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Just wondering if I can get away with gray chainmail instead of all
that brushing business that metallics seem to need.

Alfred with an M, I have to confess to being mystified by this. I find drybrushing to be one of the easiest things I can do. Quick and easy metal = base coat black, drybrush Boltgun, Chainmail, or Mithril. You can do gray, but it?s the same process.

I have a couple of brushes which have served drybrush duty for years and have the classic frayed shape. You mentioned in a previous post that you have issues with brushing all the paint off. I start by just dipping the brush very slightly in the paint, so there?s only a little on it in the first place, then wiping most of it off on a fairly absorbent surface like a paper towel. Depending on how much paint is on the towel, I?ll often reload my brush from the towel instead of the paint pot. Lightly drag the brush over the textured surface and voila. I?m lazy so I often use a little too much paint and do it in one or two passes, as opposed to being careful and taking more time, but it still looks pretty good.

I know it's fast, but it's one of those fast and dirty methods I want tos ee if I can do without.

Probably not, but worth a shot.

Generally the alternative to drybrushing is just to get in there and do it as highlighting. It takes more time, but once you get good at it (I?ve known a couple of really good painters who abandoned drybrushing) it?s still pretty quick.

Grey on the chainmail is going to give you a NMM sort of look, so you'll need to avoid metallics anywhere else on the figure.

If you just want to avoid drybrushing. Paint the chain mail solid silver, then ink with the appropriate color. The ink will shade the chain link holes & the silver base coat will shine thru on the high points. Black ink would be be first choice of colors, but black/blue (or even green) will work for elves and chestnut is good for a rusty chaos look.

Interesting options.

I didn't even think about the NMM effect. Yeah, that would be bad.

Depends on what look you're going for. Cozyness or protection? If you want it to look like grandmom knitted the loincloth/tunic/barding/whatever out of nice thick wool for those chilly autumn days, then grey is perfect. 

Even if you're doing a mail armor in NMM, you're still painting it black, drybrushing with fortress gray, then lightly drybrushing with codex gray. And that's the same as metallics which is the same just with boltgun first, then light brush with mithril later.