You can get Light 5 with dark side points. Flashpoints give you light/dark side points each time you do them. If you get 100 dark from romance solo Esseles and get 200 light lol.

I think the best move would be to balance the abilities indivisually, change the time it takes for the damage occurs is easy, to polish it all they would have to do it shorten ability animations like project (instead of bringing it straight out of the ground, and then tossing it, just bring it out of the ground towards your target at an angle) or lengthen the mirror version (give the lightning strike a charge up animation first that matches the project animation).

I can't speak for every ability in the game, but I can tell you with my Jedi Shadow, that project (with proc a very nice mid ranged nuke) has a longer animation than the global cd (picks up an object out of the ground, it floats for a bit, then he launches it) AND that in this game damage occurs when the animation finishes it. (shouldn't be that way, but there is no damage until after the animation finishes, and until it finishes I can't use any other abilities). Edit: I would also like to add that the Sith Inquisitors version of this ability is an instantanious lightning strike that is much faster than global cd, and because the animation is instant so is the damage.

I understand that the faction classes are mirrored, but it is a fact that the Empire faction classes have an advantage over the Republic faction classes. The Empires abilties are faster than the Republics classes. There are many examples of this, the easiest example is Jedi Consular vs Sith Inquisitor, the lightning attacks are instantanious, where as the consular must pick a rock up out ofthe ground, act like he's struggling, then throw it. That would not be a problem, except during that slow animation the consular is not able to take any other actions, while the inquisitor zaps and moves on to his next ability. Please fix this, it's frustrating being at a population disadvantage AND a mechanics disadvantage.

Holy crap man? When do you play? I have won 1 match out of the 2 days straight of warzones I played. And that 1 match was because there were 4 lvl 50 guys from a guild that joined together and WRECKED the other team (Aldeeran).

I wanted to do the job whether it was good or light side, and not shed blood unless it is necessary to get the job done. This leads to a neutral character. I found a way to get late game full dark/full light. However you still can't get light/dark while leveling, but that isn't the end of the world. Remember that you get light/dark side points for flashpoints, and they are repeatable. When you hit the endgame you can start choosing all light/all dark options in flashpoints, and then the next time you do it pick the same. Eventually you will be able to go through the game as neutral and still use light or dark side gear in end game.

Thanks for the posts guys, I'm probably going to end up going gunslinger, since it was what I wanted in the beginning. That and playing melee is hard when you're a victim of choppy fps. Sadly my computer is good enough but if anyone has seen the people complaining of bad fps in forums regardless of awesome computer I am having that problem as well. But all in all I think I will be happy with gunslinger sharpshooter since I have my combat medic commando to heal. So again, thanks for the posts and no more posts are required

I've been reading around the forums some more, and a very concerning thing has come to my attention. Apparently as a scoundrel and having no portable cover and still having to be very mobile you still have abilities that can only be used in cover, I think going in and out of cover while staying within 4m seems very annoying. Anyone experience this?

I played scoundrel through an esseles group yesterday and my damage was pathetic, with backshot being the only ability that did anything, does obtaining scoundrel abilities make dps viable later? Considering my guess is GS would be better from the start since charged burst is one of GS's core abilities and you start with it.

Holy crap, just realized I put "Scoundrel or Smuggler" In tittle, very sorry for that. I obviously meant gunslinger

Ok, I am trying to decide between Scoundrel and Gunslinger, and everytime I look at an already existing forum it breaks into "Scoundrel can heal, gunslinger can dps". I know Scoundrel can heal, I want to dps. So, healing utility, stealth, and better cover aside, in terms of pure dps... scoundrel, or gunslinger? (please explain your answer and thanks for reading)