Hearthstone esports betting

Hearthstone, the collectible card game from Blizzard and based off World of Warcraft lore has a vibrant competitive scene and here’s all you need to know about Hearthstone betting.

About the game

Hearthstone is a free-to-play but pay-to-win turn based card game available on all mobile and desktop operating systems. Gameplay wise it is similar to both Yu-Gi-Oh and Magic the Gathering, you want to kill your opponents life points using minions, spells and trap cards before he destroys all your life points.

Released in 2014 the card pool is constantly growing with well over 1500 cards in the game now. The main 1-on-1 game is split between “Wild”, where any card released can be used and “Standard” which uses the basic set and the last 2 years expansions. Standard is the competitive format which means the available cards rotate regularly on a yearly basis. For the competitive scene this means that certain pros will be stronger or weaker depending how the Meta looks under this year’s Standard set.

Hearthstone esports

Hearthstone competitive scene is quite vibrant with regular weekly high level games from across 3 regions, North America, Europe and Asia.

With a pyramid system starting with the online ladder and qualifiers, live events and eventually the Grandmaster Tournaments held weekly over the course if 8 weeks there is plenty of competitive action to analyse the Meta and who is strong. And while obviously there is an element of RNG in Hearthstone, similar to Poker it takes still to play your hand the right way.

Hearthstone betting

The lower ranked tournaments provide the best way to find good value in betting on Hearthstone. These tournaments usually have hundreds of players and follow the Swiss format. Instead of a bracket your opponent is based on your Win/Loss ratio, you will be randomly drawn against someone who has Won and Lost the same number of games as you. This results in a top 8/16/32 bracket of players who have lost 1 game, there are occasions that 2 losses will get you into the top bracket but for the most part there will the half the final bracket unbeaten.
Following the Swiss part of the tournament can let you find the unknown players who are good in this Meta and these can give you very good odds. With a low barrier to entry it’s not uncommon for totally unknown players to qualify for the final brackets.

Esports game structure

Each player bring 4 decks to a match, each will get a ban and then the first to win a game with each deck wins the match. To understand the pros you’ll need to understand how Hearthstone works and how it’s Meta evolves.

There are 12 classes of decks in hearthstone based off the lore in World of Warcraft, Mages, Warlocks and Warriors to mention just a few, each with their own set of cards and abilities, weakness and strengths. Like all card games, the selection of class archetype will often determine the style of play, Hunter decks are often fast low cost minion decks that looks for a quick kill within the first 6/7 turns. If a mage can stall with their spells they would be able to defeat the Hunter with their later higher power cards. Strong classes will have multiple different archetypes strong in the current Meta. Players must bring a deck from 4 of these 12 classes to tournaments.

Knowledge is key in gambling

With Blizzard employing their usual mantra of giving each class a turn of being overpowered it’s pretty easy to get a grasp of which classes are currently the most powerful. There are sites like Tempostorm.com and Hsreplay.net that show which decks are winning the most in ranked. This may not always line up with the completive scene if certain decks archetypes are easy to counter in a 4 game series.

Watching Hearthstone is easy these days with their Twitch Channel streaming the Grandmasters on Friday, Saturdays and Sundays. Highlights can be watched on their YouTube.

• https://www.twitch.tv/playhearthstone
• https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCV7woL1v23u3sc_Uo10dy9g

The casters are often very helpful in explaining the decks and why they are powerful at the moment.

Tips for betting

Hearthstone as an esport is very well polished, knowledgeable casters and a high production value especially with their screen layover allowing you to see as much information from each players as possible. The current meta favours legendary heavy decks that stall early to bring out multiple late game spells and minions. Some combo decks that rely on quick drawing and finding the 4 to 6 card combo to 100 to 0 your opponent.

As with any game, no matter how much RNG may affect it there are top level players who always perform well. Keep an eye on Firebat in the US region, the first ever world champion, who even has a card named after him, is still going strong and a regular on the Grandmaster tour.
Thijs from Europe may not win many tournaments but is consistently in the top 4 or 8. A few more lucky breaks and he could easily have been the most successful player ever. His performances in the Grandmaster series have been impressive as he mastered many different styles and showed his adaptability to any meta that might be thrown his way.

Written by Jarhead

Jarhead is the founder of Eportsbetting.gg and works as a marketing specialist within iGaming. This guy grew up with gaming and experienced the very first hits on iconic SEGA, Nintendo NES, Commodore 64/128, Atari, Amiga 500 and gaming on his very first PC - a 286 beast where he ruled in Ultima V. Jarhead's favourite games and skills are in Overwatch, Rocket League and Hearthstone.