard. Combine with eldritch blast for max damage.

The poster child for D&D casters, the Wizard doesn’t lack ways of dealing with Legendary Resistances, having multiple spells already mentioned such as fog cloud, sleet storm, polymorph, summon greater demon, transmute rock, danse macabre, animate objects, and telekinesis, meaning Wizards aren’t particularly dependent on their Intelligence score either. However, we’re not out of standouts to speak of when it comes to the Wizard:

Find familiar

Use this in combat for the Help action, to feed potions, deliver touch spells, use items/magic items, to reveal areas of the map behind full cover, and possibly to misty step to a place you cannot see yourself by using your action to see through its eyes. Check out our Find Familiar Spell Spotlight for more information on the topic

Tiny servant

This spell doesn’t do much by itself, but when upcasted to a 4th level slot and paired with magic stone it becomes a pretty reliable damage fallback that is non-concentration and rest castable, meaning it works perfectly well in conjunction with other spells on this list. It can also utilize many items, just like your familiar.

Wall of force

No save, only death. This is the archetypical legendary monster killer, and it excels at it not only with its basic use of breaking a big encounter into 2 smaller ones, but also with microwave strategies and creating domes floating off the ground to trap enemies inside without closing them off from attack (See more on using wall of force in our Flagship Build article on the Chronurgy Wizard). All in all, an auto-prep for a Wizard for its sheer strength.

Maze

Again, no saving throw, just poof. And then the monster has to succeed in a fairly difficult Intelligence ability check to get out of your pocket dimension, meaning lots of monsters will just stay out of the fight for the whole duration.

Legendary Resistances are feared among caster players in the general D&D 5E player base, but they don’t have to be. As demonstrated in this article, each and every one of the “fullcaster” classes in the game have options to deal with such monsters from the moment they start appearing. Additionally, the existence and effectiveness of those options is strong evidence that main stat ASIs aren’t the top priority for most casters, as previously discussed in our ASI vs Feats article. We hope that the read was enjoyable and that you may consider the spells suggested here when making your next character.