Army Update - The Seventh Dynasty

This army first appeared on the blog as one of my first posts as the start of my Army Showcase series and can be seen here: The Van Fell Dynasty Part 1 and Part 2. Since then I have doubled the army in size, repainted a lot of it and largely rewritten the army background.

The Nightmare Hosts of the Seventh Dynasty

Count Victor van Fell

Patriarch of the Seventh Dynasty and Terror of Mourkain, Count Victor van Fell is the malevolent power behind the self-proclaimed Strigoi resurgent. When the empire of Strigos fell; Count Victor fled the ruin of his kin by teleporting himself away from the battle. The spell however was disrupted by one of the invading orc shamans and he was cast into the underworld. Thousands of years later he has managed to drag himself back to the mortal plane only to find the Strigoi degenerate Ghoul Kings hunted by their fellow vampires. Vowing to rebuild the once mighty empire of the Strigos he has begun raising an army to destroy anyone who would deny his kin the reclamation of their glory.

'Captain' Frederick von Heisenberg 

An ancient master necromancer who fancies himself as a pirate; von Heisenberg is the drunken maniac responsible for maintaining the armies of the Seventh Dynasty. He claims to have invented necromancy before Nagash was even born, that it would be the Purple Sun of Heisenberg if his notes hadn't been stolen by that upstart Xerxes, and that you can unlock great power by consuming Skaven livers in vast quantities. He is largely ignored by his employers for the absurdity of his boasts but his mastery over the wind of death is indisputable to friend and foe alike.

Countess Victoria van Fell

The blood-daughter of Count Victor; Countess Victoria is the only person to have successfully survived being bitten by the count and not become a twisted abomination. Victoria sees this as proof of her divine right to succeed her father and lead the Seventh Dynasty to ultimate glory. Count Victor however sees her as a dangerous psychopath who lacks the skills necessary to raise the Strigoi to glory. Whilst he continues to try and create more progeny she strives to prove her worth to him in the hope that he will finally name her his heir.

Years have passed now and whilst the Countess continues to seek her father's approval she has also begun to entertain thoughts of overthrowing him and seizing the armies of the Seventh Dynasty for herself. Even though this coup is only a small seed in her mind she has already swayed the necromancer Skisrik Turncloak to her side and secured certain assurances of allegiance from Count Victor's erstwhile Dark Elf allies in the event of his death. Little does she realise that her impending treachery has already been noted and that certain parties within the Nightmare Hosts are already moving towards her downfall and the production of a male heir for the Seventh Dynasty.

The Cadaver King and his Court

Wearing a blood-stained ermine cloak and surrounded by ghoulish sycophants; the Cadaver King was a cousin of Count Victor, but whilst the latter was trapped in the underworld the vampire who would become the Cadaver king became a twisted troglodyte like the rest of the Stirgoi. Only this one had pretentious of grandeur and dreams of a time when the old empire of Strigos would be reborn and Mourkain rebuilt in splendour. Now allying his armies with those of the Seventh Dynasty he believes the time has come for the borders of his sovereign-kingdom to expand.

Count Grigori Orlok of Sartosa

A Necrarch Vampire with a taste for the finer things in unlife; Grigori Orlok is one of the Vampire Lords of Sartosa and a valuable ally of the Seventh Dynasty. Believing a revived Kingdom of Strigos could be good for business he has provided Count Victor with funds and equipment for him to maintain his armies as well as ships to transport them across the old world. It was through Grigori that Count Victor met Von Heisenberg and it was also through him that the Seventh Dynasty was able to make its pact with the Doomspire Fleet. Cunning and ambitious Count Orlok has his own agendas and the Seventh Dynasty play but a small part in larger schemes he is coordinating. 

The Unworthy

Count Victor has tried many a time to build up the numbers of the Van Fell dynasty but so far only his daughter has grown to full vampiric maturity. All others that he has bitten have become misshapen troglodytes similar in nature to the current Strigoi Ghoul Kings. Count Victor has slain nearly all of these abominations but a few of the strongest he has kept and twisted into Vargheists to serve him as monstrous shock troops and a reminder to himself of the plight of his ghoulish kin.

The Lost and the Forgotten

Skisrik Turncloak and the Betrayed

The lot of your average Skaven isn't great and it is arguably worst when you are apprentice to a Warplock Engineer; expected to carry Doomrockets and similar explosive devices from battlefield to battlefield and constantly risking your life at the expense of an ungrateful master. One day Skisrik had had enough. Slipping away quietly he found the subterranean armies of the Cadaver King and agreed to lower his Clan's defensive barriers in exchange for a position of power. The next day he was a necromancer for the Seventh Dynasty; leading the corpses of his betrayed clan behind him. Whilst treachery is commonplace amongst the Skaven, Skisrik's rejection of his own specie in favour of the undead has made him a reviled figure in the under-empire and is now known as Skisrik Turncloak with many a Grey Seer desiring his head to parade through the streets of Skavenblight on a pike.

The Bat out of Hell

This army has been a nice change from my other fantasy armies as it has given me the chance to try out some ghostly effects and use a hell of a lot of gore effect paint. The models have been wonderful to convert and paint which has created, what I think is, a rather characterful army. I would like to add even more to this army which currently stands at roughly 2000 points. Since the most recent Vampire Counts army book has come out I have wanted a Coven Throne which is largely impractical to field at 2000 points or below; I would therefore like to add a few units such as Crypt Horrors and Dire Wolves to build the force up to a points level I can feasibly use the Coven Throne at. When I will have chance to expand this army I don't know but the new Nagash release is making me think twice...