The Dark Duke Vperit

The Dark Duke Vperit, using necromantic arts to raise minions from death to do his bidding.

Originally made in 1986, this model was one of the C18 blister pack "Night Horrors".

I picked this model up from eBay a little while ago as I wanted to add some spell casting ability to my undead army, that was largely devoid of spell casters at the time. But as is often my way, I didn't paint it up straight away, and added it to the unpainted lead pile, until now.

The model itself isn't one of my favourites to be honest, but I picked it up for a reasonable price, and don't think that it's too bad. It has the less is more approach to it's detailing that I like, but the pose doesn't really float my boat. But it certainly fits the bill as a vampire casting a spell, but I suppose the fact that a vampire in the modern game is a fairly potent combat character too and this guy doesn't look like he is. But those claws and fangs must be pretty nasty.

In games of Age of Sigmar this guy will be a vampire lord, giving my skeleton army some nice buffs. His signature spell is spirit blight, which gives an enemy unit -1 attack, which will be very handy when sending my horde up against other units that have been buffed up.

I also have the option to take him as my general, and if I do he can grant one of my units an extra attack in close combat. But really this is similar to the wight king's command ability that grants an extra attack in shooting and close combat to a skeleton unit. The main advantage of the Vampire Lord's ability would be that it can be used on something like a zombie dragon or non skeleton unit, which might come in handy.

But most of all, he will provide me with a spell caster who is no slouch in combat, able to take on smaller units that make it past my front lines, and that is characterful and just what I was after!