as many already mentioned, good modeling, good light, good atomsphere. and as many said, work on the expressions.
In fact, I’d like to suggest work on the poses and think your image from another perspective:
- are you trying to tell a story?
- if you are, what’s this moment of the story?
- How’s the composition and poses helping telling the story?
When i first look at the image, i thought the main character is talking to a group of monsters. I didn’t feel enough action going on or coming up because of their standing poses. Everyone is just standing there, their muscles are relaxed. Then i noticed the sword in his hand, which confuses me. If they are standing and talking, there should be no sword (sword = fight/kill), yet if they are about to fight, well, none of them with those poses are ready for blood.
I noticed that you mentioned you didn’t want to spend more time on it so you called it off. Personally i would cut one monster or two, and spend more time on putting the characters together with more dynamic interaction. You were that close to win a choice award…
my old rusty two cents.