How To Play Hearthstone for Free
This guide offers some tips and strategies for How To Play Hearthstone for Free. Hearthstone is a "Free-to-Play" game, but a common complaint is that Free-to-Play really means pay to win. While spending real money on card packs will certainly accelerate your deck development and offer a quicker advantage in the game, patiently leveling up characters and completing quests will earn rare Cards for free and likely even develop a better player.
Level Up To Unlock Basic Cards
Each of the Heroes has their own set of 20 Basic Cards (These are really only 2 sets of the same 10 Cards). Defeating a Hero in Practice Mode will unlock a few of their basic cards, then the rest can be unlocked by leveling them up. Leveling up a hero is fairly simple - just play any type of match: practice, casual, ranked, Arena; Win or lose the Hero will gain XP towards the next level. Every few levels earned unlocks a new card.
Play Practice Mode to Unlock Heroes & Unlock the Arena
At first launch the game begins with a tutorial that involves six truncated matches against AI opponents. The tutorial is played as the Mage, and at the end of it she will be the only class available to play with until more Heroes are unlocked. New Heroes are unlocked by defeating them in matches either against AI in Practice mode, or real players in Play mode. Practice mode will typically be the quickest way to do this - the matches are generally easier, and in Play mode there is no way to choose the class of the opponent.
It's not a bad idea to spend some time in the Practice Mode, unlocking all the Heroes, before jumping into the Play mode against real opponents. The reward for spending time here is that Practice matches will help with leveling up and unlocking new cards, and the Arena will become available once all the Heroes have been unlocked.
Play The Arena for Big Rewards
After unlocking all Heroes (by beating them in either Practice or Play modes), The Arena will become available and the first entrance is free. This is where the big rewards are, win or lose.
In the Arena you build a deck by picking from one of three hero choices, then picking one card at a time out of three card choices. Three cards pop up, you pick one, then another three cards pop up and the process repeats until you have your deck.
Arena matches are against real players. One Arena entrance gets you three losses or nine wins - whichever comes first. Lose three in a row on the first time through, and you still walk out with an Expert Card Pack and 40 Arcane Dust. Win one or more, and the rewards are even better.
There's something to be said for not jumping straight into the Arena, rather taking some time to get some skills in the game and some deck building fundamentals. Those Arena losses can come quick and then you're locked out until you have another 150 gold. Come in with some skills and the fun will last longer and the prizes will be bigger.
Complete Quests to Earn Gold & Free Card Packs
While card packs and entrances to The Arena can be purchased with real money, they can also be purchased with the in-game currency - gold. Gold is earned by completing quests, and a few of the early quests will also earn a free Expert Card Pack.
After playing one match in Practice mode, the first quest should pop up, and it's a good one - play one match in Play mode (a casual or ranked match against a real player), and earn a free pack of cards. It's not necessary to win, just play.
From there, the next 2 quests are also relatively easy and rewarding - Play 3 games in Play mode to earn 100 gold (which is enough to buy another pack), and level any character up to 10, to earn a free pack. Once again, it doesn't matter if the games in Play mode are won or lost.
From there the quests get a little tougher and less rewarding, and they must be played in Play mode or The Arena, but they're still the key to earning gold. Most will have to do with winning games as a specific class of Hero, or defeating a certain number of minions, or dealing a certain amount of damage to heroes.
Save Your Gold For Arena Entrances
Don't be tempted to spend that first 100 gold on Expert Card Packs, save it for entrances to The Arena. Even if you lose you'll still walk out with a new card pack and some Arcane Dust. Win a few and it'll be even more rewarding.
Craft Expert Cards
As you earn new Expert cards, you'll start to have a smattering of Expert cards across all the different classes of Heroes. A good way to make the most out of playing for free is to pick one or two classes to focus on, then craft some new cards for those classes. Do this by "disenchanting" the Expert cards from other classes, then using the Arcane Dust to craft new cards for the classes you want to focus on. It will take disenchanting higher level cards, or a lot of Common cards to make even one new Common card, but the advantage is you'll be able to choose exactly which cards you want to create.
Check out the Starter Guide for a more comprehensive overview of the basics of the game.