How much would be lost.

Set the Light/Dark selector to whichever way you want to go. Continue to take the Light/Dark options as are appropriate for your character.

Er... No. Skills level up at pre-determined levels. There are some levels where no skills levels and no new skills are gained. At these levels, you won't have anything to train at the class trainer. So it's fine if, at LVL 65, you have a skill that is only LVL 58. That would be the max level for that skills (until, for example, BW raises the level cap to 70 and increases the max level of the skill in question to 59.)

Correct. I unlocked Chiss so I could make a Chiss Smuggler.

My character has a Biochem level of over 300. I have a schematic that requires Biochem 100. However, the game is telling me my skill level isn't high enough to learn he schematic. I remember seeing posts about this before, but can't find them now. I've tried swapping companions and sending my companions on mission, but I still can't learn the schematic. Help?

It's a square thing that looks like it is made of mesh. If I had to guess, you didn't actually click on the lore item. The modification station is not the lore item. There is a thing that looks like a sign right next to the mod station. That's what you have to click on.

I openly admit to being an alt-aholic. I'm also replaying a few classes that I had to 40+ prior to unsubscribing about 1.5 years ago so I can work on companion affection. (My new toons have higher affection than my older ones with the starting companion because of changes in the affection system.) I know where I am going with most of my new characters, but there's two I'm not sure about. I have a Jedi Sage (Heal spec) and a Sith Assassin (Tank spec). I have another Jedi Counselor and Sith Inquisitor that have not chosen Advanced Classes yet. I don't want to play the Heal or Tank specs, since I already have those. What I'd like is (1) a character that takes advantage of stealth abilities, and (2) one that does good AoE. I've tried looking at class guides, but most of the ones I've found talk about pre-4.0. I did check dulfy this morning, but the guides there either focus on PvP (which I don't do much of) or don't address what I am looking for. (They assume you have picked your advance class and spec and explain how to play it.) Could someone please let me know which specs do what I want? Thanks.

Recent changes have made companion equipment purely cosmetic. Before 4.0(?), you did have to equip your companions and keep their gear up (as well as your own).* Now a companion's combat performance is tied to your Influence with them. If you want to put your companion in all starter-world greens, you can with no loss. On the converse, you can put your companion in top of the line gear, and they will perform the same. Those are tied together, so I will address them together. First, there is no requirement to have a crafter. You can take all gathering missions (or a mix of gathering and mission) and then sell what you get on the GTN. If you do want to craft, you can only have 1 crafting crew skill per character. All blue recipes are learned from your crafting trainer (the same person you got the crafting skill from. There's one on most every story planet, as well as the Fleet.) Hit B to bring up Crew Skills and you will see an icon for each of your crew skills. If you have a mission or gathering skill, clicking on the icon will bring up a window with available "missions." (Gathering skills also have missions.) Missions have a credit cost, but will get crafting supplies. Gathering skills also allow you to get some crafting supplies in the world. (A * icon on the map indicates a node you can harvest.) If you click on the icon for the crafting skill, a window will pop up showing all the recipes you know, separated by type. (i.e. Armoring, Mods, Enhancements, etc.) Click on the name of a recipe and it will show you what materials you need to make that item, as well as a preview of the item that you can both preview (CTRL+Left Mouse) and compare to what you are currently wearing. At the bottom of the window is a button that says "Craft." Click that and the selected companion will leave to make the item. How fast a mission or crafting goes (as well as the chance of getting a critical success) is tied to your Influence with that companion. * I cry at the amount I spent when the game first came out keeping my companions up to date. My LVL 40-42 characters were all in LVL 28-32 gear when I came back because I had to "spread the love."

Probably a really stupid question, but I am going to ask anyway... If I use Cartel Coins to unlock the Legacy items for companion influence (i.e. "gains X% more influence from gifts"), does that unlock for all characters on my legacy, or only the one I unlocked it on? I know it says the unlock is only for that character, but I wasn't sure if that only referred to unlocking via credits, and CC unlock was Legacy-wide.

I just came back and picked up with my LVL 40+ toons. (I have new-class-itis in any game, so had never gotten any character to 50...) While running around the Republic Fleet, my Jedi Sage picked up a quest that sent him back to Nar Shadda, called "Road to War." I'm supposed to talk to an NPC on Nar Shadda. Well, she has a quest marker on the map (but not over her head), and when I talk to her, all she says is "You're cute, but I'm busy. Maybe next time." I'd really like to progress this quest, but don't know what to do to actually make her acknowledge me...

Who says they don't need it? If you are "juggling alts," then you have alts. And unless you make all the same class, they are going to need different things. I have 6 crafting alts - one for each craft. I started them off gearing each other up once they were all to their respective space station. (I admit my 2 highest level characters are only gatherers, and I had large amounts of Tier 1 and 2 materials when I started.) By the time I had everyone geared, my crafters had levels of 50+ and everyone had better gear than they did when I started. Heroics do give better gear, but what you get is random. Need a new Armoring? Sorry, you got another ear piece. Crafting allows you to get what you need when you need it. Run missions for materials. You don't level yourself, but you level your crafting and get materials. (All of my crafters, except Biochem, can craft higher than they can use. Biochem is the exception because she was higher level to start with.) That is a good idea. I don't know why the schematics start at LVL 8, given that the earliest someone could get them is 10 (by using an Emergency Fleet Transport to go up, get Crew Skills, and go back to the starting planet). 12-14 is more likely. Please note that your companion is capped at the planet's max. But yes, leveling is pretty easy. I almost never had to heal my companion on my Sage (currently LVL 42). Sometimes I did, but not a lot. (I want to point out that most of the time I was leveling the Sage, gearing companions was required. So I and my companions were all a little under-geared because I had to "spread the love.")

I feel less stupid now. I have an Archeo mission, requirement 150, My character has an Archeo level of over 200, but the game is telling me I don't have enough skill. I was starting to wonder if I misunderstood the requirements for the mission.

Thanks.

I've seen people say there is something you can buy in the Cartel Market to allow spec swapping in the field. Where is it? I went looking for it last night, but could not find it. Thanks.

I recently came back from a long time away to a lot of changes. Most things I have figured out, but I do have one question. My highest level character got his Stronghold. Do my other characters automatically have access to it, or do I have to send them keys? Either way, how do I send them all to the Stronghold?