8th Ed. Some out-of-the-box ideas against VC

[Lawot]

Forum consensus seems to be that Vampires are difficult to beat, at best, and impossible at worst. Now, maybe an all-comers list would inherently have trouble with VC's, but when something seems impossible to beat, it makes me think that we just need to get creative.
I've got no experience fighting VC's, but thought I might contribute a few ideas, and let those who have faced them on the field give their feedback about what would work. Not all of these seem like "good" ideas, at least not on their own, but I'll submit them anyways...after all, unpredictability is its own asset to the General.

1. Frenzied Skink Horde:
Skink BSB + Skavenpelt Banner in a massive horde of Skinks. I figure that Skeletons and Zombies are some of the only units that our Skinks actually have a chance of dealing with in Close Combat. 40 Attacks, and enough Skinks to have a chance at keeping Steadfast...could that be enough to grind down an Undead block? Maybe throw a Krox or 2 in there for good effect? Timewarp would help, too.

2. Stegadon Ethereal Hunter
Ancient Stegadon for its Giant Blowpipes, with either Flaming Sword of Rhuin, Enchanted Blades of Aiban, or a Skink BSB + Banner of Eternal Flame. That's a lot of magic attacks, both ranged and CC.
Alternatively, Skink Chief with Stegadon Warspear + Flaming Sword of Rhuin or Enchanted Blades.

3. Terradon Ethereal Hunters
Same idea, but with the necessary magical support in a unit of Terradons, for the mobility and shooting capabilities.

4. Vampire-Slayer Beasts
An Oldblood as a chosen champion for a Lore of Beasts Slann. I know the Vampire Lords are bad, but are they really something that an Oldblood with +3 A, +4 S, and +4 T couldn't handle? Plus, all those buffs should let him take down monsters and swathes of infantry with ease, right?
Alternatively, I have seen the Combat Slann on this site before. This is fully-loaded build, but something like this:
Slann
Mystery
Rumination
Higher State
BSB
Fencer's Blades
Crown of Command
Aura of Quetzl
Lore of Beasts

WS BS S T W I A Ld
10 0 7 8 5 2 5 9
Stubborn, Magical Attacks, Hit on 5+ by elites and 6+ by rank and file, only affected by magical attacks.

Many not against a Vamp Lord, but a Hero?

5. MSU Huddle
My thinking here is this: We kill Vampires by CR, not wounds, right? So the more we can do to stack CR against the unit his Vampire is in, the quicker we finish him off, right? So what could be better than negating his rank bonus via disrupting units in the flank and rear?
So, one unit hefty enough to take them on from the front (Saurus?), while Skinks, Terradons, Salamanders, Krox, whatever huddle in from the sides and rear. As long as one of the flanking units (Cohort or Skrox) has a second full rank, we get at least +4 static CR (flank, rear, one rank after the first). They lose their rank bonus, leaving them with only the wounds they inflict (assuming we both have standards).
Plus, if it turns out that we can't outgrind them, then why bother bringing big blocks at all?

6. Skink Chief Necromancer Assassin
Nothing new here, of course. Just a Skink Chief in one of the few roles they can do, armed with Sword of the Hornet, Piranha Blade, Bane Head, or something similarly suitable for an assassin. Swoop in to take out a Necromancer as soon as possible.

7. Lifebloom Attrition
A Saurus and Kroxigor-based army, with a Life Star at the center. The enemy's Invocation is AOE, but each wound we resurrect is a lot more in points - I'd take D6 Temple Guard over D6 Skeletons any day. What would we have to do to outgrind the Undead?


Finally, the first time I play against VC will likely be in a 2v2, in which my partner will be High Elves. Two strategies come to mind with them in the game:
1. Coven of Light: Slann. Archmage, and Mage, all with Lore of Light, to make Banishment really nasty.
2. Magical Shut-Down: Becalming Cogitation, Cube of Darkness, Vortex Shard, and Annulian Crystal. Gives us a dispelling edge in every turn, but specifically allows us to shut down 1-2 enemy Magic phases entirely. Wait until we get locked into CC, and then see how the Undead fare without any magical support!


I hope there's something useful here! Any other wild brainstorming is encouraged, as well!

 

[Rhodium]

Some nice little ideas but I think they are limited each in their own ways and would suffer if it was a tournament because they weaken a lizard list against other armies

But nthe more important question Is:

Are VC really that good? I have never had a problem playing VC, sure they have one crazy character but I just avoid it as best as possible,

My two standard all comers list is either
Tooled up light slann
Or
Double slann light/death
These are both pretty standard lizard lists and they ruin VC,
Things like terroghiests and banshee die to banishment/shems very quickly
VC rely on magic and a tooled up slann can shut down the phase with becalming and a cube on a skink very easily
Cupped hands is ace, pass that roll of a 4 on the miscast table over to your necromancer

When it comes to combat, I like to face up against the vampire unit whether mounted or on foot and charge a lone scar vet cowboy in, attempt to cast phas, speed of light, time warp and most important light of battle (the one they don't expect), if you get off phas speed and light, that's hitting on 6's and 1+ armour save (which is probably modified to 5+) and a one use 2+ ward, survive that, and then plow your saurus block into the flank of the big unit held up by the scar vet, no rank bonus, watch them die in droves


Against the cairn wraith front rank trick, pick them off with death snipes,

 

[Scalenex]

I suggest looking at two lores LM players seldom use.

Metal: Vampire Counts have two knight units that cost a lot of points so they don’t like Metal Shifting. Most of the chariots don’t like Metalshifting either. Transmuation of Lead has no lower limit for how low they can hex something. Zombies are normally WS 1 so you take them to WS 0. Page 4 of the BRB, WS 0 are hit automatically and cannot strike. Enchanted Blades of Aiban will let your Skinks shoot up a unit of Hexwraiths or other roving ethereals quite nicely. The same Enchanted Blades will also help your Sauri if they are fighting a massive unit of skeletons or zombies where most/all of the front rank is made up of ethereal characters (a player in my store is fond of that cheap tactic and it’s nice to have a counter). While Metal can take out heavies like the chariots, it will do very little against the dreaded Terrorgheist so you'll want lots of Skink shooting to down it or toss in some Skink priests to throw in some anti-flyer damage.

Fire: Tons of undead Regenerate. Flaming Sword of Ruin will put the hurting on embedded ethereal characters and Flame Cage will make large blocks of zombies and ghouls think twice about advancing at you. Fire doesn't give you much to take out the undead heavies so you'll probably want a lot of Skink shooting on your army (and/or Skink priests if you are expecting Terrogheists).

 

[david l]

1. Frenzied Skink Horde:
Skink BSB + Skavenpelt Banner in a massive horde of Skinks. I figure that Skeletons and Zombies are some of the only units that our Skinks actually have a chance of dealing with in Close Combat.

The Skavenpelt banner is a bad idea that makes little difference. Firstly, the zombie or skeleton block will only be 5 wide, so the edges of the horde will not be attacking it.
21 skink attacks against zombies - 14 hits, 7 wounds. Adding 7 attacks from frenzy is only 2 more zombies knocked down (doubled to 4 by combat res) and you have paid 105 points for that!
Against skeletons, its awful. 21 attacks, 10.5 hits, 5.25 wounds, 2.92 unsaved. Adding the frenzy banner is worth less than 1 skeleton kill!!

2. Stegadon Ethereal Hunter
Ancient Stegadon for its Giant Blowpipes, with either Flaming Sword of Rhuin, Enchanted Blades of Aiban, or a Skink BSB + Banner of Eternal Flame.

The flame banner does not provide magical attacks. Casting Flaming Sword to help blowpipes kill ethereals is a poor idea - Fireball is much better.

Alternatively, Skink Chief with Stegadon Warspear + Flaming Sword of Rhuin or Enchanted Blades.

Now the warspear does provide magical impact hits, so you don't need the spell when charging. When not charging, the skink chief is a liability, not an advantage.

 

[newscales]

2500pt+ i take double light slann and just burn him down. never lost to VC.

 

[JWK47]

Double Light or Fire/Metal should absolutely ruin VC.