A couple of things. Excuse my ignorance I've never played a Tcg before. Am I basically screwed playing this game if I don't buy in at one of the upper tiers? Sounds like pay to win. How deep is the gameplay? Does it come down to whoever plays the Card of surprise buttsechs and you are screwed if you have inferior cards? Or is there more strategy then that?
I haven't read past this post, so maybe someone answered already.
Short answer: no
TCGs are exactly that: Collectible Card Games. The nature of the game is that the more money you spend, the better chance you have at getting better cards which makes your decks better. Currently, the higher the tier, the more packs you get at a discounted price. This essentially gives those people a higher pool of cards to play with at the beginning. This essentially helps players have "better decks" in tournaments early on, but those people can get super-unlucky and open 500 packs of shit too.
There are formats, like drafts, where every player is on equal footing. The "Pro" Tier gives you one free draft per week, but no other benefits. People without the Pro benefit will essentially have to spend $7 per draft, or $1 + 3 packs. You can get packs by buying them for $2 ea. or by winning tournaments. You could also use packs that you got with the KS as well.
Now all packs are from Set 1. After a certain amount of time, Hex will have a second Set of cards that all of your KS packs will not be used for.
Now there are a ton of PVE bonuses that help you gain xp faster, get more loot, have more cards etc. This effects PVP in only one way: they may have free-for-all tournaments that allow PVE cards for shits and giggles, but those won't be serious games.
There are zero PVP cards given away at higher tiers. The only thing you're getting is alternative art.
So in the end, the more packs you have the more chance you have of getting the uber cards. But that doesn't mean you need them to win. A better player, with luck and a good deck build, can often win against someone else with better cards. Gameplay is exactly like MTG so you can read up on that if you want to get an idea of how it plays.