SWTOR Dark vs Light Guide

Dark vs Light is a way of competing with your server in Star Wars the Old Republic to push your  side to victory and gain some unique rewards on a level 70 character.

This Dark vs Light system is loosely based off of the Dark vs Light limited-time event, but is not directly related.

Choose Dark Side or Light Side

To participate in the Dark vs Light battle, you’ll first need to choose if you want to represent the dark side or the light side. Which side you choose is up to you – it’s not based on your character’s current alignment. To choose the alignment you want to represent, there’s a small panel on your interface, near your minimap that has a dark and light symbol you can click.

Once you’ve chosen dark or light, everything you do ingame will contribute to your chosen faction’s cause, and everything you do will gain you dark or light character alignment points based on what you’ve chosen. Almost any activity you can think of now awards darkside and lightside points – warzones, flashpoints, crafting, heroics, killing enemies, GSF, operations, and almost any quest in the game will contribute to your character’s alignment and towards the Dark vs Light battle.

If you’re on a lightsided character and choose to represent the light, you’ll gain more lightside points and will get rewards when lightside wins. If you’re on a darkside character and choose to fight for the light, you’ll start gaining lightside points on your character and eventually your character will change from being darksided to lightsided over time as you fight for the light. This works in reverse too – lightside characters that choose to fight for the dark will eventually slip into darkness.

You can choose which side you are fighting for at any time – you can flip flop back and forth if you want, but you’ll gain the most rewards when the side that matches your characters’ alignment wins. You could represent the opposite side if you want to change your character’s alignment over time for roleplay, achievement or reward reasons.

Dark vs Light Meter (Galactic Command Panel)

In the galactic command panel, you’ll be able to see the Dark vs Light meter, which shows which side is currently winning, and at what level they’re at.

To open the Galactic Command panel, which contains the Dark vs Light panel at the bottom, press CTRL+H or choose galactic command from the menu – it’s in the dropdown menu under the triangular quest icon.

As each side starts gaining points, they progress from Dark or Light level 1 to 5. Levels 1-4 are just to show which side is currently winning, and when a side reaches level five they enter the victory state with special rewards.

Dark vs Light Tokens

If you gain a Galactic Command level anytime your character’s alignment matches the winning side, you’ll gain a light or dark token which can be spent on cosmetic items. For example if you are a lightsided character, you’ll gain a token anytime you gain a galactic command level and the Dark vs Light slider is between Light 1 and 5 – it doesn’t even matter what side you have currently chosen to represent. You could even be fighting for the darkside, but as long your character’s alignment matches the winning side, you will get a token. If you’re on a lightsided character, but decide to start fighting for the dark, you’ll keep getting lightside tokens whenever lightside is winning until you eventually slip into darkness from the darkside points you are gaining from choosing to represent the dark.

Dark vs Light Victory State Rewards

When the meter reaches either Dark 5 or Light 5, the victory state starts and lasts for an hour. During that hour, a few different things happen.

  • During the victory state hour, if your character’s alignment matches the winning side, you get a bonus 15% to any CXP you earn, regardless of what side you chose to fight for. This can be combined with the activity-of-the-day bonus from the galactic command panel and with Command Boosts from the cartel market.
  • Between the tokens and the bonus cxp, it might be smart to leave some missions “almost finished” until the victory state occurs for your side, if your character’s alignment’s side is close to winning. For example, you could kill all but one enemy for a heroic, then kill the last one when your character’s alignment’s side finally wins. Or you could save a CXP pack you got from an Uprising, or save a few items to disintegrate when the time is ripe – though disintegrating does not seem to get a bonus from the light vs dark victory state bonus. Then you can use the pack or disintigrate the item when the time is ripe and get a token or some extra xp.
  • The Victory state also has a balancing mechanic to help the losing side catch up. If the lightside wins, the darkside will then get an alignment point boost to help them win next time. The Dark vs Light slider usually swings back and forth between Dark 5 and Light 5.

Dark vs Light Bosses

When the Dark or the Light side wins, the galaxy is also affected. When a side wins, special enemies of the same faction will spawn on Tatooine, Alderaan, Hoth, Dromund Kaas and Coruscant. For example, if the lightside wins, some unique lightside Jedi enemies will spawn. Which exact ones show up are random though!

These bosses are quite strong and require a group of 8 to 16 people to fight.

When you fight them, they only drop loot for up to 16 characters, so don’t bring along too many friends to fight them. Defeating these bosses will net you a nice chunk of CXP to everyone inside the operation group fighting the boss.

If you’re aligned with the opposite side of the boss, you’ll also get a bonus light or dark token depending on your chosen alignment.  For example if a dark side boss spawns due to the darkside winning, and you are a lightside character, you will get a bonus light side token.

If you’re aligned with the same side as the boss, for example you are on a lightside character  and fight a lightside boss, you won’t get a token for being a traitor to your character’s alignment – but you’ll still get CXP.

If you find a Dark vs Light boss in the open world, make sure to leave it alone until you’re ready to fight it with a group. If you engage it and you die, the boss may leave and no one will be able to fight it.

You also want to pay attention to the 1-hour timer for the victory state in the galactic command panel – the Dark vs Light bosses disappear automatically when the timer runs out – so don’t waste your time on a boss you won’t have time to kill.

If you’re interested in fighting certain bosses, you might want to line up with the faction that is the opposite of your character’s alignment, so you can fight those opposite faction bosses. A player with a darkside-aligned character could choose to fight for the light, and then when the light wins to go fight the newly spawned lightside enemies and earn a token when they’re defeated.

Dark vs Light Rewards

Apart from the CXP boost and the interesting bosses, the main reason to participate in Dark vs Light is to gain Dark or Light Tokens which are exclusive to the Dark vs Light system. The Dark and Light tokens can be spent in the supplies section of the fleet, and you can use them to buy some cool looking cosmetic armor, some animated cosmetic armor, some cosmetic weapons and some unique pets and mounts. You can see how many tokens you have on your character in the currency tab in your inventory.

The only two ways to earn the tokens are through the faction you’ve chosen winning, and through defeating the special dark vs light bosses that have an alignment opposite to your character’s. The type of token you earn will always be based on your character’s alignment… so if you really want one of the darkside rewards but have a lightside character, you have two options. If you really want to play on that character, you’ll need to change their alignment – the quickest way is simply to start fighting for the darkside. The other option is to play on a different character that has the proper alignment – all the of the Dark vs Light rewards are bound to legacy, so you could earn those tokens, buy the rewards you want, then send it over to the character you want to use the reward on.

The Dark vs Light system was meant to be an epic battle going on within each of the servers, with groups and guilds helping make a big push towards either side. If you have a group, you definitely can help push your side into the victory state by all picking the same alignment and running content together. For the average person, it will mostly be a game of waiting until your side happens to win. One way or another, keep your eye on the Dark vs Light meter, and take advantage of the special rewards when your side wins and seek out the new bosses when your character’s alignment loses!