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Depending on the "type" of stone you want...pick 2 or 3 "spec" colors
Since you have gray you may want to try black, white, and a ghost gray
Take a small brush with very stiff bristles...I use an old toothbrush and a general purpose cleaning brush from a hardware store.
Dip the brush in one color and use your thumb to "flick" the bristles at the miniature...practice on a scrap paper first so you can view what makes a blobby mess and what makes a too fine mist
This will help on your stone texture
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Yeah, it's the color/texture randomness that helps it look more like stone than a paint job.
You can also tear off a piece of sponge into a tiny, rough shape and use it to dab lighter and darker paint over your base coat. IOW:
basecoat of the standard color
sponge-dab the dark color in spots
sponge-dab the light color in spots
sponge-dab the dark color in a few spots so you have dark on top of the light
And remember that stone isn't just gray—shades of brown, orange, and red are common stone colors, and adding these even in tiny proportions breaks up the monochrome of the stone and makes it look like something other than a grayscale photo of someone from the Blue Man Group.
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First, look at pictures of stone things... for example:
Secondly, go with Rick and SKR... you don't want all the high spots to be light colored and all the low spots to be dark. You want *deep* shadows in the crevices, yes. You want bright highlights on the tips, yes. However, between those, the colors should be as far from uniform as possible.
Finally, depending on the age of the stone it may be stained, pocked, etc. Moss effects are a favorite, you can get a nice mottled stone color and then paint on tiny trails of PVA (elmer's school glue) and flock it, which gives that mossy effect and really can bring in the fact that this is stone and not just 'grey'.
I've found any time I want to paint something 'natural looking' though, the best tool is just to look at LOTS of pictures of real-world objects and emulate as much as possible.
One thing to note when painting stone is that the splotchiness needs to be very small, or it gets too busy and looks messy.
I realized that I didn't give any real technical advice...
Basic thought is 'stone is complicated'
Here's what I did for a diorama I produced:
Colors: Black, Dark Grey, Medium-Dark Grey, Medium Grey, Light Grey, White, Moss Green
Inks: Chestnut Wash, Black Wash
Start with a solid color basecoat of a Medium-Dark grey.
Once dry, wash the entire stone structure with Chestnut Wash.
Once dry, wash the crevices and deep spots with Black Wash.
Once dry, drybrush the deeper portions of stone with Dark Grey.
Drybrush the entire model Medium Grey.
Spatter-paint the stones with Black, Dark Grey, Medium Grey.
Wash areas near the base with Chestnut Wash
Lightly drybrush all the edges and some of the flat areas with Light Grey.
Drybrush some edges with white
VERY Lightly drybrush certain areas with moss green
Seal with Future Floor Polish. Allow to dry for 24 hours.
Spray with Anti-shine/Dullcote/Flat Sealer of your choice.
The key here is to get lots of layers of color. I strongly suggest mixing your own greys out of cheap bottles of large bottles of black and white craft paint.
My quick stone painting method is, over black primer, to paint medium gray (leaving any deep crevices black), then wash with Citadel Devlan Mud/Agrax Earthshade (same wash, was renamed recently), which is a nice neutral sepia wash. Then drybrush again with same gray.
Then another light drybrush, using very light strokes to encourage a textured effect, with light gray.
Optionally, another, stronger final highlight over the highest raised areas with either light gray or, as odd as this may sound, a light cream/bone color. The latter makes it look like sun is hitting its brightest spots.
For a mossy look, I just glue bits of mossy flock to it.
This won't look as "deep" as the other methods above (which are especially great for terrain) but is fairly fast and still produces an organic stony look.
My quick stone painting method is, over black primer, to paint medium gray (leaving any deep crevices black), then wash with Citadel Devlan Mud/Agrax Earthshade (same wash, was renamed recently), which is a nice neutral sepia wash. Then drybrush again with same gray.
Then another light drybrush, using very light strokes to encourage a textured effect, with light gray.
Optionally, another, stronger final highlight over the highest raised areas with either light gray or, as odd as this may sound, a light cream/bone color. The latter makes it look like sun is hitting its brightest spots.
For a mossy look, I just glue bits of mossy flock to it.
This won't look as "deep" as the other methods above (which are especially great for terrain) but is fairly fast and still produces an organic stony look.
This is more or less the method I would use, though I am not the best painter.