Hearthstone: How to Earn Gold Fast and the Best Ways to get Free Cards

In our second Hearthstone how-to, we check out all the ways you can get gold in Hearthstone without spending real-world money.

Article by Cassandra Khaw Contributor

Updated on Feb. 10, 2014

This article first appeared on USgamer, a partner publication of VG247. Some content, such as this article, has been migrated to VG247 for posterity after USgamer's closure - but it has not been edited or further vetted by the VG247 team.

So, Hearthstone's finally out of closed beta. All around, there are people singing fervent paeans to its many collectible glories. It's free, it sounds great and it comes burnished with near universal approval. In an ideal world, this would be where you saunter in to kick neatly arranged posteriors. However, unless you're a card shark, chances are you're going to spend at least a few weeks being thoroughly trounced.

What are you going to do?

Madly munch through guides from across the Internet, of course -- beginning with this one. In celebration of the perennial hunt for nerd glory, we've got a line-up of tips, tricks and strategies on how to get started with Hearthstone. Previously, we touched on the most common Hearthstone terminology. Today? It's all about the gold. (Tomorrow, it was all about building great decks using just your basic cards.)

As you might have guessed, gold, which functions as the in-game currency here, is a pretty big deal. It's used to both purchase entry into the Arena and to acquire new card packs, things no Hearthstone fanatic can really live without. But gold, if the real-world market is any barometer of things, is expensive. It costs money, money that you may or may not have as a connoisseur of free things. Happily, we've got a short guide right here outlining precisely how you can acquire more gold without spending actual moolah.

Get yo' achievements!

I know it's tempting to blaze through the tutorial, skip over the A.I opponents and just dive headlong into the Arena. However, if you're shooting to make the maximum amount of gold possible without spending any extra cash, you're going to want to hold those horses. Sure, the Arena is exciting. Sure, it's a calculated gamble rife with all the excitement you'd expect of such a setting. Sure, it levels the playing field by ensuring everyone has to work with random cards instead of pre-mediated decks of murder. Sure, it's fun but you're still new and it's likely that you're going to get trounced by Arena veterans, thereafter resulting in a waste of your first free trip to the Arena.

Focus on cashing in on all the achievements first. Seriously. They're there for a reason. While there's currently no way to do anything but verbally brag of your Hearthstone achievements, they're still a relatively easy avenue to a free 900 gold or so. 1000 gold, if you've got a nose for savvy crafting. (Don't worry, we'll talk about crafting in another installment.)

Yup. 900 gold. You completely read that right. Bet the idea of rushing off to the Arena doesn't seem so tempting now, eh? Ahem. Anyway, without further ado, here are the relevant money-making quests/achievements.

Unlock every hero – 100 gold
Win 100 games in any mode – 300 gold
Win 1,000 games in any mode – 300 gold
Defeat all expert A.I – 100 gold
Collect every card in the Basic Set - 100 gold
Collect every card in the Expert Set – 100 gold

P.S: If you finish all these achievements, there's a strong likelihood you won't be immediately flattened like a pancake at a truck stop when you finally swagger into the Arena.

Do the right quests.

Ah, daily quests. Truly a staple of modern-day gaming. It's hard to imagine a world without them these days. I'd honestly have been surprised if Hearthstone was shipped without daily quests especially given, you know, their prevalence in World of Warcraft. By and large, you should always attempt to finish your daily quests in Hearthstone. On a bad day, they'll net you 40 gold. Not enough for a trip to the Arena, but certainly still something. On a really good day? There's a chance you might go home with 100 gold.

But it's seldom a good idea to blindly do everything you're told. Hearthstone allows players to re-roll a daily quest once a day. Ostensibly, it's an opportunity for players to swap more difficult missions for something easier. However, many also use it as an avenue to better gains. ShrivelTwitch from the Hearthstone subreddit has a rather efficient approach to daily quests.

"Reroll all 40 gold quests. Don't finish 40 gold quests. Finish 60/100 gold quests as soon as possible, unless they require finishing a 40 gold quest. Finish a quest if you can't reroll and you have 3 quests."

The general idea here is that you should neither complete nor frivolously trade in your 40-gold quests. Let's use an example here. Pretend you just picked up a daily quest in Hearthstone. If completed, it'd give you 40 gold. The first response for many is, of course, to simply try re-rolling for an attempt at something more profitable. You do so. You get another 40 gold quest, complete it and go on your merry way. On the second day, you find yourself the recipient of a quest that pays 60/100 gold. Obviously, trading something like that is a little bit silly so you don't. However, in the process, you would have also wasted that daily re-roll. If you had kept the quest from last night, you would have had something to use that daily re-roll on. Yeah, something like that.

Fight Club!

Look, at the end of the day, Hearthstone is all about one versus one conflict. It's about two people matching wits, trading blows and occasionally having your Hero shriek pre-set messages. So, it shouldn't come as a surprise that one of the best ways to get gold is to simply play a lot of Hearthstone.

Mages are the bees' knees these days.

If you're the sort who prefers to play with a pre-constructed deck, the "Play" mode is your answer. 10 gold will be awarded for every three games won, up till the point you've hit the daily cap of 100 gold. This can, of course, take time. Which is why the Internet is rife with some interesting tips: run a "rush" deck so that you can move on quickly to the next match regardless of the outcome! Concede a match if things are taking a turn for the worse!

Currently, the most lucrative path to success remains the Arena. After 7 or so wins, you're more or less guaranteed at least 150g -- the entrance required to play in the first place. Naturally, if you're a great player, the rewards are potentially way, way better.

Quests

This is simple. Do all the quests. Many of these were designed as gimmes for beginner players, so don't overlook them.
One of Everything
Collect every expert card in the game - 100 Gold
Beta Hero
Use real money during the beta - Golden Gelbin Mekkatorque (card)
Big Winner
Win 1000 games across all modes - 300 Gold
Chicken Dinner
Win 100 games across all modes - 300 Gold
Crafting Time
Disenchant any card - 95 Dust
Crushed Them All
Defeat every AI character at least once - 100 Gold
Enter The Arena
Select The Arena from the main menu - One Arena Key
Arrrrrr!!!
Acquire every Pirate card - Captain's Parrot (card)
Golden Arrrrrr!!!
Acquire every golden Pirate card - Golden Captain's Parrot (card)
Mrglglglgl!