Andronikos is Spike Spiegel, man. How can you not want that? I was also kinda bored with the story (collect an artifact, collect an artifact, HEY GUESS WHAT collect an artifact) but the end of Chapter 1 is quite good, and it doesn't really slow down too much after that. I loved Taris, Hoth, and Belsavis, Voss got interesting toward the end and Corellia was pretty nifty. TL;DR it gets better.

It's not impossible. When I was on Taris I saw a 35 darkness assassin soloing a nearby h2+ quest. I was 33 at the time (idfk how I fell so far behind by Taris, got hooked on the storyline quests I guess) but I did about two thirds of the quest on my own, only getting shafted by pulls with two elites and a strong, all droids so no mind trap. If I'd been biochem I probably could have knocked those out as well.

I find it hillarious that you're having trouble levelling. Good luck on the last boss of the story, mate.

Hahaha. You can't make an assassin spec with maximum burst and all the tank talents, but you shouldn't need to. Stop trying to burst "jagernauts," use the ton of defensive cooldowns you do have when you need them and use stealth to pick your fights. Also, if you're waiting for a five-stack of Static Charge, you're doing it wrong - that damage is pretty negligible compared to, I dunno, the skills posted by the OP.

1) Assassin is useless in PvP without Disjunction? I don't really feel this way. I recently switched to Deception from Darkness and I haven't missed it much - I can use Force Shroud to get out of snares and roots, and I can trinket or vanish most other things. 2) I disagree with this as well. Volt->Volt->Shock works fine for me, as Volt hits pretty hard on light and medium armor tanks while building up stacks of my Discharge buff at the same time. Voltaic slash also has a shock damage bonus attached, stacking twice, so these two talents work well together. The class is called 'assassin' but it's not anything like a classic rogue - unlike operative/scoundrel, our DPS is more sustained, and having short-stacking buffs to watch works just fine. 3) Entropic field is helpful in some situations but it's a talent I personally skipped. If I had a couple more points to throw around or was building a more defense-focused Deceiver I'd probably take it, though, as I'm squishy enough as it is without taking a ton of incidental AoE damage. 4) Hahaha no. Force slow is fine as an ability, having all our attacks (or even just one or two) auto-snare would be slightly overpowered and not really fun. 5) Decreasing the ramp-up time of this talent would increase our overall damage but not really chage the feel of the class. See #2 for discussion of 'assassin.' 6) See #5 and #2. 7) Most specs and ACs have some kind of DoT ability. and this helps diminish our squishyness a bit. Don't like it? Don't take it, unless you're going for a 2/0/29 spec just to say you did. 8) Uh, that's exactly what Chain Shock does. It doesn't actually trigger another GCD, it just fires the spell at half power again, before the GCD is up. Have you tested these issues you have? 9) That doesn't make a goddamn ounce of sense. Nerf our abilities across the board and give us a 1-sec GCD, yes please. Separate the ranged and melee GCD? You would a) not have the energy to support that for more than three seconds, but if you did you'd b) run into actual spell cooldowns often enough so that after that initial four abilities you'd just be playing like normal anyway. 10) Discharge differentiates the charges pretty noticeably, and Charge Mastery highlights that. 11) Play right and this isn't an issue. Deception assassins can use Spike out of stealth -> Low Slash -> Electrocute for 10 seconds of lockdown. Don't throw Electrocute (tons of resolve because it's a long-range, 4 second hard stun) around so easy - wait until your target is high on resolve to use it.

The Supreme Inquisitor's set, rare drops from harder mobs and blue boxes on Hoth, is a cloak over pants. Best of luck getting your hands on it, though.

Darkness can certainly take better advantage of more of the companions. Deception is squishy enough to need a tank or careful play as you get further on, and that role can only really be filled by Khem and much later Xalek.

I've played Darkness and Deception at 50 and I've had two or three empty slots as either spec, with relics, buffs, and consumables out on my bars. If you're keeping your companion bar fully expanded all the time - why? If not, how the hell are you filling up all the slots?

From a thread a couple days ago - http://i.imgur.com/8iwNP.jpg The bottom row is the PvE stuff. The PvP gear, especially the left Centurion set (all black and purple) actually looks kinda cool. In this setting it's kind of surprising and horrifying, an 'oh god what the hell is that' thing rather than a 'draw strength from the bird spirit' thing. The tall PvE hats and the huge pointy shoulders don't look too awful separately, but together they're sure ***, and neither one looks any kind of stealthy. And the bull hat?

Probably? If the second pistol has any amount of tech power, then yes. I honestly haven't spent any time gearing him, so I don't know for sure.

I'm Darkness spec, and I can solo Heroic 2+ and maybe a Heroic 4 if I outlevel it a little when I get Talos out. I CC what I can, then Discharge->Dark Ward->Wither, then Thrash if I'm over 50% energy, Saber Strike if I'm under 50%, Shock on Energize procs and Force Lightning at Harnessed Darkness x3. Between Deflection, stuns and interrupts, I can take little enough damage from an elite and a strong, sometimes two elites for Talos to keep me up easily. It takes a while, with my companion fully dedicated to healing, but it's fun.

I like that, and I'm gonna do that when I get home.

Deception is pretty good for leveling, especially with friends - it feels like the deception talent tree comes into its own earliest, and having a sniper buddy eliminates the need for the few ranged abilities Madness gives access to. Deception certainly has a melee focus but you get a number of other abilities as you level - a melee AoE, an execute, and a whole toolbox of interrupts, stuns and controls. As far as I know, purple sabers are a reward for level 50 pvp and found nowhere else at the moment. The color is 'baked in' to the saber, so there aren't crystals floating around on the market or anywhere else.

This happened to me also. I ended up relegating a number of less-used abilities to sidebars (crushing darkness, maul, the kick-'em-while-they're-stunned move, whirlwind, and a few others.) My layout at 46, where I think I have all my hotkeys as they will be for max level: 1:Saber Strike 2:Shock 3:Thrash 4:Force Lightning 5:Overload 6:Spike Q:Assassinate E:Lacerate R:Mind Control F:Jolt Shift+1:Force Slow Shift+2:Electrocute Shift+3:Wither Shift+Q: Discharge Shift+E: Dark Ward Shift+R:Mass Mind Control Shift+F:Force Pull Forward Mouse Button:Stealth Shift+Forward Mouse Button:Vanish Back Mouse Button: PvP Trinket

These are awesome, thanks for putting them up!

There's a midlevel set not tied to social, the Supreme Iniquisitor's stuff I think, that's got pants (the chestpiece is a robe but it's open in the front).

HAHAHAHAHAHA. The shadow is the assassin with different names and icons. It's literally 1:1. QQ moar.

45 tank here, she's great pure DPS - I've been using her since I got her and loved it. Give her a second lightsaber as soon as you can and keep her gear updated, though. I'm not a fan of the romance, but as a lightside character you should enjoy that as well.

I've got a 41 Darkness assassin, and even though I've never tried Deception I can give some of these a shot. Yeah, your time-to-kill will go up but Darkness still puts out a respectable amount of damage - it's nowhere near as low as Jugg tank damage. The couple instances of open-world PvP I've run across have been pretty fun, since I'm harder to kill than people expect and I've got Force Pull to keep 'em around. I love Khem, he's friggin awesome. I used him in his DPS stance, letting him taunt and AoE as he pleased and just kind of co-tanking packs and bosses down. I could definately see going to 50 with Khem. I've been using Ashara since I got her, though. I've gotten pretty seriously indestructible over the last few levels, and she hits pretty hard when she's properly kitted out so we're cruising around with little to no downtime wrecking all the things.

I've made a number of darkside decisions she's totally ignored and I'm almost positive that I've made at least one that she really liked (+50 darkside, +40 affection). I know it's not how many people (anybody?) play but I'm level 41 and sitting 500 dark points off neutral. I've continued to play how I wanna since I've gotten her and I've lost maybe ten or twenty points total with her. I like the character of the fallen and somewhat grey Jedi because it's closely aligned with my calculating and self-interested grey Sith. I would love the option to corrupt her to the dark side, if only because it would make me okay with the romance options. She seems...really young, and kinda naive, and I feel like a creeper hitting on her :\

Depends on what you wanna do, they all have a viable role. Tank damage reduction has a real place in PvP and a beefy tank can hold off a friggin ton of people at key points. Madness assassins benefit from a number of ranged and utility abillities on top of their roguey play, and Deception assassins are made for hitting like a bus full of trucks.

It reminds me of the old Holy Shield, too, which is kind of comfortable for me. AoE tanking sucks, but in few/single target situations I have no problem with the way it works - I like the leeway it gives you with the buff lasting longer than the cooldown (unless it gets knocked off) and it being off the GCD. Discharge has neither of those things and makes me grouchy, but it's far less critical to my survivability. The change I'd suggest, if any, would be to spread our mitigation out a bit more - buff Discharge and Wither and nerf Dark Ward so it's not so crippling to lose it in an AoE fight.