Your strategy for playing as Necropolis.

Well, that's how it is, but hoping for the leadership crown and dedicating a slot to leadership (at the very least, losing at least 1 level plus relying on the god of randomness... with your troop recruitment) – I don't know. In my opinion, Zoltan is better – any hero who has taken magic can buff himself or focus specifically on magic (hello to the most useless race, Dungeon), learn Plague from the Liches, at least without building a Guild of Mages.

But this isn't necessary; it's only worth taking him in the case of a large map, and the probability that leadership will drop for the Necropolis is practically negligible – 2%.

And Zoltan doesn't have a particularly appealing specialization; even that useless Warlock, who has gone into Chaos, can cause trouble with dead undead even with just one Meteor Shower around level 15, plus Arcane Wave, which gives аж two types of the same spell.
And in general, it seems to me that in the late game, on large maps and with large armies, Dungeon sucks against everyone anyway, unless you come across a clever Warlock who focuses on purely combat skills (definitely with defense) and support with Darkness or Summoning.

Well, this is just my opinion... yesterday I was playing the "School" map with a hero... and my favorite... everyone is on their own, so there's only a lumber mill, ore, 2 gold mines, and 1 random mine, neutral creatures of levels 1-3 in each of the "home" zones, there's no chance of Vampires. So, it depends on the map, but it's nice to get Vampires on the field and turn on auto-battle... it's a good idea.

Well, if you're not betting on Vampires, the other Necropolis heroes are kind of weak, except for Naadir, with his Specters... Or Deidre with enhanced Banshees. They're still weak specializations; Markel is much better:)

I'm probably unlucky when it comes to vampirism, but it hasn't dropped for me except in co-op. Regarding artillery from archers, in my opinion, they are as useless as those of Dungeon; I prefer to run and cover with the 3rd tier, just for the beginning... here, you also need to note the stupidity of the computer; when I'm already going to Rachnos, it still has a fort, but all the dwellings are built.

That's strange; it drops often, even, perhaps, too often, when you want more Subordination, and you get either Vampirism or a curse...

And the archers are weak, of course, but I fix this with Battle Fury and the Amulet of Bloodfang; their damage is tripled from 1-2 to 3-4.

Try the mega_AI mod so that the computer doesn't act stupidly.