I played as a dark Jedi-counselor with one sword and used critical hits in melee combat. In general, melee combat was rarely useful. Well, there was lightning, Force choke (takes away half of the HP), and many other fun things. When I first met Malak on the Leviathan, I simply choked him (Bastila, the idiot, says, "Run, he's too strong for you!", but it's just that I'm too strong for him, so Bastila went to fight him to save the plot...), and on the Star Forge, there wasn't much interesting either; everyone died quickly, but Malak... This time, Malak was incredibly strong, considering that I immediately absorbed all the corpses and left him with nothing - nothing worked on him!
Neither lightning, nor Force choke, nor fear, nothing! I just hit him, hoping to shock him...
And the second KOTOR with a dark counselor was completed very quickly (I had about 1000 Force points).