Play me like you see me: Relational Moves for Intimate Play

Soft More, Lavish, and Echoes

Procedures for smut, intimacy, and emotional saturation in play

These are not rules for sex.
These are invitations — to stay a moment longer, to risk vulnerability, to play with heat instead of speed.
They live at the threshold: when a scene is already trembling with tension, and someone wants to go deeper.
Not bigger. Not harder. Just… closer.

These procedures are for smut, for yearning, for emotional intimacy.
They have little or no mechanical benefit. No point save the moment.

They are for moments where the characters ache, and the players want to lean into that, explore it and listen. And please don't use them if the players don't want to lean into it. Figure out how to talk about it.
They do not resolve. They reverberate.

Esorano

But I really think that before we can FKR smutty games or smutty Play-by-post, we need some methods and procedures or ways to tune into one anothers yuck-and-yum. Before we let go of the guardrails to find deeper meaning, we need to learn to listen for it, tune into it and unlearn the need for numerical values and solve the world play. Simply to be better at exploring it and one another for its own sake.

Soft More

An invitation. A whisper. A hand reaching, not grasping.
For the "Hard more", there will be another post coming up soon - meant for gratuitous violence and feeling horrible.
This one is about the tension of wanting more, and the joy of another interpreting that invitation.
Anyone present can offer a soft more.

Anyone may say when another does something that feels right to their character.
“More?” i say with my..." (say how does your character communicates it.)
(Softly. Not as demand — but as question.)

The addressed player may either oblige or refuse, directly or indirectly.

"Yes, there is more" or some such, and offer one more thread —
a deeper vulnerability, a truth, a look, a sound, a feeling they almost didn’t say. Press whatever the other thinks they want more of.

This can be:

A quiet confession
A glance that lingers too long
A hesitation that becomes a kiss
A touch that almost wasn’t brave enough and is given offer to bloom.
Increasingly horny erotic gymnastics.

If refused, the must show how they retract, and not say why. The moment lingers. That’s fine. Let it ache. They can of course still say why if asked afterwards in character.

This is not escalation. This is exposure.

Naudline Pierre

Lavish

A ritual of mutual presence.
You do not reach forward — you unfold where you are.

A player may declare:
“I want to Lavish.”

This invites a moment of co-expression - oh I want to make this moment good with you.
Co-expression of beauty. Of care. Of taking time.

The other(s) may respond if they want to lavish too:

During a Lavish moment:

Each involved character may give, share or present something for the other to take freely: a gift, a touch, a memory, a smile.
Must either, in addition, with their phrase either

embellish a detail of the other that they genuinely like
search for a detail (and say how) with their eyes, fingers, senses, whatever, searches for.

The other must do three things

acknowledge what is freely given
embelish or search in return
ask "why" the other is earching, embelleshing or giving.

The moment may become smutty, or stay emotional

The aim here is not climax — it is communion

This is for moments when:

Lovers reunite
Holding one another through grief
You bathe together in the River
Cooking dinner naked at dusk
Fucking, real closely.
Whispering truths during aftercare
Or simply sleeping safely, curled up, in the wreckage

Smalyon

See Me / Look At Me

Not declarations of role, but invitations to be read — and responded to — in a particular light.

Disclosure: I learned of the see me / look at me concept / ritual from a friend talking about a Larp they had been to - never the specifics of this mechanic or what the play was about, merely the names and sub-dom dynamic. I made my own from what the dynamic dyad does.

My friend has provided me with the reference now Carnival of Glories by Tory Root. Surreal how close it leans to my fantasies.
Beautifully weird and serendipitous.
Lovely <3

This mechanic is also a proceduralisation of what I wrote about here, when dealing with mental impact.
These phrases are not scripts. They are charged lenses.
They say: “Witness me through this shape.”
And: “Respond. Not by ignoring. But by meeting, rejecting, or reshaping what you’ve seen.”
Each phrase is spoken through the body.
Each one asks something of the moment.
Each one receives a response — and then opens the space to shift again.

See Me

An offering. A plea. A yielding.
Say this when you want to be read as:
Open
Waiting
Vulnerable
Unfolding
Submissive
Asking without asking
Examples:
“I sit here, hands folded over my lap. My eyes do not meet yours.
See me as waiting.”
“I move closer, sauntering — but one hand teeters at the hilt of the blade on my back.
See me as willing, but uncertain.”
“I lean in, offer my neck. But my voice does not follow.
See me as something you could choose.”

Look At Me

An invocation. A stance. A readiness to act or be answered.
Say this when you want to be read as:
Holding
Claiming
Intentional
Powerful
Dominant
Ready to shape the scene
Examples in different styles of domination:
“I tilt your chin up with two fingers, eyes never blinking.
Look at me as if I could break you.”
“I stay still while the room trembles. I do not reach.
Look at me like I matter most.”
“I step forward. My voice softens, but my hand closes around your wrist.
Look at me like I might not wait.”

Response is Required

If someone says See Me or Look At Me —
You must answer, in fiction, by affirming, resisting, or reinterpreting their request.
You can do the following:
Say “I see/look at you, so i” and treat them as they asked. Interpret it.
Say “I don’t see you/look at you,” and act against the reading. Interpret it. This ends the potential.
Say “I see you — but not only how you want,” and give first a reading of them as they asked, and then a third reading that does not refute the first.
make a switchy reversal
Then — you may layer in your own perception:
Look at me — claim space in return
See me — show what the moment opened in you
end it there — closeness is over. Act on whether the act was satisfying for you.
This is ping-pong.
This is tension.
This is meaning made live — across bodies, eyes, and choice.

Switchy Reversals

When the lens turns mid-situation:
No, Look at Me.
“I kneel — but with my head held high. My hands do not tremble.
No. Look at me like... ”
(I am not only soft. I might own this moment yet.)
No, See Me.
“I press you down — but my breath is shallow. I hesitate at your skin.
No. See me as... ”
(There’s fear underneath this stance. I’m letting you glimpse it.)
Yes, and Look at Me.
“I shiver when you touch me. And then I hold your gaze.
Yes. And look at me like...”
(Let me tremble and still lead.)
Yes, and See Me.
“I answer your demand with quiet obedience. But I do not disappear.
Yes. And see me as...”
(Witness what this surrender costs — and gives.)

Mutual Meaning

This isn’t about locking in roles. It’s about letting the scene breathe through recognition.
When you say “see me” or “look at me,” you are:
Offering a read
Asking to be touched through perception
And inviting yourself to be changed by the response
This procedure is not about status.
It is about honest tension.
Wanting. Risking. Letting someone see — or mis-see — and staying.
See me like a demon in waiting. Caios Santos

Echoes & Hidden Truths

For when someone listens well enough to feel what was never spoken.

These moments are not invoked. They arrive.
When a player acts in alignment with something a receiver never said aloud—something written, hinted, or only revealed in aftermath.
The receiver can say that there was a hidden truth (they need not have written it down to make it real. The character sheet is descriptive, not prescriptive. This ain't no cart-before-horse world.)

This is mutuality at its most fragile:

A hope met
A fear uncovered
A gesture read just right

It might ache. It might burn. But something opens.

Trigger

When someone:

Acts as if they knew a truth another player never said
Moves in sync with a desire or fear hinted at, but unspoken
Offers comfort, pressure, seduction, or reprieve that touches what was secretly written or thought.

Or, conversely

When an emotional outburst or action makes a past gesture clear in hindsight.

What Happens Then

Choose one, right then and there, each — or let it arise in play:

Ask a Question of the Heart
The one who was read may ask a question of this caliber, pointing to themselves - and what the other would do if the read character does what they want.
“What do you want from me, truly?”
“What would you do if I said yes?”
The other must answer honestly. No deflection.
Hint the Truth
Say something aloud they never meant to say - or hint at it beyond any shed of doubt to the other. It is true.
a truth, a memory, a rule of self.
It cannot be denied to them once spoken. If you try to lie about it in privacy with them, the lie will break like your voice.
Reveal a Trembling Gift
“You’ve seen something I wasn’t ready to show.”
Then: offer a vulnerability, favor, or access. A gift.
"You can always make me tremble with tender touch"
The other may do the same. Or not.
Do not open yourself
Ah, what shame!

Optional: The Secret Paper

At the start of a situation/scene/play-session/session-zero/campaign/coffee-break/whenever, a player may write a secret longing, fear, or truth on a slip of paper. Keep it hidden.

It may be revealed only:

When someone acts perfectly in resonance with it
Or when a breakdown or emotional climax names it retroactively

When revealed:
The paper may be opened. Passed across. Read aloud.
The scene may quiver, rupture, or soften.

There are no tokens. No debts. Just resonance — or dissonance.
No one is owed anything, ever.
But someone may be answered.

A secret revealed. An anonymous artist

Shared Strings

A String is a lingering connection — and a potential for real closeness.
not just between characters, but between players through characters.
Metaphysical softness.
Instead of classical telepathy, well-explained or functionalized, this is a way to dirty up one anothers fictional situations.
If later reciprocreated or acknowledged - it becomes a bond and its phrasing changes to reflect the mutual closeness.

These are things done in quiet, and handed to the other. "You have a string on me now" it says. a gift of vulnerability through beauty.

They are what loads the other procedures with an extra layer of meaning-making.

Does it result in some mechanical benefit? Is it truly different in nature from a bond?
I dunno, I don't care.
It is the shared connection.
It is the best way i've found to say "This mattered to my character to such a degree that your character now holds deserving power over me, use it well."

Example strings:

“We shared the bathwater before the riot.”
“Only you know what I looked like before I died.”
“I held your broken rig together with my mouth.”

Strings may:

Let you find, call, or reach the other across time or distance when relevant.
Allow one last act of saving, remembering, or surrender
provide some mechanical benefit
become a bond if you hand the other a string back at another point.
Sever anothers bond with you by involving the string.
End an intimacy. Swift or quiet rejection. painful or not. no roll or test
Protect themselves from longing.

When you do this, ask the one who gave you the string whether you still have it or not. If they say that it is cut - burn the string. (preferably the paper too)

Imagine me this!

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