No - it's like Naxx where you can unlock with gold. They're saying that the barrier for new players keeps rising. Now to get the minimum cards you need to be ever slightly cometitive, you'd need thousands and thousands and thousands of gold. But to get that gold, you'd need to be an infinite arena player or have the cards to complete quests and be competitive in ranked. Which means you already have the skill (arena) or cards and skill (constructed) - there is no longer another way. So now we really can't talk about new players entering HS as f2p players. There is no realistic way for new players to emter HS without paying for 2 adventure expansions minimum and a few dozen of each pack type.

HS needs a means of allowing new players to get into the game. One possibility is expanding the base class cards to include core rares and perhaps an epic or two. But. I think a sunset date on its expansions and sets where they are no longer used in ranked (similar to what mtg does) would be the best solution here (along with several eternal formats for players who want to play with their complete collections). HS has gotten to the point where there are too many cards for many casual players to be able to enjoy the game (saying they have arena is a cop out) after well over a year of complaints of there being too few cards available. And if there are no new players, HS will just shrink away to fewer and fewer players as old timers get sick of the grind, fed up with the unfixed bugs, tired of whatever current cancer-ridden meta their last straw happens to be or just get bired with the game and its limited formats. Bliz really seems to be backing themselves into a corner where they have zero options to keep the player base healthy - its going to be interesting to see what haooens in the next year, because something major is going to HAVE to happen. Either a collapse of the game or a huge restructuring.