Multi-cursor is actually a better version of search-and-play-macro, not search-and-replace.
The advantage of it is that you can execute the "macro" incrementally and spot early when you've made a mistake, rather than recording a macro then letting rip and discovering, too late, that there was a mistake 80% of the way though, and now you need to undo the whole thing and and try again.
(I use multiple-cursors in Emacs for multiple selections, iedit-mode for live substitution (sometimes in combination with wgrep), as well replace-regexp for plain search & replace, and while they all overlap, none are poor versions of any of the others. They each have their strengths and weaknesses. However it's vanishingly rare that I use macros any more.)
The advantage of it is that you can execute the "macro" incrementally and spot early when you've made a mistake, rather than recording a macro then letting rip and discovering, too late, that there was a mistake 80% of the way though, and now you need to undo the whole thing and and try again.
(I use multiple-cursors in Emacs for multiple selections, iedit-mode for live substitution (sometimes in combination with wgrep), as well replace-regexp for plain search & replace, and while they all overlap, none are poor versions of any of the others. They each have their strengths and weaknesses. However it's vanishingly rare that I use macros any more.)