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I don't want to use lightning all the time.

The point is, the game is designed to be balanced. Removing 1 force from dark makes it unbalanced.

To compensate, 1 light force should be removed.

It is only fair.

Light has heal, protect, absorb - everything you need to counter dark forces, yet dark is deprived of one of it's tools. It puts dark players at a big disadvantage.

Why not remove grip and drain while we are at it. Then light force and noobs can pwn

Unfair!

I would rather see it a no force server or a neutral force server than a "selective" force server.

I would rather see it a no force server or a neutral force server than a "selective" force server.

That was my feeling also, but the majority rules so the force powers are in. I can't say how to balance them more fairly, since I rarely use them. In fact, most games I end up getting thrown to my death a few too many times & I leave for a low-force server instead.

I'm hoping it'll eventually get me to learn to compensate & learn force tactics, but for now I enjoy pure saber duels.

I've had some in-game discussions with Fluk3 when he first posed this discrepancy, and I think he has a valid point. However, I've played enough JK2 out there to know that many "Padawan" named players will abuse this power. They are typically the same players that chat-kill, or run off in the middle of fight to either suicide (just to deny you a victory) or heal up and come back with an unskilled, blue flailing windmill.

As a result of my experience, I have no problem with lightning being disabled. Although, I don't believe that the real point here is lighting - it's balance. It's only reasonable that the light force users give up something. As a light force player, I have no problem parting with heal. Frankly, I never use it - mainly because it's one of those "crutch" powers like lightning that won't give the player a realistic idea of their saber skill. For me, saber skill is what I'm trying to improve, and with opponents like Bird, Fluk3 and Loki it's not an easy task, but still... it's a lot of fun 

Harumph.  I'm a mostly-light sider and I use Heal, thank you very much, .  I see nothing wrong with it.  I guess I don't agree with the position that the two sides were balanced to begin with. 

Perhaps you're right. I only offered up heal as it's one of those abilities I don't have much use for. To me, there are more than enough health packs and shields lying around the board to not have to resort to force Heal, I just assumed - incorrectly - that others would reach the same conclusion. By the same token, I don't use protect either - you may remember from our Protect test session a few weeks back, where I activated it and took a couple of shots. It's main purpose seems to be deflecting or reducing melee damage, and is surprisingly effective against kicks.

(Harumph.  Heal, a crutch.  Bah!       )

This is not a reaction I had expected particularly from someone as skillful as yourself. Your criticism of my opinion of Heal seems just as odd as Fluk3s request for balance. Two players that, frankly, are at a point where they don't need to resort to either.

My criticism of your opinion of Heal is 90% joking, and 10% serious, BU.  I just thought it funny that you picked a Light side Force power I use, instead of say, Protect (which we both learned about at the same time), or whatever.  (Hence the playful, and dare I say traditional, "rolling of the eyes" and "sticking out of the tongue" I used ).

I am bit obtuse at times... it's a human failing of mine. I'm sure building those mountains of Dell OptiPlexes at work every Monday and Tuesday until 10:00PM has taken some toll on my general constitution as well. I'd much rather be sitting at home in front of my Mac playing JK2 with you guys. I have a lot of fun playing this game both with and against you and the others, and respect your expertise. I've been a fan of the Star Wars universe since A New Hope, so playing this excellent game with cool people is a real treat for me. Additionally, I know we can all improve much more efficiently as a group than as individuals. 

Hopefully this gives a clearer understanding of my perspective not only relating to this issue, but the greater scope as well.

I don't think of people "resorting" to powers other than Lightning.  To me, it's Lightning that throws the balance off.  It's easy to throw three levels in it and cut a wide swath of destruction against everyone engaged in a general melee. 

I couldn't agree more - this is exactly how I feel about lightning. I am very happy it is disabled. Lightning is where Fluk3 started this discussion, however, after chatting with him a bit, and reading his post again, I got the impression that is was less about lightning and more about removing a light force power to compensate the dark. I can understand his point. If I were a dark force guy (which I'm not and as a result, have little experience with) and had someone charging me with absorb and protect on - it's going to be hard to bring that person down. Granted, lightning wouldn't do any good in that situation either, and the light players power would be very limited, but if as light force players we have the ability to Tank-up, even though we are using sabers (which takes a lot more skill than lightning), we'll still have some advantage though it may not seem like much.

That being said, I have never seen a light force player do this. All the light force people I've encountered, either don't realize this as an advantage, or are at a level where they need not bother (that's you Bird). I don't think this force balance is a big issue or an issue at all right now, but it may become one, and that, if I've understood correctly (see obtuse above) is the potential issue, and likely why he brought it up.

Any of you play UT?  Using lightning is about as lame as piston camping in UT.

well, to add a dab of dark to the discussion, i'd like to say that i'm a dark force user, and i don't miss lightening at all. it seems like the "easy way out," like laming someone by continuosly pushing/gripping them over ledges. i prefer to use drain to get health back, and grip for the occaisional jump/slam.

lightening just seems extraneous, especially because its so non-specific. suppose you only wanna hurt one guy in a fray, but there are many? meh, i'll stick with grip. 

How about this:

instead of disabling a force, why not just limit the amount of force points one can have. That way, if they allocate all their points to lightning, they would be seriously deficient in other forces such as jump, push, pull, drain, saber etc.

They should be really easy to defeat then regardless of the lightning.

Sounds fair(er) to me.

I think lighting should be on... Dark side is supposed to be destructive, and uber evil and all that( ), but the light side has peaceful counters to them all, (like you can persuade a dark side attacker so he can't grip you, unless he uses seeing. . .).

"The Force is one" and all that whatnot...

just my $0.02 with out all the well structured debate and counter arguments.

Thank you...

Just as lighties are annoyed by the advantages of certain dark forces like grip, drain or lightning, darkies are annoyed by the ever-safe-and-invulnerable heal, protect, absorb combo.

If you don't have all the dark tools and you are against a formidable light player who knows how to use all 3 well, it is really hard to make a dent.

For example, in maps where you can push people over cliffs (not that this is everyone's favorite fighting style) light force users can turn on protect and push darkies around like crazy while enjoying immunity to counter pushes and drain.

If a player uses protect (the blue one right?) all the time, he is only vulnerable for a few seconds before having enough juice to turn it on again. This is one example of where a quick lightning bolt can even things up a bit.

Not promoting lightning specifically again, just an illustration of the loss of balance of the two disciplines when one is removed from one side.

having used both dark and light regularly before settling on dark, i gotta say that getting rid of protect makes the most since. it's kinda cheap, but not as key as absorb, so i think most people will be cool with losing it.

depends on how much force is allocated to lightning, how long of a jold (how far way?) and what the other player's shield/protect/absorb status/point allocation is