Hearthstone ANSWERS! What happens when both players die at the same time? Is it a draw? [Solved]

A quick answer to the Hearthstone question: what will happen if both players die at the same time or on the same turn? I had a chance to test this out and threw my likely victory to find the answer!

The Answer

The simple answer is that both players lose. There is no draw, there is no complex rule to figure out who died first. Instead, both players are given a defeat and any ranking loss that goes along with it.

Update!

It appears that in Arena matches, both players will be given the defeat screen but the game will not count as a loss toward your arena score (for either player). This is an important distinction as it really does make a draw something to aim for in certain situations.

Example

When I was first greeted with the defeat screen, I assumed that it was actually that whichever player dies with the lowest life total is the loser. I will provide my example as an illustration. I was playing random matches with a Warlock deck to unlock new cards and managed to stabilize the game at 2 health. The opponent had the early advantage but I managed to take out his minions and get up a wall of taunt minions of my own. I was slowly picking away at them and had the Hellfire card (3 damage to all players and minions) in my hand for many turns. I figured, worst case scenario I will end the game on my terms by casting it to kill myself. After getting the opponent down to 3 health, with no minions and no cards in hand, I had the option of hoping he didn’t top-deck a game winning direct damage card like Starfire (which he had shown he had in his deck once), or I could choose to kill us both.

I assumed the game would end in a draw with Hellfire doing 3 damage against my 2 health and 3 damage against the opponents 3 health. However that was not the case. Draws are non existent in Hearthstone after a bit of research. Instead, both players receive a loss. I suppose this could be seen as a good game design choice because you will never have a reason to try to end the game early.

My experience in most other card games led me to believe that because all damage in a card like Hellfire is dealt at the same instant, we would both meet a criteria for losing the game (zero or less health) at the exact same instant, thus resulting in a draw because nobody has won. However thats not the case — I was greeted with a surprising Defeat end game screen. Hearthstone chooses to give both players a defeat because nobody has won! An interesting take on the rules. After further research on the Hearthstone webpage, I can confirm that both players received a defeat.