I've been using stims that boost my endur/def pretty much since I started playing. It just dawned on me that while having more hit points is nice, maybe I should be running with stims that boost aim instead. Is that correct? A little off topic (but as the OP I guess I'm allowed? LOL) but what adrenals should a merc being using? I was using a stim that boosted my armor rating but have recently gone with a stim that boosts my crit. Am I on the right track?

Ahhhhhhhhhhhh, now it make perfect sense. I think the part that threw me was the muliplyer effect of the mods. I couldn't for the life of me figure out how, even with really good mods I would be able to match the non-modible stuff. Course, now I'm crying about all the organge stuff I've sold so far. Arrrrg. Thanks for clearing this up!

So far when I compare gear I generally look at the overall armor rating and specific stats my character needs (aim, crit etc.). When I look at orange gear they usually aren't better than the non-slot gear I already have on. On the GTN I oftentimes see orange gear with nothing in the slots and the armor rating is something really low like 16 or so. Now I know that I can put items in the slots. But how do I determine what affect on the overall armor rating will be without swapping stuff in and out (and paying to do that)? Sorry if this seems like a stupid question. I'd appreciate if anyone can clear this up.

Thanks. Yes, I understands how the yields are dictated. I guess I should have been more clear on why I was asking. With L/D missions you can enhance how quickly you go light or dark. I really don't care about whether I am L or D. The issue is, relics. All the ones I've seen require L/D I or highter etc. My main has a couple relics but can't use them because he can't seem to get off of being grey. Thinking about it, I guess my real question is, are there relics out there that can be used if you are grey? If not, I guess taking L/D missions is the best way to move the needle to the point you CAN use a relic?

My main toon has BioA/BioC/slicing. There are no L/D missions for any of those like there is with diplomacy. Now that I took diplomacy on my alt to support my BioC I'm trying to understand what the deal is with L/D missions. Obviously you get L/D points (which my main can only get with responses to game dialog) but I'm unsure whether you should just select missions for one or the other or just take the richest yeild. Are there differences in what is returned? Thanks.

Bingo!

Here is the issue, I'm have a really hard time trying to figure out how to allocate my points in the skill trees. When I look at the descriptions that reference "2% increase in XX" or "cooldown reduced by 10 seconds" I'm not sure how to put that in context being only a level 18. While I'd like to check out the engineering tree at some point, that will most likely be on another toon. So that leaves marksman and lethality. If anyone wouldn't mind sharing what your skill tree looks like along with why you made the decisions you did (specifc skills, PvP, shots, CC etc.) that would be great! Thanks everyone.

Absolutely fantasic thread. Thanks for the info. PLease continue sharing your insights. Although, is you sig correct that you have cancelled your sub?

You CAN make decent cash but the key is mission selection. I'm level 14 and have over 181K in the bank. Take a look at this.... https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0ArCSGLnwZLADdGxYdlhEejBFclBjR3l1N29OaW1kYUE&output=html

Others have posted results of slicing missions that were REALLY helpful. I'm about to change focus and work on bio missions. I've started tracking, in detail, the results of all my missions to help me figure out what to expect from each mission in terms of items returned and quantity. I assume others are already doing this. Is there anyone out there willing to share their information and collaborate on building a result database?

Great idea! There would be some varibility between servers but general tendencies and trends should apply across servers I'd think. It will be a LOT of work to keep something like this up but I'll be a regular reader (and maybe contributor if you need additional data) for sure.

Very well done and thanks!

So I figured out how to display quickslot bar 1 & 2 at the same time. Great. But for the life of me I can't figure out how to bind keys for each slot on both bars at the same time. I realize that I can bind a key to change the active quickslot bar but then I have to switch bars, select action, switch back. All those extra actions can end up taking a LOT of extra keying (and totally unnecessary and usually at the worst possible time IMO). PLEASE tell me I'm missing something here....