All in all Mannfred is a great choice to lead a 2000 pt Vampire Counts army into battle if you plan to focus on magic byraising undead and augmenting your existing forces.
The 4 most noticeable attributes that sets Mannfred apart from other Vampires are:-
1) his lvl 4 spellcasting abilities
2) knowledge of all the Vampire and Lore of Death spells
3) the +2 wounds on his profile (the rest of his profile is the same as a normal Vampire Lord)
4) his option to take up to 2 arcane items (rather than the usual maximum of 1) and
5) the Sword of Unholy Power (see my earlier post on Mannfred the Acolyte)
A Mannfred equivalent cannot be created by customising a Vampire Lord character. Mannfred, for instance is a level 4 wizard with Master of the Black Arts, Lord of the Dead and Summon Creatures of the Night. To become a level 4 wizard a Vampire Lord would have to take the Vampiric Dark Acolyte power plus the 50pt (non Vampiric power) upgrade to his wizard level. The combination of Vampire powers that Mannfred has comes to 110pts, ie 10pts more than is allowed for any other Vampire.
To customise a Vampire Lord to something similar to Mannfred would cost 350 pts (205 for Vampire + 50pts additional magic level + 95 pts for the Vampire Powers).
Mannfred costs a hefty 475pts so you need to decide
if all of the above additional attributes are worth the extra 125pts.
It all really depends on what other units / characters you would like to take into battle. If you include Mannfred you really need to design your game tactics around him because he takes up such a large portion of a 2000pt army.
To really make Count Mannfred earn his points he needs to make a big magical impact on the game. The easiest and surest way of doing this is to have him casting lots of Invocation of Nehek spells. Each successful cast will raise, for example, an average of 3.5 skeletons (4.5 if he's close to a Corpse Cart) which equates to about 31.5pts if the skellies have spears). So Mannfred would have to cast about an additional 5 successful invocations more than a normal Vampire Lord would to pay for his additional points cost. I think that in a 6 turn game this is unlikely (although you never do know until you've tried it out in battle a few times).
Mannfred possesses 3 attributes which might aid him in getting these additional 5 casts. Obviously, his 2 additional wounds which might keep him alive longer. He also has an extra invocation spell* that will give him +1 to casting rolls when raising skellies or creatures of the night (ie. Bat Swarms, Fell Bats or Dire Wolves)**
* The extra invocation spell will make Mannfred more tactically flexible but only slightly.
** Any other Vampire Lord would only be able to choose creatures of the night OR lord of the dead (because he would have to spend pts on Master of the Black Arts plus Dark Acolyte)
The third thing Mannfred has going in his favour is the Sword of Unholy Power which is more valuable in his hands as a Count than it was when he was an acolyte. Purely becuase he will kill more enemies and therefore gain more power or dispel dice.
The extra magic might come in useful, especially the Lore of Death but Mannfred really should be concentrating on bolstering his undead army.
The final thing I should mention is that Mannfred can take 2 arcane items (although they cannot both be bound items, eg. The Staff of Damnation and the Book of Arkhan).
The only really useful combination is the Scaeptre de Noirot and the skull staff. Combined, these 2 items allow Mannfred to raise D3 + 9 Zombies on a casting roll of 4+. It's an expensive option though for an extra 90pts which could pay for 20 Zombies from the outset.
All in all I love Mannfred but he needs to be employed with care, it's a lot of points to spend in a 2000pt game. You could have a Vampire Lord and a no frills Vampire Hero instead and free up points for your core army.
The choice is yours, the best option would be to test him on the field of battle and see how he gets on.
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