Lawyers are pursuing a broad range of cases in an effort to address climate change. Given the scope and complexity of climate change (and the scale of the solutions it requires), this diversity is not surprising. But it amplifies a key question in any strategic litigation: how that litigation will contribute to the overarching goal? Sometimes the link between the case and the impact will be direct; in other cases, this link (the theory of change) may be more attenuated, but no less important. Climate liability suits (lawsuits seeking damages from the companies that have been major contributors to climate change) are just one form of climate litigation, but they have attracted significant attention. There are a range of reasons that might motivate such cases. - Some are practical: communities or individuals facing the costs imposed by climate change need money to prepare or repair. - Some are moral: companies that engaged in decades of predatory delay – lying to the public to maximize their private profit at enormous cost to the planet – should be forced into a reckoning. - But some advocates have also suggested that imposing liability on the major fossil fuel producers will push them to change their behaviour in the future – to produce less (and ultimately no) fossil-fuels, thus speeding the path to global net-zero emissions and stabilizing climate change. This paper asks the how these cases contribute to the larger goal of addressing the climate crisis? It suggests that we be more critical in interrogating our assumptions and more creative as we consider how to use these cases. Asking these questions do not imply that we shouldn’t sue fossil fuel companies based on the deceptions they perpetrated and the damage they caused. To the contrary, it is based on a belief that there are ways to use these cases to achieve future change. But if the goal is to secure a fast and deep decarbonization of the economy, moving to net zero (or negative) on the timescale dictated by the IPCC, then we need to think carefully about whether and how such suits might be best used to achieve that goal; and what might be done before, during and after to maximize that impact.