Ultimate Team is a dynamic game mode in Madden that brings the best parts of the game into a massively multiplayer experience.
It’s okay to feel overwhelmed by that notion; Madden Ultimate Team (MUT) is a tough game mode to get good at, but in this article, I am going to give you my top tips on how to win more games in Madden 23 Ultimate Team.
There are a lot of moving pieces, and different things to consider when playing MUT. The best way to look at MUT is to see it as 3 separate game modes stacked on top of each other.
Madden Ultimate Team is an MMO, a team builder, and an on-the-field simulation game all at the same time. If you want to win more Madden Ultimate Team games, you are going to have to master all three sections of the game.
Here’s exactly how to win more games in MUT this year.
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Master the MMO Portion of the Game
I’m sure there are arguments as to whether MUT should be considered an MMO, but I don’t care. Madden Ultimate Team is a massive online multiplayer game with an in-game currency, plus daily and weekly tasks that help you compete at a higher level.
In that sense, MUT is an MMO and you should treat it as such by doing these 3 things to maximize your team’s talent and your in-game capital:
Log in Daily, Complete Challenges
Madden Ultimate Team is a constantly updated game mode, new special missions and challenges are added multiple times a week.
If you sign into MUT every day, you won’t miss anything, because every challenge should be active for 24 hours at the very least. Most of the time they will be active for a lot longer.
The other reason to sign in every day is the coin incentive; you get an amount of coins each day you sign in and the amount is dependent on how many days in a row you’ve been active.
Trade and Sell Items
Throughout the course of beating missions and playing games, you get a lot of free items thrown at you, most of which become obsolete very quickly.
Most of the items that you receive can be either quick sold for a small amount of coins, or they may be eligible to be placed in the auction house where other players can bid on them. You may have the option to trade the item as well.
Don’t let these items sit in your inventory collecting dust; sell, trade, or auction them off to maximize your profits.
Complete Sets for Elite Level Players
The best way to get specialty elite players without spending a ton of money is to slowly work on sets.
Sets are checklists of less valuable items and players, that, once completed, earn you a very highly-rated specialty card. Most of the time the card you are working towards in the set is a specified player, but occasionally you may be awarded a mystery pack.
Each set has its own rules and themes.
Become a Master at Building a Team
Once you acquire coins and bonus cards from grinding away on the MMO section of the game, you must be able to build a solid team, that maximizes strategy items, archetypes, coaching playbooks, and other game features in order to start winning in MUT 23.
Much like building a team in Franchise Mode, MUT allows you to build a team from the ground up, crafting a team of players centered around one or two elite players to start off.
To really expand your team, and build a core group of star players that can win you games, consider these tips:
Invest in Good Cheap Players
Early on it is very important to add players that you can build around while you grind out missions and challenges. So that you can start to build a dominant team to help you win more games.
The best way to build a solid team early is to pick up the best cheap players in MUT 23. These players will be staples of your team for a long time.
Build Around Specific Offensive and Defensive Playbooks
Pick an offensive and defensive playbook that you like, it’s important that you are comfortable playing in that style of offense and defense. There are playbooks that are better than others, but it’s more important that you have familiarity with it.
Once you pick out a playbook, you should align the archetypes for each position on your team to be as close as the recommended archetypes for the playbook scheme fit.
Maximize Your Strategy Items
Strategy items are boosts you can equip for certain position groups or groups of players with the same chemistry, such as +1 to zone coverage.
To maximize these strategy items, you need to build your team with players with similar archetypes and chemistries.
At every opportunity you should be adding chemistry upgrades to players who have open slots, using chemistries that fit with the rest of the team and the strategy items you have equipped.
Master the On-Field Gameplay
The third and final phase of MUT is the classic gameplay that you would expect from a Madden game; an on-the-field football game where you control one of the teams.
This has been around forever, and if you’ve played Madden before, you’ve probably already got your own tips and tricks in order to win more games, but here are what I feel are the most important:
Manage The Clock
You don’t even necessarily have to be good at the game in order to win easy multiplayer games in MUT. If you have a power run game, that can chew up the clock and gain 3-5 yards per rush, you can essentially control the entire trajectory of the game.
All you have to do is run the ball slowly and methodically all the way to the end of the half (MUT games are very short, it’s not hard to do) and run it in for a touchdown with less than 10 seconds to go, leaving your opponent with nothing to do.
No matter the situation, whether it’s the first half or the second, the goal should always be to score a TD with less than 10 seconds left on the clock. If you can do that consistently at the ends of one or both of the halves, you should have a great chance at winning a lot in MUT.
If this strategy is used on your defense, it’s important to use your timeouts and fool your opponents into running out of bounds, in order to stop the clock and force a kick.
The extreme option would be to let them score so that you can get the last-minute score instead of them. I prefer not to do that as it’s quite risky.
Know Your Playbook
What are your go-to plays in different situations, what’s your most consistent yard-getter in terms of plays, do you know how to beat each cover defense? Are you going to make a dive for the touchdown?
What defense do you play when you need to stop them on 4th and 2? How about 4th and long? Should you look at a better defensive playbook?
Answering those questions has always been vital in understanding how to win in any game mode in Madden.
You need to practice and get comfortable with a playbook that has plays you are confident in, on both sides of the ball.
Practice User Defense
There are training drills in Madden 23, just like there are every year, in order to teach people the art of playing defense in Madden.
It’s always a tricky thing to do, it’s not as straightforward as playing offense, and there are small tricks you pick up as you play longer and get used to it.
The main thing you need to figure out is which position you want to play. My recommendation would be either the corner covering their best receiver, or your middle linebacker, depending on your opponent’s style of offense.
One thing you do need to know: user defense is king. You just have to master it first. A couple of the links attached earlier on can help with this, but I strongly recommend paying extra attention to the defensive playbook guide.
