New Sensations HUD adds Powerful Role-Playing Tool
For the BDSM community role-playing (RP) is very important in both Real Life (RL) and Second Life (SL). Dom/mes and subs are drawn to each other in hopes that they can share their favorite fantasies with someone with similar tastes. It is rare to find someone that enjoys every aspect of BDSM that you do, but together you experiment and hope the other finds excitement in the things you like or at the very least acceptance. In RL, it is a good idea to discuss limits and safe words, but what about in SL? Like many in the community I have used two safe words in both RL and SL. To review the use of two safe words, one is to slow down the direction of play (without stopping or going out-of-character (OOC)) and one is to stop it completely. The most common that I have heard is “yellow” for slow down and “red” to stop although I met one Domme who liked to use “liver” as a stop word since liver gave her the creeps :)
There are some that feel that limits and safe words have no real place in a virtual environment since there is no physical aspect to it, but I disagree. Most people are RPing to explore their fantasies which are in themselves not physical, per se. But think about how sad it might be to those who have their favorite fantasy ruined by it turning into something scary or creepy? This can be harmful, both mentally and emotionally as well as not being fun.
On the other hand, some people’s fantasies run into the extreme. And a virtual world may be the best place to experiment with those fantasies. But how do you know when you are going too far.
I have felt for years that there should be a better way than just a safe word. Safe words are for emergencies and and tend to put a damper on play. Now, thanks to Amethyst, I have found a better way! With this release of her Sensations HUD v5, there is now a Roleplay page that may keep your play fun and exciting and help steer away from ruining it for your partner.
The Roleplay layout has three color bars that you can share with your partner. One tracks Enjoyment, one Anxiety/Fear and the last tracks Excitement. The green arrow is you… you can control where it shows on the bar simply by clicking the bar in that location. The red arrow is what your partner has set on their HUD. In essence, this is real-time feedback for how your sessions are going.
This is a wonderful addition to using safe words since you can see just how much (or how little) your partner is enjoying the session. Pushing a soft limit? You can see how much anxiety you are causing without having to slow things down. Your partner doing something that is REALLY turning you on… make sure they know by clicking the Excitement bar way up.
Set up is really easy too. From the Roleplay layout, click the Sensations logo and go to Settings... Change your target to your partner by clicking Change... and if they have you targeted you will see each others feedback!
The Notify feature will let you know if your partner has changed their feedback while you are on another tab (maybe your are suspending them on the cuffs tab and they get really excited) and you can see their feedback as text without leaving the layout you are on. I suggest you turn this on so you don’t miss important feedback.
Not everyone plays one on one…. With the group setting, you can set your HUD to group mode and then anyone in 10m that targets you can see your feedback.
If you haven't found the layout option yet, you may like this wonderful shortcut. Click the Sensations logo to bring up the menu, click Layouts... and then select the page on the HUD you want to go to! This may be faster than using the right and left arrows. To make this even better, Amethyst has added a similar option for the sub menus. Say you go to the Collar page, you would be looking at the Manage sub page. If you wanted to do some Inspect poses, you could click the submenu right arrow three times (allowing for SL lag) or you can click the submenu title (in this example Manage) and a menu will pop up and you can just select Inspect from there.
Every since I was a young Mistress, pink has been one on my favorite colors. I remember dressing Ken up in Barbie’s pink skirt and making him lick Barbie’s pink pumps. But pink is not for everyone, so many of you will be excited to hear that Amethyst has included a new “theme” for the Sensations HUD called Obsidian. This dark but colorful theme looks great and is real easy to switch to. Again click on the Sensations logo, choose Settings... and click Look... Default is the standard HUD and Obsidian is the new theme. Once you click the new theme, the next time you change the page that you are on (right/left arrow or Layout) you will see the new colors.
While you are in the Look... menu, check out the Quick Bar if you haven’t already. It allows you to customize a four button bar with your most used buttons. Once you turn it on, go to the page that has the button you want to Record to the Quick Bar. Go back to the Look... menu, choose Quick Bar and then Record. The text will prompt you to pick the quick button you want to program, then the button that want to be recorded there and viola, your favorite is there for easy access.
In closing.... I think the Roleplaying HUD is an invaluable addition to any serious BDSM relationship but the amazing part is that the HUD is free to anyone that TPs into Sensations, just click the Free Sensations HUD sign.
I hope you will get as much quality RP time with your partner using the new Sensations HUD as I have. It has really freed me to try new things and see how my subs like (or not like) it without breaking character!
May you find your fantasies fun,
Miss Ichi
Posted June 11, 2010 by Ichi Merit
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