W'soran/Melkhior

W'soran on the cover of his own Black Library book.

The founder and usurper of the Necrarch Bloodline of the Vampire Counts. Both were huge fucking nerds with a penchant for playing army men as adults. Note that there are two different versions of the end of the story of W'soran/Melkhior. It's more up to personal interpretation which is canon, although the former story is supported by the legend of Ushoran leading to it being taken as slightly more canon.

The Legend

W'soran

Originally the High Priest of Lahmia during the days when the Tomb Kings had skin, W'soran was born to an ancient yet respectable bloodline from Mahrak (a place known for the founding of Nehekharan religion). Despite his heritage, he secretly adorn Nagash's brilliance, even go as far as regretted that he was born too late to serve Nagash during the war.

He was invited by Lamashizzar to join his little cabal where they tried to attain immortality by studying Nagash's book, as well as interrogating his servant Arkhan the Black for further knowledge. Like all other members, he grew tired of Lamashizzar's incompetence that he switch side when Neferata shown her superior mastery of the dark arts over her brother. In fact, W'soran was the first to kneel before Neferata.

After Neferata achieved vampirism, W'soran was the first to receive her new elixir. After becoming a vampire, he looked even older and ugly to the point of looking like a zombie, but he seems to satisfy with the result.

The founding of the cult of blood as well as the construction of its temple were W'soran idea to harvest more blood and minions without noticing by the public.

At a meeting with the cabal who are now vampires, they were all shocked by Neferata's sudden decision to raised the future king of Khemri herself.

W'soran's believe she has turned into a mentally unstable idiot after she killed Khalida (whom he also mocked as an idiot) and would rather ruling Lahmia behind her descendants as a trading ground. But he believes they (the vampires) should've done study further into the dark arts and use it to destroy Nehekhara and perhaps the world, then build a new Empire atop its ashes.

Still, he was able to persuade Neferata into giving him the permission to study the book. He seized the opportunity to do what he had always wanted to do...promptly sealed himself up in the Great Library of Lahmia to read...and summon Nagash!

Years after years, he used up a lot of slaves in his rituals but fail to summon the great necromancer's spirit, until one day Ushoran barged into his place and offered assistance. Under W'soran's instruction, Ushoran obtained Thutep's skull after he secretly hired a bunch of tomb raiders to dug up Thutep's remain at Khetep's pyramid.

With the proper material acquired, all that's left is a proper timing. Just so happens the book he has contained crucial informations about Morrslieb's sighting, and they were all predicted by Nagash in life. With the green moon's power and Thutep's rotten skull, W'soran found Nagash! but to his surprise, Nagash was in fact alive and has been building an army capable of destroy Nehekhara, which located just north of Lahmia across the sour sea.

Unfortunately for W'soran, Neferata caught him right at this time, staked him in the heart and thrown him into a casket. Before being immortalized however, W'soran profoundly told Neferata that Nagash will come and destroy all and he will curse Lahmia to never rebuilt till the end of times with his last breathe if Neferata dare to tear his head off.

W'soran has been pretty much imprisoned for 22 years until Alcadizaar laid siege to the city. He was freed by Neferata in order to provide battle support for the Lahmian army. The entire times, W'soran stayed inside a tower with clear view of the battlefield. He use the books knowledge to summon a fuckload of undead to fight the enemies. The dead came from the catatomb, mostly belongs to poor or homeless people Neferata had torture and killed in order to find Alcadizzar and for nourishment. Although the Nehekharan do not fear the dead as they used to when fighting Nagash, they serves as good distraction that blocks the enemy troops from moving forward. All of the zombies died when a good catapult rock shot towards the tower and disrupt W'soran's ritual.

After Lahmia's fall, W'soran and his followers escaped and travel straight to Nagashizzar where they pledge themselves to Nagash's services after offered him his book.

Nagash took him and his followers in and trained him until he is powerful enough to be considered a level 4 wizard. During this time, he formed a bitter rivalry with Arkhan the Black, whom was raised back to serve his master. Arkhan proved to be quite an obstacle to W'soran from becoming Nagash's number 1 (all just so he could obtain his knowledge of course) due to his excellent magic ability as well as his battlefield experience, proving to be Nagash's most useful servant by far.

In order to control the massive undead army, Nagash etched the sigil of binding into W'soran's face as well as his other 7 followers, making sure he could inflicting suffering on them while tasting their agony (because lore of darkness is all about feeding on negative emotions and feelings, further evidence on the dark elves and necromancers being edgelord wizard). Because of the additional vampires W'soran had bought, he was able to control a much larger army, yet Arkhan is still the head of operation. W'soran once again got the permission to use Nagash's book on the battlefield.

When the undead legion reached Nehekhara, it first landed on Lahmia and took over its ruin, killing all the bandits and thugs hanging out there and making its first encampment at the former Lahmian palace in order to plan for further strategies. W'soran had to stay there for days, only to furiously found out Arkhan had abandoned him and head straight west to where Khemri located, thought the bastard lich was trying to steal his glory in taking Alcadizzar's head. After W'soran's army crossed the golden plain and raze its crops with blackness, Arkhan's army was already in a battle position against a coalition army of Lybaras and Rasetra. Arkhan blame W'soran for misinformed everyone and Nagash that the great cities are divided and were unable to muster a proper defence against them. W'soran rebuttled by saying it is but a fraction of the forces they had defeated back in the seige of Lahmia. As a result, Arkhan ended up making W'soran to clean up his messes since he already had prior knowledge on defeating them. W'soran was apparently surprised by the new rune weaponry and spellcasters employed by the Nehekharan that were so effective in killing the undead. It was by sheer size and the udnead's tireless natural that W'soran won the battle. Still, the casualty inflicted on them would wiped out an average army and W'soran began to notice how long and painful this campaign is going to be with Arkhan being his bane while dealing with Nehekharan's new military technology.

Because of the nuisance Lybaras and Rasetra had posed, W'soran had to divide his army and sent his 4 vampires to seige their city (leaving only 3 by W'soran's side), prevents them from marching behind their army. Arkhan was also aware of W'soran's treachery that he make sure to stay away from him as far as possible.

A week after Arkhan razed Mahrak, the undead legion began trespassing the Valley of Kings, a gigantic linear valley path that leads straight towards Quatar then Khemri. Unfortunatly for them, Alcadizzar has prepared a strong defense along the valley path: Archers with fire arrows, catapult that sling flaming boulders, a tall wall made of granite and heavily armoured soldiers from Ka-sabar that throws sandblocks and fire pots.

Already it made Arkhan seething but the wall was eventually breached after two days of constant attack.

The second wall was even taller for their ladder and wall too thick to be blast open by spells and catapult that W'soran was persuade by Arkhan into sending his vampires (Note: the death of just one vampire could killed off several thousand undead soldiers that was bind to them). It was a great risk but they succeed nontheless with W'soran casting his fog spell to conceal his vampires to sneak into the wall. The second wall finally falls after 5 days.

The final wall was even thicker, taller, leaving only a gate made of basalt. There, Arkhan leaving the rest to W'soran and his goon. W'soran and his 3 followers then channeling their energy together and bought forth a dark cloud of tomb scarabs. The scarabs where then sent to the defenders ontop of the wall while 6 bone giants batter down the gate.

Unfortunatly for W'soran, his rituals were disrupted when a newly reinforced archers arrived on the wall and starts to shoot flaming arrows rain upon them and shot one of his followers. Worst comes when Alcadizzar arrived just in time on his chariot with many horseman charging with him.

W'soran managed to blast Alcadizzar and his wife off the chariot, but due to the sheer plot armor of the king, he not only survived but also slained all three of W'soran's followers (one of them was shot in the eye by his wife). Arkhan at this time thought of the battle was but a lost cause and decided to retreat and abandon W'soran and his 3 pets behind. W'soran too had enough that he left the battlefield using a jar tomb scarabs. He was never seen again at this point, not even in Nagashizzar for sure since Nagash was busy raging his ass off for 7 days and 7 night.

Here, the story of W'soran and Melkhior splits. The W'soran version follows.

After Nagash was killed W'soran turned more nerds into Vampires and crossed the impassible mountains to join Ushoran, who had been kind of a bro to him. He aided Ushorsn in building up the power of Strigos, and helped Ushoran claim the Crown of Nagash. An afterthought came that Nagash wouldn't have been to pleased about that and that maybe the Crown of Sorcery was better left in the hands of an actual sorcerer (himself). This inspired W'soran to began to experiment with imbuing one's own essence into physical objects, skirting along the magical theory of elf Soulstones but instead creating the process of Lich phylacteries. He eventually created a helmet of his own and placed part of his soul within it, then gave it to a tribe of humans called the Dresca and watched them tear themselves apart through his subtle mental influence. He made a pact with the leader of a human tribe named Vorag Bloodytooth, who in exchange for helping make him powerful built W'soran a fantastic and secret laboratory fortress. Here W'soran conducted many EEEEEEEVIL experiments and perfected the Lore of Vampires. During the fall of Strygos, W'soran and his followers ambushed the Strigoi while they were fighting greenskins. Eventually, W'soran faced Ushoran alone and lost due to the influence of Nagash through the Crown. His forces were crushed by the Strigoi, and he himself fled through the burning city causing as much damage as he could to slow down the pissed off Strigoi, Strygos, his own traitorous followers, and Orc pursuers. During his retreat he found a large vein of Warpstone and consumed it, using the boost in magic to collapse a mountain which killed many of those chasing him and cut off the rest.

He used his magic to hastily construct a mountain keep that could only be reached by a long mountain pass filled with traps and monsters, then awaited his enemies. The Lahmians and Strigoi made it to the pass, but most were slain between battling each other and falling into traps laid by the mad scientist Vampire. Melkhior, clever and knowledgeable about his master's preference for traps, reached the keep and pretended to warn his former master about the coming threat, and convinced him they would make a final stand inside W'soran's own vault. W'soran found himself fighting the enemy Vampires alone, and after slaying them to the last Melkhior attacked his master from behind. Melkhior taunted him as W'soran lay dying, and W'soran seemingly fought his own dying breath to make out a few last words to his traitorous pupil. As Melkhior leaned in closer with a grin to hear what the old Vampire had to say, W'soran seized him and growled with a wicked smile that he had discovered the secret of true immortality. W'soran bit his student in the neck, and his soul entered the body of Melkhior and consumed the younger Vampire's soul and knowledge. When the Lahmian reinforcements finally arrived at the keep, they found the corpse of W'soran and the (un)living student claiming to have done the deed. He told them he wanted to join them, and would give them all the secrets of W'soran provided he had time to translate the many tomes and decipher the experiments and tablets within the vault. He fed them a steady stream of lesser magics and artifacts before returning to his wayward students, gathering them into enclaves dedicated to advancing different areas of necromantic and alchemical study. Each knows little of the other enclaves, and none know all but himself. He himself is the master of the large and isolated Necrarch Bloodline, and over time and wearing different guises has ingratiated himself one way or the other with all of the Vampire Bloodlines.

While each different Bloodline may claim to control an army, claim to control a nation, or claim to be invincible it is W'soran and the Necrarchs who's combined strength is represented by the application of Undead monsters, unbelievably powerful and previously unknown magic, and subtle manipulation to the combined might of the others.

Melkhior

The above story represents the basic interpretation of the story. The following is the original version of the fluff and is less detailed.

In this one, after the fall of Nagash the Necrarchs built their power and spread throughout the world without the parts involving Ushoran and the Strigoi. W'soran, being more trusting in this interpretation, took loyal students with him as they traveled in secret administrating to the Necrarch enclaves. At one point, Melkhior began to read the books of Nagash while W'soran meditated or conducted intensive research. During one of these meditations, Melkhior slew the body of his master, trapping the soul of W'soran in the spirit world where he gathers armies of Ethereal undead to prey upon the living and eventually his former student.

Melkhior built a magically hidden tower in the Great Forest which is found within the Empire, and studied magic alone.

Zacharias The Everliving

The following story goes along with the latter story where Melkhior defeats W'soran, but for the sake of unified canon (as in the current canon both W'soran aiding Ushoran built his empire and this story appear to both be true) one can assume that a different version of is happens in the former story as well.

At one point a thief named Zacharias attempted to breach the tower where Melkhior was dwelling and steal a book of Nagash and, impressed that the young man had foiled his magical defenses, Melkhior made Zacharias his pupil. As the years went on, Melkhior became more and more insane and would go on Strigoi-like rampages to drain whole cities of blood. Zacharias took advantage of these times to read the book. Of course, one of these times Melkhior returned and caught him at the act so a fight broke out with Melkhoir winning and Zacharias fled.

Wounded by the pursuing minions of Melkhior, he hid in a cave and fell into a restorative hibernation for ten years. When he awoke he found that a Black Dragon had begun to use the cave as a lair. He promptly drained the dragon's blood over a very long time until it died (since nothing can wake up if a vampire feeds on it while it's sleeping) which caused him to grow in strength and cured his Vampiric weaknesses and need to feed on blood. He promptly reanimated the Dragon's corpse as a mount, then gathered an army and returned to lay siege to the tower. The two battled, and from here the story splits once again.

In one version of the story, Melkhior only narrowly survived the confrontation and fled to plot revenge. In the other, he perished and Zacharias took over as head of the Necrarch Bloodline and organized them into an effective force preparing to attempt to conquer the Empire in a manner similar to the von Carsteins. Either way, Melkhior's treasures and book of Nagash wind up in the hands of Zacharias.

The End Times

When Nagash came back, Nagash contacted him for his service, but found that Zacharias thought he was his equal. For this insult, Nagash promptly set his brain on fire in his head and instantly killed him. Unfortunately, this and a complete lack of any mention of W'soran or Melkhior in End Times suggests he really was killed by Zacharias, although no mention of the other Necrarchs were made either. Unfortunately, End Times left out quite a few things and the lore answers that Josh Reynolds provided were rendered non-canon by usual Games Workshop douchebaggery so either the Necrarchs were all wiped out alongside Zacharias, completely offscreen or just joined Nagash/went into hiding equally offscreen, and either way were 100% destroyed with the old setting when Age of Sigmar came to be.

Necrarchs

Necrarchs are the mad scientists of the Vampire Count options. All are skilled in magic and/or science. Much of their time is spent in experimentation, in delving for the knowledge of other races (like elves), and creating new forms of magical artifacts and Undead monsters.

Like the other spellcasters of the game (Empire Mages, Tzeentchian Warriors of Chaos, Saphery Mages, and the like the Necrarchs are more likely to be found in the company of other Bloodlines than in an army of their own. Should have need to however, Necrarchs are very adaptable.

Any option you want to take can be handwaved as another Bloodline recruited to their service, although particularly "Necrarch" options include Zombies and Skeletons for Core raised in bulk as needed (failed test subjects in mass graves is another good explanation), Corpse Carts (as gatherers of new specimens) and Hexwraiths/Spirit Hosts (vengeful test subjects, experiments in soul-binding, or the minions of W'soran in the story where his soul is doomed to wander) as Special, Black Coaches (as a protective form of Chariot for the studious Necrarchs to direct battle from) and Mortis Engines (an arcane object created by Necrarchs powering their creations) for Rare. For Lords and Heroes, no named character is fitting (apart from possibly Mannfred the Acolyte. After all, he has studied everywhere, probably including under a Necrarch tutor at some point) unless one wants to use the stats of one of the Mannfreds to use as a Necrarch model. Necromancers are a possible option as an assistant, but really any options should be spellcasting Vampires and Master Vampires. Use of any other Lores other than Lore of Vampires is within theme if you choose to use them.

On the Tabletop

W'soran/Melkhior once had models and stats, but have long since been removed from the game and discontinued. If you can obtain the models, one can use W'soran or Melkhior (depending on which version of the fluff you consider canon) as a Master Vampire spellcaster in the Lore of Vampires riding an Abyssal Terror.

Necrarchs used to be one of the more popular Bloodlines until von Carsteins became the only Bloodline of any importance in the game in 7e, and as a result have a fair number of on foot and mounted models. All are out of production, so eBay is your only source.

As for how they used to be in their old rules, Melkhoir knocks in at 660 pts , he causes terror (with -1 to enemy leadership, but the modifier doesn't affect undead or daemons naturally), he is immune to all psychology, he is a lvl 4 wizard that gets one more spell than usual, has stupidity, has an abyssal terror and most importantly he can recast a spell on a 3+ (you still have to cast it as normal after passing the recast roll), though he cannot cast the same spell twice on the same unit. Melkhoir also has three very special items that are awesome, he's got a magical sword that gives the models he hits -1 to their to hit rolls (he doesn't need to wound and the effects are not cumulative), he has a book he wrote that allows him to automatically cast a spell (it doesn't even use up any of your magic power either), and the spell that he casts can be recast as normal, but after using it, roll a die, on a 1-2 it can't be used again for the rest of the battle, and he has a black cloak that makes it impossible to shoot him. Literally, he cannot be shot at or hurt by shooting ever, not even by warmachines (he takes no damage if he gets hit) and not even by magical missiles (again he takes no damage) which is awesome combined with the sword so he doesn't get hit in combat, and combined with the book so he can keep shooting out spells. Statwise he's a Necrarch Vampire Lord, so also good in combat.

Gallery

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  The body of Melkhior, either inhabited by the soul of W'soran or as the traitorous pupil himself. Mounted on the "ever popular" only version of the Abyssal Terror that looks good.

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  An old Necrarch model.

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  A set of older Necrarch models.

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  Yet more Necrarch models.