Coming Soon, Maybe: Buying Hearthstone Packs with World of Warcraft Gold
The WoW Token. Introduced back in early 2015, players in World of Warcraft were able to purchase 30 days of game time that they could then sell on the auction house to other players in exchange for their in-game gold. This legitimized and protected the purchase of in-game currency from other players, something which outside of this transaction is against the usual Terms of Service.
It's not rocket science! Unless you're an engineer..
So, why are we talking about this? Because soon, WoW players may be able to turn their in-game gold in World of Warcraft into Hearthstone packs, and that is kinda awesome. This will be done by purchasing an in-game item in WoW and converting that into Battle.net balance.
The Beginning: BlizzCon WoW Q&A
During this year's BlizzCon, the WoW team has a Q&A panel, which was excellently recapped by MMO-Champion, and was the first time that the team mentions they wanted to do something more with the WoW Token, allowing players to instead use it for other in-game services and.. Battle.net Balance!
Quote from Blizzard
- They're looking into making the WoW Token be able to be used for other services as well like Character Transfer, Faction Change, or Battle.net Balance.
It looks like that investigation didn't take too long...
Action: WoW PTR Patch 7.1.5
This evening saw the first patch of the new 7.1.5 PTR cycle and included were some strings that pointed toward players being able to redeem their WoW Tokens for Battle.net Balance. It hasn't been stated if this is going to be active on live with the 7.1.5 patch, but it certainly is a step in the right direction for those that want to use WoW Gold to buy Hearthstone packs.
We are confident that this will make it to the live servers in some form though, so get grinding that WoW Gold!
Quote from MMO-Champion
- TOKEN_COMPLETE_BALANCE_DESCRIPTION (New) - %s will be added to your Battle.net Balance. You will receive a confirmation email shortly.
- TOKEN_CONFIRM_BALANCE_DESCRIPTION (New) - %s will be added to your Battle.net Balance.
- TOKEN_CONSUMABLE_DESCRIPTION_30_DAYS_BALANCE (New) - Use: Adds 30 days of game time to your World of Warcraft account or %s to your Battle.net Balance.
- TOKEN_REDEEM_BALANCE_BUTTON_LABEL (New) - %s Battle.net Balance
- TOKEN_REDEEM_BALANCE_DESCRIPTION (New) - Add %s to your Battle.net Balance?
- TOKEN_REDEEM_BALANCE_ERROR_CAP_FORMAT (New) - |cffff2020You can't choose this option because your Battle.net Balance (%s) is near or at the maximum.|r
- TOKEN_REDEEM_BALANCE_FORMAT (New) - Current Balance: |cffffffff%s|r|nNew Balance: |cffffffff%s|r
- TOKEN_REDEEM_BALANCE_TITLE (New) - Battle.net Balance
Should You Start Playing WoW?
If you aren't a fan of the game or MMOs, you should just keep chugging along at Hearthstone. Others that have previously played or have been interested in checking it out, this could be an interesting part of the game to pursue, but don't let it burn you out.
In order to get started with WoW, you'd need to buy the base game and the current expansion, which in USD is going to run you $70. Then every month you're looking at $15 for your subscription fee, or at current WoW Token Rates, 47,881 Gold to maintain game access. $70 could get you at least 55 Hearthstone packs right now, more if you take advantage of deals such as those through Amazon Coins.
Certainly ain't cheap! Price rose during print.
You'd then need to level your character up to 110, but at least you do get a level 100 boost through the Legion purchase so that helps. Once max level, you'll want to obtain some gear to help get through max level quests faster so you can some initial gold which means running dungeons, battlegrounds, and even raids! All of those things will take up time which could otherwise be spent playing Hearthstone.
Assuming that WoW token prices don't change, which they will with increased demand, then you're going to need to crank out another 48k on top of that monthly sub to start getting those card packs. Gold isn't very hard to come by in WoW, but you will want to read up online about keeping your gold making efficient (/r/woweconomy on reddit is a good starter resource). Those that master the art of the Auction House could make some killer Battle.net Balance!
How Much Battle.net Balance for Those Tokens?
Unfortunately, one of the current unknowns is how much players will get in their Battle.net balance account should they choose to redeem the token for it instead of game time. I would assume that you get the equivalent of the cost of game time, which is $15 USD. This is what you can buy on Battle.net for a single WoW Token at $15.
- 9 Hearthstone Packs (7 + 2).
- Three quarters of a full adventure such as Karazhan. Two wings if bought individually.
- 16 Overwatch Loot Boxes
- A 10,000 Gold Hero in Heroes of the Storm and a 2,000 Gold Hero.
- Some Starcraft II in-game content.
- Any of Blizzard's Legacy Games. (Warcraft III is awesome!)
Not too bad, but it certainly isn't anything too crazy, not when you consider time investment. If you're enjoying WoW though, a little extra something in other Blizzard titles is great!
Personal Bling
As a WoW player who started playing in The Burning Crusade (10 years ago), I don't go too crazy anymore making gold but I am still able to churn out somewhere in the realm of 160k - 200k Gold per month by being a "filthy casual".
You'd be lucky to get this Tabard these days for 200k.
I play battlegrounds and arenas with friends, have enchanting to break down old and useless gear into materials that I can sell for a pretty penny, and do my fair share of World Quests to get my gold. There is a lot of room for improvement, so don't take my experience as the same as everyone elses, but looking at the numbers I can buy $60 worth of content a month if I dump it into WoW Tokens.
I'll continue spending my gold on more important things, like maxing out my achievement points so I can get into nerd fights on the internet about who has the bigger number. You know, things that matter.
What Do You Think?
This is the first time you can trade currency in one Blizzard title for essentially what is currency in another. Although you won't be buying arena or heroic tavern brawl entries, you will be getting those sweet card packs.
Should Blizzard extend this into other titles? Consider trading your Hearthstone Gold into WoW time.
Are there any downsides? WoW Tokens are surely to go up in price. They already have while working on this post.
Extra: Lady Liadrin in the WoW Trial
If you haven't yet obtained the extra Paladin Hero in Hearthstone, Lady Liadrin, maybe now is a good time to give that WoW Trial a go. If you level up a new character to 20 in World of Warcraft, this Hearthstone hero is put onto your account! A quick look into the game with a guarantee of phat lewts!
Lady Liadrin was added to the game in Patch 4.2.0, the same patch that introduced more deck slots back in March.
Será mesmo? Aí fica aquele mistério no ar. o/
I am sitting on just over 8 million gold :) can't wait for this. Going to buy 500 packs of next HS expansion / the remaining heroes i need in HotS and another 250 packs in Overwatch.
I don't play WoW, same as other people, isn't this kinda unfair to the people who aren't able to afford tons of packs with money, gold, and now WoW in game gold. new players and players who can't play so often could/will feel more behind in the meta than they do presently; me included :P
A perk for others is not necessarily a disadvantage to you. Yes, I might have an easier time obtaining legendaries but if I was just going to spend money otherwise, all it's doing is saving me money, not costing you anything. I would have had the same stuff either way. Sorry if you're feeling limited by your collection but if you really care there are plenty of things you can do to boost it.
please no
So you want to reward gold farmers even more? Don't get me wrong I have a shitton of World of Warcraft gold left, but a pack has to cost an insane amount of world of warcraft gold seeing as a lot of players have millions and millions of gold. Which would again suck because casual WoW players don't have millions and would barely be able to afford one pack.
I don't see it working.
A question please, any know if its the same wow token or it will another one so i can tons of them now before prices going up crazy
What a time to be a Chinese gold farmer
Well, time to mass produce Sky Golems.
I guess Blizz starts to give away their stuff step by step for "free". I wouldn't wonder, when new players get the classic set for free in 1 or 2 years.
I like the idea that if someone likes to play WoW, but also plays some of the Blizzard games they can trade their gold into those games. In a way it gives another option to get new cards, without either spending more money or grinding gold in Hearthstone to get those packs.
But I think this is more of an great idea for those who play Hearthstone now and then, rather than the players who just play Hearthstone as their main game. However, it's nice to know that if I do play WoW again I have that option to trade in WoW gold for Hearthstone packs or for the rewards that the other Blizzard games have to offer.
Probably not, but it's easy to buy a WoW Token from the log in screen on an inactive account. Then you can buy more in-game.
Pro-tip: if you know you can afford a wow token you can open a ticket asking for a 7 day free trial so you can log in and buy one with gold. I bought the Legion expansion and I've had a subscription since launch but haven't paid for a sub yet. Going all off wow token time still.
they should just make wow free to play already then make money from expansions and services
Can you play demon hunter on trial account to unlock Liadrin? Also is she golden at 500 wins like Wellmetguy?
You cant play DH in trial. Only with Legion and they start at lv98. For Liadrin you need a fresh character to lvl from 1 to 20. And she is not golden, since its new hero with animation already
My guess was right on DH... With Liadrin, i mean is she golden not straight form the start but if you have 500 wins on paladheen already, because i have never met her in golden. Thanks in advance
The portrait doesn't change to a gold outline at 500 wins for any of the alternate heroes. Their hero power WILL get the golden border, though.
I fail to see how this is good for HS.
It's not good or bad for the game... it's good for WOW players who also play Hearthstone. How is that confusing?