6 awesome strategies to use at Marvel SNAP’s Featured Location, Machineworld

Marvel SNAP Featured Locations are mini-events that are definitely worth some deck adjustments if you’re looking to win some matches. Featured Locations, for those unaware, typically change over on Tuesdays and make a specific location more likely to appear. In this case, we’ll be taking a look at some nice cards to use while Machineworld is the Featured Location, though all of these will work whenever you encounter the Machineworld Location.

What is Machineworld? What’s the key to winning when Machineworld is up?

In the comics, Machineworld is Earth-10102. The “main” Earth we follow in both the comics and the Marvel Cinematic Universe is Earth-616. Dr. Strange and America Chavez travel to Earth-838 in Dr. Strange and the Multiverse of Madness. Earth-10102 posits a reality where Hank Pym, aka Ant-Man, and Professor Charles Xavier, leader of the X-Men, “enhanced” Cerebro to detect super powers regardless of the presence of the X-gene. Because of some of Pym’s experimental processors, Ultron was able to infiltrate this version of Cerebro.

Cerebro/Ultron proceeded to reprogram the Sentinels to hunt down all humans. A Terminator-style war broke out between the machines and the humans, and there was no John Connor this time. Instead, Cerebro/Ultron, along with The Vision, and one sentient Machine Man made a bomb that destroyed organic life, thus bringing to fruition Ultron’s promise in Age of Ultron, “When the dust settles, the only thing living in this world will be metal.”

In Marvel SNAP, Machineworld gives a copy of whatever card you play at that Location to your opponent. The cards retain their Energy cost. You need to think about cards that are helpful to you, but won’t be as good when used against you. Machineworld also causes large hand sizes for both players. Another popular strategy is to wait until turn 6 to play any cards at Machineworld. That way your opponent can’t use them.

Great strategies and cards to use on Machineworld

Discard package

Blade (On Reveal: Discard a card from your hand), Sword Master (On Reveal: Discard a card from your hand), and Lady Sif (On Reveal: Discard the highest-cost card from your hand) are all great cards to play at Machineworld. These will become dead cards in your opponent’s hand if they don’t run Discard synergy cards like Morbius (Ongoing: +2 Power for each time you discarded a card this game), Ghost Rider (On Reveal: Bring back one of your discarded cards to this location), Swarm (When this is discarded from your hand, add two copies that Cost 0 to your hand), Apocalypse (When you discard this from your hand, put it back with +4 Power) or Hela (On Reveal: Play all cards you discarded from your hand to random locations).

They won’t want to play them, and you should have the advantage.

Lane denial

This can be a tricky one to pull off, but it will lock your opponent out of Machineworld if it works. You need to have Viper (On Reveal: Your opponent gains control of one of your other cards at this location) and Ebony Maw (You can’t play this after turn 3. Ongoing: You can’t play cards here) in hand. You play Ebony Maw and Viper on Machineworld on turn three. When Viper reveals, she shifts Ebony Maw over to your opponent. They now have an Ebony Maw and Viper in their hand, but they can’t play Ebony Maw since by the time they could use it, it would be turn four. You just have to watch out for them to use Viper against you, but unless their deck has some Viper synergy, they probably won’t want to, so you’ve given them two dead cards. Machineworld puts pressure on you and your opponent to play cards so denying a lane with the Ebony Maw trick, or by using Spider-Man (On Reveal: Your opponent can’t play cards at this location next turn), or Professor X (Ongoing: Lock down this location. (Cards can’t be added, removed, etc.) can limit their options.

Sentinel

If you have seven cards in your hand at the end of your turn, you don’t get to draw. Machineworld creates situations where your opponent has close to a full hand. They may not be able to play Sentinel (On Reveal: Add another Sentinel to your hand) without having it create a situation where they would have seven cards at the end of the turn, and not be able to draw from their own deck.

You may want to run Collector (When a card enters your hand from anywhere (except your deck), +1 Power) so you benefit from playing Sentinel. Just don’t play Collector at Machineworld to give it to your opponent! Both Ronan (Ongoing: +2 Power for each card in your opponent’s hand) and Devil Dinosaur (Ongoing: +2 Power for each card in your hand) benefit from large player hands. Devil Dino works off your hand size while Ronan works off your opponent’s. Both can become powerful stat sticks, especially when combined with Sentinel.

Destroy package

Cards like Nova (When this is destroyed, give your cards +1 Power) , Bucky Barnes (When this is destroyed, create the Winter Soldier in its place) , and Sabertooth (When this is destroyed, return it to your hand. It costs 0) are much stronger when played with a card that can destroy them like Carnage (On Reveal: Destroy your other cards here. +2 Power for each destroyed), Venom (On Reveal: Destroy your other cards at this location. Add their Power to this card), or Deathlok (On Reveal: Destroy your other cards at this location). If you give a Bucky to your opponent and they aren’t playing a destroy deck, it’ll just be a 2-Energy, 1-Power card. Just be sure you don’t play your Destroy card at Machineworld until turn six so you don’t give your opponent a way to take advantage of these cards.

Mysterio

Mysterio (As you play this, play Illusions to other locations. Disguise this as an Illusion until the game ends) works a little different than other token generators in SNAP like Squirrel Girl. Mysterio doesn’t place a token — it counts as if you played a card there. If you play your real Mysterio at one of the other locations, a 2-Energy, 0-Power Mysterio gets played at Machineworld, and copied to your opponent’s hand.

Machineworld will stay the Featured Location until Thursday night

The main thing we’ve learned this week is never let Hank Pym tinker with Cerebro. Featured Locations are the way SNAP introduces a new Location to the pool of randomly selected Locations. For the duration of the event (usually about 48 hours), there is a 40% chance you’ll see the Featured Location in your match. No matter why Machineworld is in your Location pool, hopefully these cards and tips help you win.