World of Warcraft → HearthSteed!!1!one

You don't have to pay anything to get new cards. Use the coins you earn to play the arena. Even if you lose all 3 games you'll still gain at least a pack of 5 cards. Also, if you play casual, you get matched up with people of a similar skill via the hidden MMR so your win rate will be about 50%. To just play casually, this game is very much not pay to win in my opinion

im not sure you understand how a card game actually works. If they were physical cards you would still have to go buy them.
This way you can earn decks just by playing and never have to buy anything. Gratned it would take much longer.
Im 30 yrs old and make my own money. I spent $7 on cards and got a few nice cards which helps out alot. If $7 really breaks your bank I feel sorry for you

Try explaining that to the person who is making the cash. That you want to spend 7 bucks on a game vs spending 7 bucks for groceries. I lack employment, hence my lack of funds.

I've played casual and I've lost every single game I've played, with the exception of 1.

It helps a lot to level up the heroes to 10 to unlock all of their class specific cards. Then you can build a better deck with those and the neutral cards available. You can level up the decks against the AI to make it go faster. IcyVeins (and other sites I'm sure) has some decent decks for every hero that you can build for free once you have the cards unlocked.

I've done that so far for the mage and the hunter. I have 7 of the "toons" unlocked.

You can build a decent deck for free. You also have to remember that this has been in open beta for several months. I have not dropped a dime on the game, but through hours of play and daily quests I've earned plenty of free packs. I should be not only better than you but have better cards after playing for months. Doesn't mean you can't beat me if the cards fall right.

If you want a level playing field (besides RNG that favors no one), play Arena. You seem to get enough gold through casual play to perpetually keep rolling decks there. Plus, you get free packs to craft a nifty open/ranked deck too.

Arena is the best part of the game. You have to get 150 gold to play instead of 100 for a card pack but you're guaranteed a card pack and often gold or dust to craft cards. Well worth the extra 50 gold and far more interesting

The trouble for new players is quite simply the cards they have fail epically. This issue is compounded for each new class they want to learn as the basic class deck cards are not enough to beat better carded players.

Following advice in the Hearthstone topic here, I built up a priest deck, but it took me a great many losses before I had the cards needed to turn the battle in my favour, and even now it's 50/50. When I do work on it some more it will rise to 80/20 in my favour.

Also however good the pack, you still might get crap draws.

I got my mount yesterday after a few hours of playing. I'll second Cat5 the newbie cards are epic fail. The only chance you have is battling another newbie or someone with no understanding of strategy. Even then the RNG can stab you in the back. I had one battle where I was doing great, but had a fist full of low cost cards. I was able to play them all, but kept getting more trash cards and ended up losing. I doubt I'll be back as I'm unwilling to pay and don't like having my butt handed to me when my deck doesn't have a chance.

Your best bet is to avoid random games and level via the computer for a bit.

Got my mount yesterday. It did take some time and I went through some losses before I got my three wins but was well worth it.

Honestly though I cant see myself ever going back to Hearthstone....unless new achieves/mounts/pets are available....

No, the newbie DECKS are epic fail, but there are enough solid basic cards to make a reasonable custom deck right from the get-go. They only get better once you start picking up the basic class cards.I'm having a blast at arena, and the only thing I've paid for was $2 once for one arena entry (and that was to get the Geblin during Beta). I run casual games just to complete quests that the Arena isn't covering, and I'm doing fine in those with not much more than the basic cards.

(I've crafted one Azure Drake (highly recommended, as it goes into everything), and I opened a Gorehowl which is really strong in the Warrior deck. That's really about it, though - no legendaries at all, no other epics at all, and no other rares of note. I don't even have any Harvest Golems yet! )

I can do one Arena for free every couple days, or even more often if I do well.

Yeah, I'm not sure if I was just lucky or what but I didn't customize the deck at all and I didn't have much trouble. The advice I'd give is:

1) Keep as many creatures of yours as you can out and alive. Your goal is to widdle the opponent down safely while you build up for one massive ending attack.

2) You don't want the opponent to have any taunt creatures. You are going to overrun him directly in the end, so don't let anything get in your way. If the opponent creatures don't have taunt, kill them if you can do so safely (not by losing your own). If for example you have a 1/1 out and then the opponent puts a 1/1 out, you might be tempted to sacrifice your 1/1 to take out his on your turn. Don't. If you do, yes they will both die but you won't have gained anything more. So instead just attack him directly with your minion. Chances are on his turn, he is going to make the mistake of sac'ing his minion to kill yours. At least you got a pt of damage on him before they died.

2) Attack the player directly when you can unless:
1a) You are in a situation where you have multiple creatures out and if left to the opponents decision on which to attack, you could end up losing a creature. Attack is creature first if yours will survive in order to safe the weaker one. (see point #1)

3) I know you want that fireball to do 6 pts of dmg directly to the opponent, but don't hesitate in using it on one of the opponents creatures. Particularly if it can taunt (which will stop you from your one massive onslaught). Be patient in holding the fireball, don't cast it until you need it.

4) The cards that give you more cards, use right away. The more cards you can draw, the more options you have, and the better your chances of winning.

5) Don't be afraid to use the card that does 1 dmg to all opponents creatures just on one creature. I know it would be epic for him to have out 8 8/1 creatures that you just destroy with one card, but that moment isn't going to happen. Don't sit on the card and lose your opportunity.

6) The creature that gives all your other creatures +1 dmg... that is your money card. Don't spend it as soon as you get it. Build your army, be ready to attack (having made sure he doesn't have any taunt creatures up), then put it out (and hopefully put out two that turn because you saved them up) and overrun him. Your (hypothetically) four creatures that you had out that could only do 10 dmg in total are now going to be able to do 18 pts of dmg. Which is going to catch him off guard if he was sitting at 16 life thinking he was safe.

The big thing with any of these card games... or I guess with just about anything in life... is patience. Don't play your hand as soon as you get the cards. Take your time, accept taking a little bit of dmg here, and just stick with your plan, improvising as necessary.

So today I joined in game and played casual. At first I didn't care and helped kill my own toon off. I did that 3 or 4 times. Then I got an opponent that I decided to fight, and I won. Then the opponent after him left after I whittled them down to 13 health [I had 28 health]. So I got 3 wins and earned my steed. Now I'm happy, lol.

You should do practice play until you have the complete basic deck to begin with.

After that you can customize a deck. There are several strategies you could follow. Zerg rush (lots of low mana mobs), spell strategies, etc.

If you don't want or can't afford to purchase more decks, do quests. There are a couple starting quests designed to get you into the game. After that there is usually a new quest every day.

This is one of those easy to learn but difficult to master games.

My strategy depends on the class I play. Mages are better suited to spell strategies as an example.

I find it fun when my opponent has a bunch of mobs out and I play flame strike (4 damage to ALL enemy minions)

and then hit their hero with all my cards.

also its fun to have mirror images out (1 mana card that puts out 2 0/2 minions with taunt) then in a later turn play ether raid leader(3mana card) or stormwind champ(7mana card) thus making a card that couldn't attack (the mirror images) able to attack

I found this resource helpful - nice insight to what cards work good with Arena/Draft. It's also a good place to begin learning about ideal card swapping.

»freethnkr.com/hearthstone-tips/

I got mine yesterday won 3/5 games. Would have been one less but I used a "heal all" card when I had a "draw a card if a minion is healed" one out. My opponent had one which stacked up attack per opponent healed so that card rocketed to 20atk. Now I knew this was coming and had a Shadow Word Death (destroys a minion with +5 atk or more) card to play with the mana to cover it that same turn, basically getting his hopes up then nullifying it. The issue? The cards I got from all those heals took so long to come in my turn ended before I could play anything else!

I'm only using a basic heal set, it seems to work fine.

This was my problem, I was just playing with the standard deck and didn't create a customized deck. It would have been nice if that was where you were directed immediately after you finished the tutorial.

Once you get to level 10 in a class check out Icy Veins basic deck guide. They talk you through the deck and guide you what to use when.

My priest deck was based around getting a lightspawn and 2 double health cards to make a powerhouse but this tactic didn't work so well recently. The Icy Veins guide is all about lots of low value minions and control, which is a much better tactic in the early stages. Mind Control really messes up most peoples end game but by this point you have 5+ minions all doing 4 dmg.

I don't plan on playing much, might unlock all of the classes, but don't know how much I'll play as it cuts into WoW time.

Yeah I have a similar issue but our guild are doing a Hearthstone tournament so I need to make an effort!. Looking forward to the Android release as I have an hour a night in bed reading/on phone and it would be ideal.

Are they planning an iDevice and Android version? Both would be better suited and I would play on either my Kindle HD or iPad.

Yes. It's coming "soon".

Yeah they've announced it but no idea on the timeframe. Also it could just be for tablets and not phones.

Played a couple of games last night as I want to get all classes to level 10. I redid my mage deck as per Icy Veins to finish of that daily quest and then redid my warrior one in the same vein, subbing the cards I was missing for ones of equal worth, again to get some daily quests finished off. Both decks worked a treat, so it's well worth a read of the Icy Veins guides, if only for strategy.

I also caved in and bought 2 packs of cards. 3 rares which is nice but not ones for the priest deck which I'm favouring currently.

I think I'll play more once I can put it on my iPad or Kindle HD, but until then my play time will be limited as I can't shrink it down to fit on my second monitor

The past few nights I've been done with WoW with a good 45 mins to spare. No point loading up Borderlands 2 for that short time so Hearthstone fills the gap nicely.