Honestly, I wish male smugglers got a female Corso instead of just Risha and Akavi (and yes, I am definitely customizing Risha into less makeup as soon as that's available). When I first saw Risha (without her makeup) and heard that you got her on Alderaan, I was hoping for a Princess Leia mimic (like how we get Bowdarr to parallel Chewbacca) - nope. Really, when I first heard about Corso I was expecting him to be a generic human companion, but he's turned out to be one of my favorites. I guess he and the two interesting aliens sort of make up for the lack of a lightside male love interest.

Wow... I think Corso's a great companion personality-wise, but... /inb4 "Team Corso"

This game takes place almost 3000 years before the movies. You can go to some of the planets in the movies (Tattooine, Coruscant, etc.), but the characters and events of the movies aren't involved at all.

Both use Cunning, Endurance, and Presence as primary stats. Things like Crit, Alcarity, etc., depend more on your build (e.g. healing scoundrel vs. scrapper scoundrel).

The reason for that is that your decisions in story quests affect future story quests. For example, say you're doing story quest where a character shows up, but only if you didn't kill him earlier. You chose to kill him, but your ally chose to spare him. Will he show up in the story quest that you're doing together? What if he lets you make a choice that affects future quests. Will your friend be deprived of the chance to make that choice just because you killed the guy in your quest? Will you get to make that choice because your friend spared the guy in his quest (effectively bringing the guy back from the dead for your story)? It's far simpler to keep people from having a joint class quest (even if another member of your class tags along), and keep your plot entirely distinct from your friend's plot. If it helps, think of your class story as separate from your friend's class story. You're not both doing, say, Trooper quests: you're doing the Kaylila's Trooper story, and your friend is doing the, say, Bill's Trooper story. The stories may be painstakingly similar at times (identical, if you both make the same decisions and are of the same gender), but they are distinct enough that they can't be done together.

You can get two relics that function as equipment for your character. For example, you'll want to be Dark/Light II by level 20 to get your first relics. Also, a lot of later gear is alignment-based.

Stick to one tree until you hit 40. Most trees give you skills at levels 20, 30, and 40 if you stick to them. Once you hit 40 and get your top-level talent, stick points wherever you like. It seems that a lot of trees have at least one Tier I talent that is better for people specced in the other trees than it is for people specced in that tree (e.g., a DPS tree will have a healing talent or a healing tree will have a DPS talent) - make sure to pick those up from the other trees after you've hit 40 with your own (and ignore the useless skill that might be in your own Tier I). Otherwise, your best skills are probably in your own tree. Of course, by the time you hit 40, you'll probably have a better idea of what you want. Which brings me around to the point that it's better to just choose a tree at first - as you play the game, you'll get a better idea for which particular talents are more useful (especially since most of the talents outside Tier I buff skills you won't even have when you first choose an AC).

Heck, they should make all major companions influenceable (and not just the Sith Warrior's).

Meh, I hope the smuggler gets the option of being bit more altruistic at some point. I was hoping to model my lightside smuggler after Hannibal Smith from the A-Team or an Underground Railroad "conductor" - evading unjust local laws where the Republic lacks the political will to intevene. The point of having video games, for me at least, is the ability to actually have a visible impact for good on the world, which you can't in real life (sure, you can have an impact through charity and the like, but it won't be a visible one because it will get lost in the Law of Large Numbers). It's just sad that if I want to be a lightside altruist, I have to be bound by the Jedi Code (which I consider to be completely unrealistic about human nature, not to mention self-genocidal) or a bunch of military regulations - or support the Empire but do good while I'm doing it. Sure, I could be a jedi who's benevolent but disregards the Code, but that would leave me with a grey alignment, which is gimped in this build (although they claim they'll add grey rewards later, but they say that about a lot of stuff and I'm not going to gamble my main on "grey rewards" being high in BW's production queue). Why must I choose between being restricted by a bunch of rules I disagree with, or being a selfish SoB who never helps anyone but myself except incidentally (sidequests, etc.)? Seriously, hasn't BW ever heard of "Chaotic Good?"

Yes, it is.

So she's a Machiavellian sociopath but not a sadistic one. I'd say that still qualifies as dark side. The frustrating thing is that I hear that in beta she used to be more light side. But for some reason BW decided that it was a good idea to give darkside male smugglers two romancable companions and lightside male smugglers none. Now the only lightside males on the Republic side who can actually have a relationship (as opposed to a fling) are Troopers, unless you want to do some pretty artful RP-ing to explain why a lightside jedi is breaking code or why a lightside smuggler is dating a sociopath.

Rhythm is exactly the right word. Get a good feel for what order to use your skills in to keep your energy above 60 while still churning out heals. Hint: Before the battle starts, throw out a useless Underworld Medicine so you can get Pugnacity up (make sure to let your energy regen back before attacking). It saves you a little time later.

If you're gonna heal you need to prioritize the healing. That means watching your party members' health. Whenever anyone's health drops, throw a heal on whoever's health is the lowest (you should only have the one at this point). Quickslot your heal to 1 for greater efficiency. Don't DPS unless everyone's at or near full health, or unless healing will bring you below 60 energy and no one's in urgent need (in which case you can throw in a default attack). Going lower than 60 energy hurts your energy regen, so make sure to stay in the top two bars. As you get new skills, make sure to work them into your rotation. For now, just keep an eye on everyone's health and your energy, and try to get a feel for the balance of it. Due to the way energy regens, there's a definite rhythym to healing without dropping below 60 energy, so just try to get used to it while dropping heals on whoever needs it the most (but don't be afraid to drop below 60 in an emergency, especially if the fight's almost over). EDIT: At level 12 you get a slow heal that costs no energy. Although you can throw it in when you don't want to spend energy, you'd probably be better off just using your default attack for a little DPS; that heal's pretty worthless until you get the talents that improve it (after which it does have a role in your rotation).

FWIW, while cover may not be useful to DPS Scoundrels, it's handy to have that extra layer of defense as a healer.

They aren't. :/