Bloodstone
A while back, I got briefly really obsessed with Bloodstone Gnomes miniatures from Reaper, which I gather are ostensibly for Warlord, a game I both don’t play and don’t know anything about. Indeed, I’m not even terribly positive about the name, or that said gnomes are actually for it.
I picked them up as generic goblin/gnome-size critters for games of D&D or whatever. At least, that was the justification I gave myself. Really, I just picked them up because I thought they looked great. One of them is even riding a beetle! Only later did I realize why I liked the look of them so much: it turns out they were designed by Wayne Reynolds.
Anyone who has ever picked up a Pathfinder book or, indeed, looked at an RPG-adjacent tome in the past twenty years or so is familiar with Reynolds’ artwork. Around the same time I learned this fact about the Bloodstone Gnomes, I was also posting a string of RPG-related artworks to my year-long daily aesthetic thread over on Twitter, including a couple of pieces by Reynolds.
In the process, I learned that a lot of folks really don’t like his stuff – though the ubiquity of it would suggest that those folks are probably in the minority. I like his work for a number of reasons, with perhaps the most significant being his knack for absolutely layering his characters in bits and bobs while still making the art feel clean and sharp. His adventurers look like what I think adventurers ought to look like. He’s got an immediately recognizable style, and draws great gribbly monsters – witness the popularity of his Pathfinder goblins – which also endears him to me more than a little.
All those traits combine in the Bloodstone Gnomes, which probably helps to explain why I like them so much, even if the models lose some of that crisp definition. They also make good stand-ins for goblins. And I do love goblins.
The Incredibly Strange Creature 
I’m a tabletop miniatures enthusiast, collector of miniatures and rule-sets, painter and occasionally even play some games. I picked up WARLORD: SAVAGE NORTH, that contains WARLORD 2nd Edition rules and new factions for the game. WARLORD has a lot of classic factions that I love and can represent with miniatures I have on hand. With the BLOODSTONE GNOMES we have an army that is quite unique. The lore is interesting, the art work is really dark and the models are quite a bit different looking, evil AZTEC Smurfs. They are sort of blue goblins or mini TROLLBLOODS. I like to build out nice sized armies for the games I collect at least 2 so I can play the games with a friend. Wood Elves and Orcs are easy for me to represent, but BLOODSTONE GNOMES, that would a really cool unique army to collect, build, paint up and play with. I imagine myself going to REAPERCON someday with a BLOODSTONE GNOMES ARMY to play some games of WARLORD at some point, so I wanted an official army. For years I have looked for the models, trying to find a deal, a lot or bundle. I did but the metal models are expensive. There are a few BONES versions of a few of the factions’ models now. Having just about finished painting my 4th back-to-back army, I finally took the plunge and rewarded myself with a sizable selection of models for an official WARLORD2nd Edition army. It was a challenge deciding on what to get, not having played the game or really understanding the game mechanics, so I chose a lot of the models I liked. I read some forum lists; I’ll certainly add more at some time in the future. I was able to get some discounts, the entire faction is available from REAPER. Classic metal models, I bought these and haven’t gotten the BONES versions yet. I have enough models to use in other games as well such as DRAGON RAMPANT. It’s hard finding any content on this Faction, I’m glad I found this post!