No Huttball at all probably woulda been more effective... much earlier on. Development is adding another empire vs empire map. Don't you worry yourself.

*Imply that gear = skill.* Since you don't have gear, you obviously are not a skilled player. Hur-dur... derp.

Maybe cause its not fun getting 2-5 shot? Essentially making the 1-49 levels in warzone the last thing you'd want to do? If there is always a few level 50 with high expertise gear in a warzone... who wants to play with the big boys when they take you down with so little effort? Then, when you finally hit 50, you still have to take the 2-5 shots until you get enough gear to at least take a few more hits before dying... while all the way progressing up to equal gear. Later, Bioware introduces a higher tier of PvP gear and the late comers to the game have an even bigger gulf to climb up... Working as intended?

So... are we trying to say.... "Since a level 49 is just as bad... why not keep warzones 10-50?" Seriously, I can make essentially the same argument you did for a Lv20 vs Lv10... Lv30 vs Lv20 and so on... A Lvl 50 has: 1) Access to all of their abilities at max level. A Lv10 only has what they entered the Fleet with. 2) Access to their full spec a Lv10 doesn't even have a spec given that it's one 1 point. 3) Access to a full set of Expertise gear, while lower levels have at best, an expertise weapon of varying efficiency. 4) Assuming the Lv10 is new to the game, the Lv50 will have much more experience in the game and how to win the Warzones. 5) Again assuming that the Lv10 is new, the Lv50 will have had more time to make friends to form a premade group. 6) A Lv50 isn't held back by dodgy Bolster scaling that has strange effects on secondary stats. AKA: Access to Gear that brings you far above the bolster values given to Lv10-49. 7) The option to be a 400 Biochem and the option to use the high level Biochem stuff, and will have built up more PvP consumables. I'll just highlight the 2 more important reasons why.

PvP Gear: 100 'main' stat? 100 endurance? PvE Gear. 190 'main' stat? 130 endurance? I'm pretty sure the main stat difference qualifies for a 45-ish% deduction in stats.... which is going a bit overboard... I'm still for a flat +10% Expertise on all levels of PvP gear... but, yea... lowering the deduction to even 20% on the main stat will go a long way....

Solution: All PvP Gear on all levels have Expertise that adds up to 10%. To make PvP Gear less viable for PvE, PvP Gear has 5-10%(?) lower stats then equal tier PvE Gear. And there we have it... PvP Gear is BiS for PvP and is gimped in PvE thanks to gear stats being lower. PvE Gear is BiS for PvE and is gimped in PvP thanks to having no Expertise. BiowareEA is happy cause you can still grindprogress into better stuff. Everyone is happy, but that is a fallacy since people will always complain, thinking that even though their clearly specified purpose PvP Gear gives them a raw +10% damage/defense/heals in PvP... the stats of their gear should also be the same for PvE content.

Worst part is that particular convo is at the end of the instance, everything done and over with... and seriously, the guy should have said something when you first picked dark side in the engine room... should have expected you to try to get the dark side option at the end... At the very least, the other light/dark side convos in other FPs are in the middle.... it really helps to be the crutch of the group when you are the odd-person out.... Like dark side scoundrel sawbones. Let them rage and find themselves a light side healer... Probably not as effective in Empire since there is a bigger pool of dark siders to choose from when you are the odd light sider... but then... its heals in rage land.

As a smuggler, you cannot go all out and sustain energy at the same time. Which you are obviously doing. You gotta throw in a basic attack or 2 in your max DPS rotation to allow your energy to regen. Energy regen punishes you when you go below 60% energy. You regen even less energy as your energy drops lower. For example: This rotation will drop your energy fast... Backblast --> Pistol Whip --> Quick Shot --> Quick Shot --> Quick Shot --> You can try... Backblast --> Pistol Whip --> Quick Shot --> Basic Attack --> Quick Shot --> (Whatever your other skills are, it still amounts to the same thing...)

Nay. Optimally, at level 32-34, once you have Emergency Medpac (and put a skill point in Psyche Meds for Triage) if you still can't manage your energy and keep the HP flowing... you are doing it wrong and/or people in the equation needs to upgrade their gear... Before then, yea, Diagnostic scan will probably save your bacon. http://www.torhead.com/skill-calc#701rffMzhooz.1 Granted, I have not tried putting Kolto Cloud into the equation yet, I have at the least main healed the Jedi Prisoner Flashpoint quest line. So take that into consideration. Admittedly, the most annoying part could be when you join mid-battle in PVP without upper hand at the ready... and Underworld Medicine does not cast fast enough to save your ally... or your ally decides to run out of range or line of sight you. I guess this is for another topic though...

Heard Guss from Smugglers actually CCs enemy companions for ya... plus he heals. I'm gonna rate him pretty high up there.

2 Premades vs 8 pug <-- Very Bad 1 Premade + 4 pug vs 8 pug <-- Bad 1 Premade + 4 pug vs 1 Premade + 4 pug <-- Best Situation 2 Premade vs 2 Premade <-- Ok 8 pug vs 8 pug <-- Ok The fact that there is Huttball, where the same side fights each other alleviates the Q time... considering that Empire already fights itself all the freaking time on my server, it ain't much of a change.

I would play an Imperial Soldier/Trooper whatever... a story along the lines of you and your squad being abused by whatever higher command and sent to die. Of course, there may be reprieves to the abuse... Though... I suppose it would be pretty hard to make a number of semi-fleshed out squadmates and having them die along the way... while also introducing new ones to replace the dead.... "Congratulations, you survived." (This is what you see at the end of those Japanese PSP Gundam games... and that highlights the situation, war is not fun... in comparison to our 'heroes'.)

As a scoundrel who played mostly heals from... 10-33 with FP experience. (Just hit 34 today...) There are a few tiers to look at, for when it seems effective to switch to sawbones spec. 10-19, just throw 2 points into Exploratory Surgery and you are 'heals'. [2 Sawbones Points] 20, probably the earliest to put all in for a healing spec, slow-release medpack. [11 Sawbones Points] 30, when you get emergency medpack. It is also when you can drop Diagnostics as a whole. (But then, I've healed 10-29 FPs without diagnostics crit regen nor tanks... so results may vary...) [21 Sawbones Points] 34, I'm going to try to pass this off as full heals... see how it works out from here to end game... [25 Sawbones Points] 40, it has Kolto Cloud, your only AE heals, seems an obvious cookie-cutter choice I expect. Its introduction may be a convincing argument to use Crit Diagnostics.