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Coming back into fantasy with 8th and Im testing out a few lists with a few different armies let me know what you all think I can change.

The theme Im going for here is zombie hoard with lots of dark magic. I love zombies, I love the idea of necromancy so help me out by making my list competative.

H: Vampire- Helm of Commandmant, AoD (Hand weap and shield), and Raise Ghouls (dont know what spells to take on this guy)
H: Necromancer- Black periapt, Invocation, raise dead (buff zombies and make new hoards to block incoming threats)
C:35 Zombie hoard- Full command (distraction/tie down block)
C 29 Ghouls- Ghast (killy/beat through attrition block, Vampire goes here?)
C:Corpse Cart (buffs/I just love the model)
S: 14 GG- Great Weapons, Full command, Banner of Barrows (Hammer unit/ necromancer goes here?)

Should I cut back on commands and just fill out the squads letting my heros run around solo? Should I take zombies at all and just bring two smallish units of ghouls? You see the theme Im going for now help me sharpen it up please

In my limited experience, finding a way to be sure you've got VanHel's is pretty crucial. Buying it on the necro, picking up the book, or going with forbidden lore are all viable options. It's difficult to stop when spam cast, and can give you greater reach or get you out of a bad jam if you've been outmaneuvered.

I don't know if you need AoD on the general, given that he shouldn't be risking himself in combat anyway...

If the vampire is leading the fighting block, he won't get to use the helm to pass his weapon skill. Swap it out for the 4+ ward, which you'll want.

Necro in a block that fights? He'll be dead in the first round.
Try and find some points for 10 skeletons with a banner (good to have an extra banner). Have the necro hid in the skeleton unit, behind the grave guard and ghouls.

As Red Zeke pointed out, get Van Hels on the necro, instead of raise dead, and I'd drop the invoc on him. At this point value, I'd lose the banner of the barrows too.

That gets you pretty close to the skeleton unit you need to hide the necro in.

-Matt

Why not hide both the vamp and the necro in there so you can keep the helm? No point in putting your T4 general into combat under most circumstances, right?

Banner of the Barrows is probably a good cut, especially if you have Van Hel's available to provide the re-rolls in combat.

H: Vampire- Helm of Commandmant, and Raise Ghouls (dont know what spells to take on this guy)
H: Necromancer- Book of Arkham, Invocation, raise dead (buff zombies and make new hoards to block incoming threats, cast Vanhels)
C 29 Ghouls- Ghast (killy/beat through attrition block, Vampire goes here?)
C:10 Ghouls ( Distraction/ meatshield)
C: 10 Skeletons- Full command (bunker for my Heros as suggested)
C:Corpse Cart- Loadstone (buffs/I just love the model)
S: 15 GG- Great Weapons, Full command (Hammer unit/ necromancer goes here?)

Better?

Should I just drop everything on the necro and give him black periapt and vanhels?

Should I just put my heros in the ghoul bunker and make the skelies into zombies or more ghouls, possible unit of wolves for flanking or mobility?

Sitting at 995pts with this. Great stuff guys.

ideas?

Looks pretty healthy to me. Close enough that you should trot it out and see how it does.

K thanks for all the help. Prolly buy some models soon and start painting.

Do you think I should really take a mix of skellies and ghouls seeing as my vamp is tooled for buffing ghouls or will it matter? would it hurt to just put them in a ghoul bunker or are skellies a must? What if I dropped the 10 man ghoul unit a put it wolves for flank hits or machine hunting? Thoughs?

The answer depends on whether you will be playing scenarios from the book or not. If you are, then you'll probably want another banner to protect yourself in Blood & Glory. If you aren't, then it's probably best to make them all the same.

Welcome to a career in Necromancy! I play a similarly styled list, found here: http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/327127.page , and it has some interesting discussion on vc metagame... Although it does diverge toward the end.
Concerning our primary core troops (Ghouls/Skeletons), basically comes down to 1. Ghouls are slightly better wholistically 2. Skeletons are more symbolic of the undead.
I would like to point out that in my experience small units of undead are worthless... The concept of redirecting and meat shielding is replaced with tarpits. Your unit will lose to anything on swings, and you are giving up both cr from ranks, and bodies to keep the unit from crumbling completely (and thus not allowing more to be rezzed). A further issue arises when you hybridize your core units, as you will never be able to increase that skeleton unit beyond 10, dooming it to the fate I mentioned. I think your first lists were stronger, with a slight tweak of chars for magic:
vampire: helm, ghoulman
necro: invocation, vanhel's, black perapt
That is my low points magic build, except I use skeletonman instead... And I've found it to be the most effecient for reasons explained in tha link.
Hope it helps!

So a big unit being like 30+ guys or will 20 do?

What Im really stuck on is core unit sizes and were to put my heros/lords to keep them safe? I they are attached to the unit they are buffing they are going to get charged and beat down. If I put them in a small "bunker unit" that unit will be to small to defend anything. what to do

20 is a good starting point, but you will find that a single large unit will allow you to maximize use of the hat... I would prolly combine the ghouls, and then swap the skels for A 10 'man' ghoul bunker...
I find that rarely do undead want to charge, and as such I generally run my chars in a unit until the turn before contact, then walk them behind (and preferably of out potential overrun alleys). When you charge as undead you give the opponent 2 rounds of combat before you raise more guys, which can end up being really bad if a unit can churn a large number of wounds out...
*Edit* I could see a unit of 29 and a unit of 20 being good, like they say: Overkill is underrated.

Perfect Thats all I needed to know ill post a new list up with said changes in the morrow. uve been a huge help kiwidru


Automatically Appended Next Post:
H: Vampire- Helm of Commandmant, and Raise Ghouls, Avatar or death (S+S) (dont know what spells to take on this guy)
H: Necromancer- Black periapt, Vanhels, Invocation
C 22 Ghouls- Ghast (killy/beat through attrition block, Vampire goes here?)
C:10 Ghouls- Ghast ( Bunker)
C:Corpse Cart- (buffs/I just love the model)
S: 15 GG- Great Weapons, Full command (Hammer unit)
R: 3 Cairn Wraiths- Banshee- (War machine killers/Flack hitters)

Final product?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also whats the best way to use zombies? or should I bother summoning them at all. Should I just skip raise dead and the zombie hoard all together because Id love to take some in a higher points games if they can be run.