Tuesday, October 13, 2009

RR Tutorial : Leash plugin

Hi there, let me tell you about one of the most popular plugins in the RR brand (and this feature is provided in many other brands as well) : the Leash. It is always useful to fasten a chain to the cuffs of your captive to force her to follow you, or to force her to stay there. Note : at the time of this writing, the version of the RR suite is 1.22, including a way to make a leashable restraint behave like a leash handle, or "anchor". In other words, to make it possible to leash another captive to this restraint, even without its wearer's consent. It can also leash the captive to any prim, regardless of whether it is a root prim or a child prim, and whether it contains a script or not.

Please note that I need to lock the restraint for the leash to work (it used to not be necessary, but really it doesn't make sense to be leashed and not locked).

So, I lock my restraint and I take a look at the menu. I go to "Plugins...", "Leash" :



This is pretty straightforward actually. I can be leashed, unleashed, yanked, leashed to another captive and the length of my leash can be changed. Easy. I can also hide and show the leash, and retrieve some additional tools.


I press "Leash" and immediately a chain is attached to my collar. It's dangling from it, not being leashed anywhere. In fact I am leashed to myself. What's the point to being leashed to yourself would you ask ? Well if I am using the Restrained Love Viewer, then I am unable to teleport until I am unleashed.

There are several ways to use a leash actually. The first one is when the top leashes the captive's restraint directly. The result would be a chain going from the restraint to the top's crotch... Ouch ! That's gotta hurt. Meet my alt Mary (the blonde on the left), who is going to demonstrate it for you. She clicks on my collar, goes to Plugins > Leash, and presses "Leash" :


The second way would be to use what I call a "leash handle", a small handle to carry and attach the leash to. In other words the chain woud not go to the crotch anymore but to a special attachment that the top wears, usually in a hand. The leash handle can be retrieved by the top directly from the Leash plugin of the captive, by pressing the "Give tools" button. Once the handle is obtained, the top (Mary in this case) wears it and the leash immediately connects to it, nothing to do. The "Give tools" button also gives a HUD called "RR Leash anywhere". More on that below.



I have to mention a... bug there. Yes, there are some known issues with this tricky piece of plugin. If the top unwears the leash handle, the chain disappears, but the captive is still leashed to the top and unable to teleport. Only there is no visual cue anymore, and that may be confusing. So don't do this, once you wear your leash handle, don't unwear it before unleashing your captive, or if you do it is better you leash her again afterwards, to see the chain again.


However, the top can drop the leash handle to the floor. Mary simply right-clicks on her own leash handle, and selects "Drop". And see what happens :




I can move around only so far away from the handle that is now on the floor, no matter where Mary goes. I am effectively leashed to the leash handle that has been dropped, and no longer to Mary.


Now, Mary can choose to get her handle back, while I'm still leashed to it ! She just right-clicks on the handle on the floor and selects "Put on" > "Wear" on her context menu (or if she decides, "Attach > Right Hand" or wherever else she likes). This will make her walk or run or fly to the handle and wear it automatically. And...




... I am now leashed to Mary again, to her carried handle to be exact. Easy !


Now, maybe Mary does not have permission to rez things where she is, or maybe she sees other leash handles around (there are many around SL, as they are looking very simple and can even be modified), and wants to leash me to one of them, even if it doesn't belong to her. For instance in a public BDSM place. Well, she can !

She simply clicks on a ring in-world (riveted to a wall, floating in the air, half-buried into the ground etc) and Woosh ! I am instantly leashed to that ring and no longer to Mary ! However if she did that to another ring afterwards it would not do anything, she would have to leash me again first. And once again, if that ring belongs to her she can Wear it directly too, even if she was already carrying a handle (the ring, which is a handle, would probably replace the one she is carrying).


Another fun thing, since we are talking about leash handles... Since 1.17 a restraint that contains a Leash plugin (in other words, a leashable restraint) can also serve as a leash handle ! That way the top can literally make "chain-gangs" of captives. To do this, simply press the "Anchor" button on a captive's restraint (for instance a collar) while another captive is leashed to you, and you will see the latter being leashed to the former. For example, Mary is now wearing a Vixen Collar (which is leashable) and has me leashed to her. Please note that she must not be wearing a leash handle anymore, because otherwise it would conflict. She clicks on her collar, goes to Plugins > Leash, and presses "Anchor"...



I'm now leashed to her collar directly ! And if she presses "No anchor", the leashes goes back... to myself. This means that I am still unable to teleport, but at least my movements do not depend on the other captive, in this case Mary. She has broken the chain-gang.

While "Anchor" is active on Mary's collar, every leash that she activates from my restraints are automatically connected to it after 10 seconds at most. This happens only because Mary wears a restraint and is also spawning leashes. My leashes wouldn't connect to Mary's collar automatically if I was leashed by someone else, unless that someone pressed "No anchor" then "Anchor" again on Mary's collar.

I mentioned the "RR Leash anywhere" HUD above. This is a new feature as of version 1.22 of the RR product line. It allows the top to leash the captive to anything. Really anything, except the ground. Mary simply wears the HUD she had retrieved earlier, it looks like a round green button with a chain symbol on it (the color is completely arbitrary, you can change it to whatever you like).



She leashes me again, looks around, and decides to leash me to, say, one of the rings on that post in the bedroom (yes, I have BDSM posts in my bedroom...). All she has to do is to focus her camera on it by Alt-clicking on it (her screen shifts until the ring is in the middle), and she clicks on her HUD. My leash immediately goes to the ring ! That ring is not even the root prim of the whole object, and although it is scripted (but does not contain the script for the handle), it could also be clear of any script, it would work all the same.





She could even be mean and leash me to someone (another captive or just anybody) with this trick. The only thing she cannot leash me to is the land.


That's about all there is to know about the Leash plugin. Changing the length of the leash is a no-brainer, it goes from 70 cm (as close as possible without making the avatar bounce around) to 15 m. Oh and the top can "Yank" the captive, which means giving a tug at the chain to pull the her close without changing the length.


One fun thing to do with the leash handle is to drop it on the ground and turn it into a physical steel ball, that is slighlty ovoid (so that it doesn't roll too far). It would act like a ball-n-chain-like fetter ! Very frustrating for the captive, believe me. Hehe.

Oh, one last thing ! If Mary locks me in a different way, the leash might change place. There might even be several leashes, like here on the yoke, after she grabs my leash again :




Have fun !

Marine