Thanks man, this is really helpful. I will be making this for awhile man. The reason why it's so big, I started with the face, and got carried away. But I need to do something crazy so what better than Arceus. I thought I had the light source all squared away, in that it was coming from the left hand side of him, but I can see on your edit how it should be. I guess I will be painting over his fur yet again.
Just one thing to clear up, what do you mean by banding?
OK here's a quick paint over. I tried to follow your model. Changed the pallete, though the color change is not complete, the new pallet will have 18 colors. (17+1)
Started details on the face, and also combined some of the colors for the golden arch on his back.