RLV - A Quick Tutorial

(updated 9/8/2011)

If you find this page helpful, please click the +1 button at the bottom.  =^.^=



What is RLV?  
RLV stands for Restrained Love Viewer, which is Marine Kelley's enhancements to the Second Life Viewer.  A few years back, she wrote a great overview here.  RLV features are also in Phoenix, Firestorm, Imprudence, and several other viewers.  Marine is the owner of the Restrained Love API and, naturally, her viewer will always have the latest RLV features.  The other viewers may or may not choose to implement the latest RLV specification.


What do I need to run RLV?
First, you need a viewer that has RLV (or RLVa) built into it.  You can only get this in TPVs (Third Party Viewers) such as Marine's, Phoenix, Firestorm, Impurdence, etc.  Be sure you look to see if the viewer you choose has it.

Second, unless you're using Marine's RestrainedLove Viewer, You will need to turn RLV on.  I've written a short guide on How to Turn On RLV in Firestorm and at the bottom of the page is some information on how to do it for other viewers.

Once you've gotten this far, some RLV things will work.  Specifically, any RLV item that you own can place restrictions on you.  Collars fit into this category.

But the real fun comes when you add in a Relay.  Without a relay, the viewer won't listen to objects in the world.  It's the job of the relay to pass on requests from in-world objects to your viewer to apply or remove restrictions.  Your relay will typically give you all sorts of choices here as to whether to trust the landowner, to ask first before imposing a restriction, etc.  A relay is needed for if you want to be able to be trapped by something such as a cage or tied to some piece of furniture.  There are several free items in Second Life that will do the job of an RLV relay.  The ones that immediately come to mind are:

• OpenCollar - The collar has a relay script inside of it.  Just turn it on.
• ThinkKink - They offer a free relay HUD.
• Susan's RLV Relay Ring - One place to get this is to find Marine's little shop in my profile picks.  Susan's shop is just behind Marine's.  You could wear the ring on your finger, or use it as a HUD.

Who should run RLV?
Submissives who would like to get an extra thrill by feeling the restrictions is "real" in the context of Second Life.  Dominates should learn how to use the RLV tools that exist for them in Second Life.

But I'm scared!
Don't be.  There is nothing anyone can do to you that you can't undo.  Sometimes, it may take a bit of clever thinking to get out of your situation.  Often, a friend can help you because you're locked out of a menu byt they may not be.  Many relays and collars support the idea of a 'SAFEWORD' that will instantly remove all restrictions.

But, I have to ask you...where's the fun in that?  Personally, I love to be tied up and role-playing the situation.  The only time I break out of my bonds unfairly is when someone has caught me and tied me up for some ridiculous amount of time -- like setting a timed lock for a month.

If all else fails and you don't want to be under the restriction anymore, simply turn off RLV in your viewer or log in with the official Second Life viewer which doesn't support RLV.    I think only once in three years did I ever get caught in something so badly I had to turn off RLV to get the thing off of me.

There is a RestrainedLove Support group that's free to join that you can ask questions in.