I once settled a lawsuit by ordering, and paying, my attorney to draft a motion that was very in depth, littered with pages of precedent, and dismantling of the plaintiffs case. I had him stamp it with a "draft" stamp and send it over to opposing counsel at 4:45 pm with a simple caption: I'm filing this in the morning.
Before the draft, my attorney said we would settle for around $100k and be done. It would be after discovery and after interrogatories. That would be what it takes.
After draft, and before the next morning, we settled for $25k. The motion cost me around $7500 or so.
If you don't completely prepare to kick the other sides ass, they will never believe you.
After settling, plaintiffs lawyer told my lawyer he was keeping that motion for future use on his other cases.