[en] Laser-based plasma spectroscopic techniques have been used with great success to determine the line shapes of atomic transitions in plasmas, study the population kinetics of atomic systems embedded in plasmas, and look at the redistribution of radiation. However, the possibilities for optical lasers end for plasmas with n_e>10²²cm^-3 as light propagation is severely altered by the plasma. The construction of the Tesla Test Facility(TTF) at DESY(Deutsche Elektronen-Synchrotron), a short pulse tunable free electron laser in the vacuum-ultraviolet and soft X-ray regime (VUV FEL), based on the SASE(self amplified spontaneous emission) process, will provide a major advance in the capability for dense plasma-related research. This source will provide 10¹³ photons in a 200 fs duration pulse that is tunable from ∼ 6nm to 100nm. Since an VUV FEL will not have the limitation associated with optical lasers the entire field of high density plasmas kinetics in laser produced plasma will then be available to study with tunable source. Thus, one will be able to use this and other FEL x-ray sources to pump individual transitions creating enhanced population in the excited states that can easily be monitored. We show two case studies illuminating different aspects of plasma spectroscopy