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Since I'm running my maxxed out (400) slicer, I can tell you that Rank 6 Lockboxes appear to me as moderate/abundant, and are profitable; ~1400 cost for the mission, yield 1300~1900, crit I've gotten upwards of ~3100. So over the long run, it makes money. It only very occasionally loses money when a mission fails, or get a half-empty box. And enough of the time it comes back with a nice schematic or mission discovery, which is nice bonus.

Rank 5 however, the Rich lockboxes do not make money- they cost ~1900 to run, and the yield range is 1000~1600; because it's still just a rank 5 lockbox. I mean, if it crits, it profits, but it's better to pick the non-rich rank 5, since those cost 990~1100 to run, and the yield is as above, 1000-1600.

Augments seem to be a mod specifically for an offhand, so their need is infrequent at best; and the augment you get back is random stat, so it'd take a while before you find something you need. I have only used those missions for skilling up, because there wasn't a max-level lockbox mission available at the time. Now that I'm at 400 slicing, lvl 25 (3 deployable minions), I usually run 2x rank 6 slicing, and either rank 5 slicing abundant/moderate, or level my scavenging.

The two expensive rank 5 missions can be profitable, but only if you have a very high affection companion running them. I had my ship droid running them for a while, crap results. Switched to my highest affection companion and he's getting substantially better results. It's a bit of a gamble, even if you lose a few hundred credits on a few of them a good crit can get you a 7.5k box and an OK crit more around 3-4k. So the average loss can recoup easily on even just an OK crit. I have for a while been keeping track of what missions cost what and how much I've gotten back each time. From it, the 1930 and 2025 credit tier 5 missions have overall been profitable, same as the 1415 and 1485 credit tier 6 missions have been. I really should put this data into excel or something...

Unless you are specifically after augments to stick in crafted gear I second that it's not worth it to run those missions except when you need to skill up and there's no available lockboxes. If you really need an augment for your crafted gear as a slicer - honestly you have so little control over what you get and the missions take so long you're usually better off hitting the AH and picking up an augment there than sending your minions out to get you one. You can quite easily level out of the gear you're trying to augment in the time it takes you to get an augment that has relevant stats. I know at one point I did.

The profession is still profitable, it just takes longer now. I'd say it's a really good profession to run alongside others as a long term slow gaining pure money boost. Kind of like alchemy transmutes in WoW. You think ok, it's usually around what, 300-600 credit profit on average for a mission that takes 30mins at max lvl? That's not all that great, by the time you are 400 slicing you're probably looting armor pieces that vendor for more than that... but it is a passive money maker and relatively risk free (you don't have to worry 'will this sell?' since all you're getting is credits) which makes it perfect for alts especially imo. When not saving up for something specific like speeder training or ship parts I run 2-1, 2 slicing missions and 1 bioanalysis/scavenging. Making slicing pay for skilling up the others. It's really nice to just be able to mostly ignore the AH and just get pure money.

Hmm. There's no level limit for slicing missions?

Also, is there a fast/easy way to increase affection from a companion? Just buy a ton of gifts?

So I picked up slicing on my 13-16 toon. There is a 3m run that costs 120 credits and gives you between 60-200ish credits in return. Out of maybe 15ish runs, I got 2 missions and 1 low level cybertech schematic. I sold the schematic for 150ish and one of the missions for a bit over 500. I kept the other mission because it was a slicing mission.

I did one augment quest, and it returned +3 presence. I realized it'll be random what I get back, so it probably will be very expensive to get the right augment this way.

If you're actually playing the toon, slicing is worthwhile. I quested for about 2h last night and probably picked up about 1000 credits from gathering lockboxes.

The next level of quests are available at 17, so I'm curious what will be available.

So to answer your question... at level 10ish, if you're just doing missions, it isn't worthwhile. If you're playing? maybe.

Just like the other tradeskills, despite the level listed on the quests there is no level restriction on actually taking them. You could skill to slicing 400 and never gain another point of XP. I had slicing capped around level 34.

I've been leveling Underworld Trading on companion gifts along with buying them. Other than the 30sec debuff you get for giving a companion a gift there doesn't seem to be any limit other than needing the right levels of gifts for each tier of companion affection.

Ahh... So what you are saying is that even though the missions are broken down by character level brackets, their availability is skill based? This means that even if I turn 17, I won't necessarily have the level 17 quests available? I'd need to get to the magical skill level that opens them up? Interesting.

Maybe in the future I'll level a toon to 10 and pick up a the research mission skill I'm going to be missing for picking up slicing.

You've got it.

I knew I'd never remember to switch to an alt to run missions to support my crafting so I kept the mission skill and dropped the gathering one for slicing. It actually took me switching things around a couple times to get where I was happy. Fortunately, I did that before I got too far along with anything. My crafting skill is Cybertech so I kept Underworld Trading because the rare metals to craft upgraded items gets expensive pretty fast and it included companion gifts. I just buy the green crafting mats in bulk off of the GTN and then resell whatever I have left over after a crafting tier. If you're doing something where the rare mats aren't as expensive as Cybertech the math might work out differently.