Welcome to the FINAL Alpha Test for Breach before we begin Steam Early Access. We’ve enjoyed having all of you test alongside us as we’ve expanded to new regions, added more classes, and HEAVILY expanded our playerbase. In this upcoming Alpha, we’re not only going to provide you with what will likely be our Early Access build, but going to test out the ability to purchase QC Points in-game. For those wondering, we’ve changed the name / icon for what used to be known as “Sparks”, now known as QC Points. We’ve also set everyone to exactly 400 QC Points, for which we’ll cover a little later in this news post. First, let's cover the timing of this Alpha, then we'll dig into QC Points:

• [b][u]Servers Open:[/u][/b] Saturday, Jan 12th at 9 AM Central
• [b][u]Servers Close:[/u][/b] Sunday, Jan 13th at 11 PM Central

This is a slightly shorter, focused test, so that we can maximize our matchmaking testing. As per usual, [url=https://www.timeanddate.com/countdown/vacation?iso=20190112T09&p0=24&msg=Breach+FINAL+Alpha+Test!&font=serif&csz=1]here's a countdown timer for when we're starting[/url]. Now, let's get to the questions on QC Points and in-game purchases:

• Where/How do I purchase QC Points?

Currently, QC Points can only be purchased in-game. This can be achieved by opening up the Shop (“H”) menu, where options will be presented to you at various levels.

• Wait, this is Alpha. Isn’t everything going to be wiped after this last test?

Yes, that is correct. All player progress and purchases will be wiped. However, for any QC Points purchases that are made, we will refund that total number of QC Points into your QC account when you access Breach again, starting in Early Access. For example, let’s say you purchased 1,000 QC Points, and spend 750 on a new class during the Alpha. When you log into your account during Early Access for the first time, you will have 1,000 QC Points waiting in your account, but your previous class purchase will not be there.

• Now that QC Points are in the game, does this mean Breach will have pay-to-win items?

No. Our model follows that of a popular MOBA you might be familiar with.   Points are used for cosmetic items.  There is always a free rotation of classes, and classes can be unlocked with earned gold or points.  All 'power' items like gear and gems can only be purchased with gold and awarded during play.  

• I had a problem with my QC Points purchase / I bought something with QC Points and didn’t receive it - what can I do?

Please [url=https://xsolla.com/gamer-support/]file a support ticket[/url] and provide us with details about what you purchased with QC Points, when, and of course your in-game name. We’ll look into it and reply to tickets in the order they are received. 

• Can I gift QC Points to a friend?

Not currently, and we’re discussing if that will be available in the future. If you have other questions before making a purchase, feel free to reach out to us [url=https://www.discord.gg/playbreach]on our official Discord[/url] and we'll do our best to answer. You'll also find several new and exciting things in the Alpha test this weekend! - [b][u]Prismatic Gems:[/u][/b]  This new category of gems allows you to alter how your ability works.  Increase an ability's offense attributes at cost of its defense, increase its damage at cost of its cooldown, etc.  There are nearly 100 prismatic gems to choose from!  - [b][u]New Gear and Talents:[/u][/b] There is now almost 150 talents for you to choose from!     - [b][u]Exorcist Class:[/u][/b] This new Hedge school of magic class is first to have the unique ability to directly affect the Veil Demon's possession ability!  The power of Hedge compels you! - [b][u](Real) Friends List:[/u][/b] Not implying your friends before were fake, just that the in game functionality was!  As many of you know it was just piggy backing off of your Steam friends list.  Breach now has its own Friends List.  So you can add and invite anyone in the game, form parties together, and have purpose when spamming LFG in chat! - [b][u]Boosts:[/u][/b] We've introduced boosts and we are giving everyone enough QC Points for free to buy the 7 day boost.  Be sure to do that if you are gunning for earning gold to get some of that new gear or new classes, and even more importantly for the bonus XP to reach level 100! - [b][u]Matchmaking and Game Modes:[/u][/b]  Tuning matchmaking is an ongoing process that we can't do without your help in these Alpha tests and Early Access.  We are so thankful to each and every one of you for your patience and helping us with this.  We've made some adjustments based on the data we've been able to collect over the past few tests.  As requested, we are in the process of setting it up so that you can choose to queue as just a Hero, just a Veil Demon, or either.  We hope to have that functionality complete shortly after Early Access starts.  As part of this process the co-op queue is currently disabled.  However, you can still play as any number of Heroes vs an AI Veil Demon in custom mode, and you can even LFG for it with the new Friend's List!  We've also renamed the 'play cards' based on feedback.  The Solo card has been renamed 'Mission with A.I.' and the Versus card has been renamed to 'Mission with Players.'  - [b][u]Intro Story Cinematics:[/u][/b] We are going to be releasing story quests and motion comic cinematics throughout the Early Access period.  This is the first installment that starts to reveal some of the backstory, the mysterious Lucius, and your Hero's place in the Academy.  Right now you can only see these first two cinematics during character creation.  So unfortunately only the new players will see it in game.  Of course everyone will see it when Early Access starts and later we plan to allow you to access them at any time in the client.  For now, if you are already in the Alpha and are interested in seeing it we'll be [url=http://www.twitch.tv/playbreach]showing it in a livestream on Jan 11th at 3PM Central[/url].   - [b][u]New Veil Demon Tutorial:[/u][/b]. Following the above bullet point, the New Veil Demon tutorial takes place in Kiev shortly after Lucius first caused the Breach there.  Any player can replay this Veil Demon tutorial by stepping through the mysterious tear in the Veil found in the back corner of the Library of Alexandria. One other large note is the [url=https://account.qcgamedev.com/users/shop]pre-orders officially end at 11:59 PM Central on January 16th[/url]. Don't forget to get those bonuses for when we launch into Steam Early Access on the 17th, and we'll be announcing our opening time for Early Access after this Alpha Test has concluded. In addition to the above, we've been making several balance and bug fixes based on your feedback and findings in the previous tests.  For examples:

• Necromancer's Shamblers will no longer block you or your allies movement
• We've removed motion blur from the game!
• Updated the Shop with numerous new items, and even icons to help tell each one apart
• Guard's damage received increased from 50% to 75%.
• Resolute Block's duration reduced from 4s to 2s.
• Missions will now award Gem Shards instead of a random Gem.  So that you can use the shards combined with gold to purchase the gem of your choice.  
• Added in a new Elite monster - Stone Togor.  Stone Togor is now the default elite monster in Kiev, replacing the Komainu Annihilator.
• Increased Ra's Solar Beam damage and decreased Solar Blast (stage mechanic) frequency.
• Added a bunch more sound effects, VO, and updated some older temporary sounds.
• Spell tooltips will now display spell categories.  So that you can more easily recognize which gems and effects affect a spell.
• Updated Anubis' "Soul Blast" attack with a new name (used to be Sandblast) and it's now a free-aim projectile blast.
• Updated various Veil Demon abilities Aethyr Coil, Burning Soul, Inspiring Presence, Pain Conduit, Shadow Soul, and Veil Rift to provide better balance and correct bugs observed in previous tests.
• Fixed the issue of a Dark Mage Bot appearing in the Safehouse. If you see him, please let us know.
• Added New Daily Quests and a New Quest Chain
• Gems can now be removed instead of only replaced.
• Kikimora Fiend's Bewitch has been redesigned.  It is now named Entangle and drops a totem that pulls the target player to the totem.  Allowing the Kikimora to move freely during the effect.

[b][u]Known Issues:[/u][/b]

• Please note that if you're trying to purchase QC Points, you need to enable the Steam Overlay, otherwise it will not work.
• Some UI elements may overlap each other in lower resolutions.
• Bonus AoE Damage gems do not work with some abilities.  For examples: Cerberus Inferno, Sacrifice, Vortex Slug, Shards of Cerberus, Cerberus Core.
• Frienzied Shambler is not affected by some Red and Blue gems.
• Attack clip 50% increase talent does not work on hedge classes.
• Custom controller bindings may not persist in Options.
• We are still working on adding key rebinding for movement controls, and other aspects of the core game.
• Some Prismatic gems balance values are in progress.  
• Kikimora Fiend's abilities balance values are in progress.  
• Pain Conduit and Translocate's skilled play bonuses health threshold requirement is lower than intended.
• Controller support has been adjusted, but the "F" command may still be shown for "Interact" - Please use "D-Pad Right" by default if you see "F".
• Players may get caught in a longer load screen than expected when starting a match, and can hear a match starting in the background. This cannot be fixed by reconnecting, but the player will eventually connect within a few minutes.
• The Veil Demon model can sometimes appear to throw itself out of the world upon possession. 
• The Veil Demon can sometimes lose all collision after reconnecting to a game.
• Some abilities are not tracking their score correctly on the in mission stat board, resulting in displaying lower than actual stat numbers.

We'll see you in Alexandria!