Friday, June 29, 2007

Contests at Alt Orgy 4.0

We will be having three contests at this weekend's Alt Orgy on Desperation Isle. I have some lovely high-linden prizes for the winners. The contests are:
  • Most Treasure Chests Found: The first persion to collect all 12 treasure chests hidden on Desperation Isle wins the prize. The chests must be discovered during the event (I will know if they weren't). If no one manages to find all 12, I will award the person with the most finds, assuming they locate at least 8 chests. Please report the number of chests you found in IM to Wildefire Walcott before 1am. I will confirm your findings. The treasure chests are all small and have a lock that bears my initials. You can see a picture of one here. Note: In order to "collect" a treasure chest you must "buy" it for L$0. Just touch it or right-click it and click Buy. If you don't do this, I won't be able to confirm you found the chest.
  • Most Sexual Partners: The avatar who manages to engage in sex acts with the most partners wins this one. Results are tallied by a special HUD (called The Bonometer) designed specifically for this event. Instructions follow.
  • Most Sexual Encounters: A similar contest to the other one, this contest involves the greatest total number of sex acts, and also requires the Bonometer HUD. Note that 3-ways, 4-ways, or more-ways count as multiple acts (1 with each partner). Read on for instructions.
Ground Rules
These rules apply to all three contests:
  • The contests run from 7pm-1am. Any prizes found or partners encountered before or after the contest will not be considered when deciding the winner. We have means to identify violations.
  • Only sex acts committed on Desperation Isle count. (The HUD will only work on the isle.)
  • In the event of a tie, a winner will be decided based on a random number guessing game.
  • For the sex act contests, any continuous time you spend with a partner constitutes a single "encounter." If you have oral sex, vaginal sex, and anal sex (hopefully in that order) with the same partner right in a row, that's just one encounter even if it's multiple acts. If another person or people join you, you may count that as an additional encounter (even with the same partner), as the new partners change the dynamic.
  • Multi-partner encounters (more than one partner) count as multiple acts. For example, if you engage in a three way, that counts as two encounters- one for each of your partners- and you must "tag" each of them to get credit.
  • I will contact winners personally (probably the next day), and announce the winners here on the Desperation Isle Estates Blog.
The Bonometer HUD

In order to record your sexual encounters and partners, you and all your partners need to wear the Bonometer HUD. Get your free copy of it at the Desperation Isle welcome area. The HUD displays a few buttons on your screen. Here's what they do:
  • Tag: This button "tags" a partner, requesting their permission to consider you a partner. After engaging in a sex act with someone, click Tag. A dialog will appear on your screen, listing the avatars in your vicinity. Click the name of the person you wish to tag. If that avatar is wearing a Bonometer HUD, they will be asked whether you two had an encounter. If they click Yes, then BOTH of you will get credit for one sex act. If it's the first time you've tagged this person, your "Partners" count goes up by one. If you've tagged that person before, only your "Encounters" count increases. Remember these are both important scores- you can lose the Encounters contest but win the Partners one.
  • Report: This prints a list of partners you've had that evening and tells you your current tallies.
  • Submit: This emails the results of your exploits to me. You MUST send your results to me by 1am July 1 (at the end of the orgy) in order to be considered for the contest. Please try to only send your results once.
Notes about the HUD:
  • The Bonometer only works on Desperation Isle, and is only intended for use during this event.
  • Both partners must be wearing the HUD in order to tag each other. Only one partner needs to initiate; the Bonometer will increase the encounter counts for each partner upon acceptance of a tag request.
  • The HUD is copiable. To give one to someone else, just find it in your inventory, detach it, drag it onto the avatar you want to give a copy to, and then re-attach your own copy. The copy you give to your friend will automatically reset itself so they don't inherit your tallies.

Monday, June 25, 2007

Alt Orgy 4.0 on Desperation Isle

This Saturday (June 30, 2007) Desperation Isle will host the fourth in our successful series of Alt Orgies. The idea behind the event is simple: Create an alt, attend the event, and engage in a multitude of anonymous perversities with other incognito residents. It's like an X-rated costume ball. After the orgy, be sure to stop by the Who Were You thread at Second Citizen to reveal your true identity!


To help financially-challenged alts, the welcome area at Desperation Isle has a notecard giver that hands you a list of great places in Second Life to find free hair, shapes, and skins. There's another box at the welcome area that distributes free sex toys, including a landmark to a place where men/shemales can get nice looking free penis attachment.

This event is only as serious as you make it. I've seen people engage in some thoughtful RP at the events, and I've seen some very silly things there as well. There will also be a couple of contests at this event (well at least one- the other is still in planning at this point), and prizes will be awarded.

While you're there, be sure to check out our huge new area, The Cave (it's only reachable by teleporter). Just be sure watch your step!!!

Monday, June 18, 2007

Rent Box FAQ

[Updated 2007.10.20 - updated for Desperation East]
Residents of Desperation Isle Estates: I have set up rental boxes for each resident of the isle. This notecard will tell you where they are and how to use them.

WHAT ARE RENTAL BOXES?
Your rent box is just a scripted box that keeps track of your rent payments. When you pay the box the money goes to me (the landlord), but the box will tell you how many days worth of rent you've paid for and it will send you a reminder when rent is due.

WHY SHOULD I USE ONE?
The rent box will make both of our lives easier, as it will remind you when you need to pay your rent and will also give you the flexibility of paying at whatever interval you like. For example, if you wish to pay weekly, just pay for 1 week's worth of rent at a time. Want to pay monthly? Pay for 4 weeks' rent, and it won't bother you about rent being due until a month has passed. It will keep me from having to track you down whenever rent is due.

WHERE ARE THE RENT BOXES?
I have set up a skybox at around 650 meters elevation over the Desperation West club, and placed all the rent boxes there. You can also get to the rent boxes from the ground by going to the gazebo in the welcome area of the isle (near the SE corner of the Vinyl Spike club) and riding the "Rental Boxes" teleporter.

Desperation North has its own set of rental boxes, which are 750m in the air, over the Desperation Isle Productions store. There is also a teleporter to the Desperation North skyboxes near the SE center of the island, in a little stone gazebo surrounded by palm trees.

The Desperation South rent boxes are 650 meters in the air, in the NW corner of the island. You can get there by taking the teleporter in the stone gazebo down on the ground.

The Desperation East rent boxes are 400 meters in the air on the Western side of the island. There's a gazebo on the ground with a teleporter.

WHICH ONE IS MINE?
Every rent box has floating text over it that lists the renter's name and the weekly rent. Please only pay your own box. :)

WHEN SHOULD I PAY?
Your first payment is always due one week after you acquire your land, since the purchase price of the land is equal to one week of rent. Subsequent payments can be in increments of 1 to 8 weeks' worth of rent, and this is completely up to you.

WHAT IF I WANT TO PAY MONTHLY?
If you want to pay monthly, just multiply the weekly amount by 4 and pay that amount. No special changes have to be made to the box. You can pay in any interval from 1 to 8 weeks.

HOW DO I USE ONE?
Couldn't be easier. Once you find your rent box, right-click it and pick Pay. Enter the amount you wish to pay, and that's it.

I OWN OVER 4096 METERS- DO I GET MY DISCOUNT?
Yes, the weekly rent price listed over your rent box is based on the tiered pricing that kicks in over 4096 meters. If you acquire more land, I will adjust the settings on your rent box. (Please IM me if you do get more land on the island... I don't always know until I check my transactions history.)

Desperation West

The welcome area gazebo with the teleporter to the rent boxes is at Desperation West: 128, 83, 30.

The rent box teleporter is in the SE corner of the welcome area gazebo:

Desperation North
The gazebo in Desperation North has a teleporter that leads to several locations. Click the center of the teleporter and use the Next button to pick the Rental Boxes location, then click Energize! to go there. The gazebo is located at Desperation North: 145, 111, 33.

Allowing Guests to Set Their Home Locations

UPDATE (2010.12.18): As of 2009, land no longer needs to be deeded in order for group members to use the "Set Home to Here" feature. The land only needs to be "set to group."

NOTE: There are two ways we can do this on Desperation Isle Estates. Use this method if you ONLY want to allow people the ability to set your parcel as their home. If you wish to grant them other powers on your land, I recommend deeding your whole parcel to your own land group, which also saves you 3 prims. See this post about deeding to determine what suits your needs best.

When you purchase land on a private island you can set your Second Life 'home' location to your land so that World > Teleport Home (or CTRL+SHIFT+H) takes you there. You will also log in to your home location in the event that the sim you were last in crashed and is still offline when you try to log back in. You don't have to do anything special to have this ability if you're the land owner, but if you have a partner or friends who would like to be able to set their home location to your land, there are a number of steps you need to follow, and I need to be part of the process.
  1. Turn on the viewing of property lines so you can see the boundaries of your lot. Land you own will have a green border: View > Property Lines


  2. Select a 16m portion of land on your lot by right-clicking your land, then clicking Edit Terrain, and then just left-click the ground inside your lot. This should highlight a single 16m square of land. This will be the place where people have to stand to set their home location. Just click another area if you want the home location to be someplace else.


  3. In the land Edit dialog, click Subdivide. (If you don't see the Subdivide option, click the More >> button to expand the dialog.) Next click OK. (As the warning says, you may want to re-check your settings afterward in About Land to make sure everything's set the way you like.) The newly subdivided 16m parcel should now be surrounded by a green border.


  4. If you don't already have a land group, create one. It will cost you L$100 and you MUST have a minimum of 2 people in it, or the group will be closed within a couple of days. To create a group, go to Edit > Groups and click Create.
  5. Invite Wildefire Walcott to your group as an Officer (or any other role in your group that has the 'Deed land and buy land for group' ability under Parcel Management). The default settings of the Everyone role do not have the appropriate settings for her to deed the land back to your group.
  6. Either teleport Wildefire to the desired location or give her exact coordinates to it. She will reclaim and then deed the 16m of land to your group. You will be able to tell the land is deeded by looking at the Owner property of the parcel in About Land. It will say: (Group Owned) Also, the parcel will be surrounded by a blue border instead of green.
  7. Now have your friends stand on that deeded 16m of land and go to World > Set Home To Here.


  8. Wildefire will leave your group after that. Make sure you've got someone else in the group, or the group will disband in a couple days!
Additional Notes
  • The ability to 'Set Home to Here' is actually a group role option (located under Parcel Powers in the Roles tab of group settings). In a newly-created group, the Everyone role has this ability enabled by default. If you happen to uncheck it, only people who are in other roles with that option enabled will be able to set their home locations to your land.
  • The steps required to allow guests to set their homes on islands are different from privately owned mainland, where you don't need to do all this business with inviting me to your group and having me reclaim the land, etc. On mainland property that you own, you can just do the following: In the General tab of About Land, click Set... and select your land group. Next check Allow Deed to Group (normally you'll want to check Owner Makes Contribution With Deed on the mainland, too- this option is meaningless for islands), and then click Deed... Click OK and the land will be deeded (as indicated by the "(group owned)" text in About Land). If you rent mainland property, the land is very likely already deeded to the property owner's land group.
  • On private islands like Desperation West, the Second Life client will let you go through the above mentioned steps for deeding your land to the group, but it won't actually do anything. (You will still be listed as owner after clicking OK.) I consider this a bug.