#Voice of the Skeptic

[itsonlypolite]

how would the shifting mound shop for clothes??

... good question. Well, first things first, look at all those poor vessels making up her dress! They gotta be cold. Maybe some of the voices (with easily translatable outfits) could help?

Yay! Five vessels out of an incalculable number clothed!

Bonus clothing swap for all the voices who were kind enough to lend their outfits!

[snowfallenapocalypse]

Howdy Slay the Princess friends! I wanted to show off my Voices designs, they’re still very likely to change cause I’m still not quite happy with all of them, but I hope you enjoy them! :3c

Explanations and a few extras below the cut! :) (This ended up being a really long post so be warned!)

For the most part I try to use the same body shape for all of them, with the only differences being their accessories and some beak variation. None of them have wings either- I don't like drawing them that much so they're reserved for TLQ

Alright here we go- explanation time!

Hero - Knight's helmet based on the default warrior class helmet from Miitopia, no clue if the feather, ponytail, thing... is his actual feathers or part of the hat and I probably never will. I love how he looks even if the helmet sucks to draw

Broken - Shackle and chain around his neck, not much to say about this guy, I was a bit worried it was too similar to the Prisoner's shtick at first but it's grown on me

Contrarian - Jester's cap, the most common defining accessory I saw for him in fanart and thought it fit. Probably gonna change him cause the current iteration doesn't feel quite right. (Either hat redesign or something new)

Opportunist - A tie and ripped dress shirt, I wanted a smarmy business-ey feel for him but didn't think a nice shirt would fit in with the aesthetic of the game, so I gave him a ripped one (he probably found it on the ground somewhere)

Paranoid - Perfume pendant, I adore this concept but have had a hard time conveying it properly. The pendant is filled with smelling salts cause there's no way in hell he's gonna just let one of them faint. I want to keep this concept so much but I know it has to go through a few more designs cause I don't really know what it's supposed to look like.

Smitten - A shawl with heart shaped embroidery and a flower broach, I... Don't know how to feel with this one? It doesn't quite fit Smitten's exuberance but I don't know what I would give him instead. Will probably change later if I do come up with something better

Hunted - Hooded cloak, for camouflage :0 (it's a very short cloak though basically only covers his shoulders.) I drew him twice so you could see both versions, realistically he'd always have the hood up but I find it hard to draw and doesn't look as good so I don't bother, (it probably looks weird because the hooded version is missing the feather tufts, I added a quick sketch of the hood with them below)

Cold - A hole in his chest (shamelessly based on Mad Rat Dead,) Cold didn't seem like the type to have any worldly possessions so this was the most literal way I could convey his 'heartless' personality, it is kinda bending my rule of giving all these guys unique accessories but it fits him quite well so I don't mind

Skeptic - Detective hat, this is another one that I think looks a bit weird due to the lack of tufts (version with them below) and I don't know how well this fits his personality, but Skeptic is probably the voice I'm least familiar with so I'm kinda just ignoring redesigning him until I get a better grip on his character (I also don't really know how to draw this hat- I tried my best lol)

Cheated - Cut off tuft and scars, I had a really hard time coming up with this one and I'm still not quite sure how I feel about it. It's another one that bends my rule of having accessories but I couldn't think of anything to put on him that fit the vibe of 'Being salty from repeatedly losing to someone using hacks in a game.' (Yes, that's how I summarize Cheated's personality lol)

Stubborn - ...Isn't here, Oops? Yeah, you probably noticed but I don't actually have a design for him yet. I might give him a cape? idk. He's another voice I don't really have a good grasp on, I have to play through his chapters again :')

Anyways! Here's the basic design rules I tried to stick to when coming up with these guys (and the explanations as to why) cause I wanna share my creative process :0!!!

-Same body shape/their defining trait should be an accessory and not their size/frame/body (just to keep things simpler for me, technically broke this one by taking a chunk out of Cold and Cheated tho, oops)

-Easy to convey without too many details (this is because I draw absolutely tiny on paper and details will get lost at that size!)

-Should be visible in a bust shot, aka shoulders up (that's just what I draw the most, as you can see)

-No weapons (the only weapon they'll ever have is the pristine blade, I didn't want a scenario where TLQ looses the blade but actually it's fine cause the Hunted has a dagger or something)

-No pants, shoes, long sleeves, or full outfits (this one's just a personal preference, I think they look a little weird in clothes.)

(The 'Same body shape' and 'No weapons' rules are the main things holding me back from most of the easy Stubborn ideas I have but I'm sure i'll come up with something eventually!)

Speaking of!

If you wanna suggest some ideas for better designs for these lads (or send your favourite designs by other artists (or your own)) please do!! I plan on drawing some other designs I like by other artists soon for practice/inspiration, so please send them my way >:3c

As a send-off to the post (and a thanks for reading this far holy shit I wrote far too much) here's the extra bits! My one Long Quiet full body, the Hunted and Skeptic sketch with their tufts, and a bonus Opportunist cause I realized you can't really tell what the shirt looks like lol

[insomniac-dormouse]

Silly designs for silly voices

[swanpyart]

Some designs for the Voices! Since the Long Quiet is a bird man, here's a bunch of bird men

[toon-topaz]

Finally finished an animation I've spent around 2 months on

[blazeys-planet]

Hi its been fifty years but i haven't died nor stopped doing art i swear- Deciding to get back into this by indulging in my current hyperfixation on Slay The Princess, so heres a design for Skeptic, Smitten and Paranoid! + a bonus Narrator for fun and profit

[olegianote]

I love your stp narrator! And I'm 100% sure you already know this, but secretary birds are also called killer queen! So does this mean the narrator gets called the killer king/queen sometimes by the other voices to annoy the narrator? :]

OH THAT WOULD BE SOOO FUN! I like when Narrator gets annoyed! Which is why this ask inspired me to do this little comic:

[bubblybloob]

Skeptic wants no part in this.

I don’t know if this meme has a name, but I felt like doing it with the voices. I think it’s funny how you can literally see how I draw them change slightly over the course of the drawings, the hands especially.

[mcnotok]

All my fellas <3

[occatorcreator]

I need to draw more of the voices and Narrator...

There is a lot of instances where one of the voices just takes over Quiet's body, usually against his will.

[weatherprogrammed]

yeah. i didn't like the bird designs so i'm doing the classic guy shaped thingies. personal designs will change over time. alter thing is an inside joke and not headcanon nor interpretation

[itsonlypolite]

Replayed the Drowned Grey Route recently and it always makes me laugh a bit at how long we stand in the pouring rain for that route

[lovelylittlewordsmith]

I don't think we can heart lungs liver nerves our way out of this one boys

[zel-zo]

A little stabby + a little nappy

The Slay The Princess Brainrot Continues

[3zethe3zr]

Working on a stp au, so take the designs of the protagonists: two dysfunctional and amnesiac detectives and their equally dysfunctional amnesiac client! This surely can't go horribly wrong!

[swanpyart]

I think Skeptic and Smitten are actually true opposites and it’s part of why we never see them in a route together on their own. Skeptic is skepticism and Smitten is blind devotion, and those two concepts cancel each other out.

Think about it: our perspective of the Princess alters what she becomes. Damsel is a harmless and soft Princess Classic with no deeper world because the Smitten views the Princess as a harmless victim that can do no wrong and loves him back. The Prisoner is more complex because Skeptic IMMEDIATELY pegs her as someone more calculating, intelligent, but also capable of reasonable discussion. He’s willing to hear her out or side with her, but not without hearing out all sides.

Smitten and Damsel are star crossed lovers defying an evil Narrator that wants to tear them both apart. Skeptic and Prisoner are two hostages who realize that they need the others assistance to escape someone whose trying to pull the wool over both their eyes (also the Narrator).

And even funnier, BOTH are correct ways to interpret our relationship with the Princess!

But it’s hard to picture any sort of resolution between these two ideas because they are nearly contradictory because of the Pristine Blade; you either side with the Narrator initially or the Princess.

This could also be why Cold and Smitten don’t cancel each other out. Cold doesn’t hate the Princess, he just feels NOTHING towards her. He only shows up organically if we take advantage of her in a vulnerable state to kill her as quickly as possible. That’s why he only appears in states where the Princess is already “dead” in the Player’s view, like the Spectre, the Greys, and the Wraith. Cold’s only opinion of the Princess is “dead”, and that trait doesn’t contradict the opinions the other Voices may have.