Would love some help on our dnd campaigns big bad!

[severe orchid]

Looking to update this artisan guild orc necromancer that I’m using for a dnd campaign. This is a mini i painted a while ago and would love some help in how i can improve it.

Few notes:
-Sword has to be black due to lore reasons
-“magic” effect has to be red, but not “fire red”, so no oranges or yellows.
-hair has to be black.
-things i have repainted are the loin cloth, red magic effect, green orc skin, partially the sword. I know i need to work on the cloak and armor more.

Any an all advice would be amazing! Thank you. (Note, last picture is the previous paint job)

[frank ledge]

I like it. My two suggestions are, since he's the big bad, clearly important, take the time and really blend the highlights and shadows. Color choice is great now tie them together

And the black hair is fine but it's too close to the armor

Highlight one of them with blue or a different grey. They'll both read as black but different

Like how GW sometimes uses thunderhawk blue to highlight their black

[severe orchid]

Great advice! I’ll redo the highlights on the blacks for sure. How does the sword feel to you? Not 100% sold yet on it

[frank ledge]

I like it. My only suggestion would be to push the bright purple even brighter. So you've got as much contrast as possible

[severe orchid]

Tried updating the black armor/hair a bit

[frank ledge]

Looking much better