This is the place where I'll update my progress of building my army, as well as the results of the games I play. I'll be playing a lot at varying point values, so for anyone wondering how effective the Sylvanian list is, this could be helpful to you. Of course, I'm always looking for suggestions and advice too, so feel free to chip in. Thanks for reading, and I hope you enjoy at least some of my commentary. :lol:

Week 1

So, as some of you have probably seen, I've started my Sylvanian vampires for the SOC campaign that's running at my local Games Workshop. Week one has come and gone, and I have 10 Sylvanian Levy, 5 Drakenhoff Guard, 5 Dire Wolves, a Fell Bat, and a heavily converted Wolf Form Thrall painted up, and I'm in the lead in the campaign after 2 wins with my 250 point skirmish combined with a perfect 3/3 for painting/converting, 5 points for the models I have done, 2 for playing a SOC list, and 1 for having my 250 points ready for the day, for a total of 13 points in the campaign. I believe Xris is in a tie for second with 10, but my math could be off there.

Game 1:
My first game was against my friend Mark and his lizardmen, which was something of a disappointment as we headed down to GW together, and still got stuck playing each other. Of course, we got there a bit late, after cramming in some last-minute painting, so a lot of people had come and gone by the time we made it, so I don't blame the staffers for it. Besides, we hadn't actually played a game yet, what with the mad rush to get the forces painted in 3 and a half days.
We played a Take and Hold scenario, with two objectives; a small fortress, and a grave hill thingy. I placed my Grave Markers close to them, and they both scattered nicely into place. I also surrounded the bog in my deployment, my models being too close together for him to be able to scout his skinks in.
My Dire Wolves did next to nothing this game, killing a skink or two before being shot up quite nicely. I raised zombies like mad, charging into the skinks and holding them in place, gradually wearing them down through attrition, as he couldn't keep up with the numbers I was raising. My Guard took on the Saurus with my charater's help, generally dealing with them quite easily, and eventually a combined charge of two zombies and a guard chased off his scar-vet after a failed fear check.
All in all, the list worked as I expected, the raising being more than he could handle; there was very little he could have done to win this game, and I don't think he lost through any fault of his own. Fun for me, much less so for him, especially as he got a 1 for painting, due to running out of time before he could do any significant highlighting or touch-ups, along with dumping a pot of orange paint onto some new pants. A bad day for him, and I hope next week goes better, or I would expect him to seriously consider giving up on the campaign.

Game 2:
I never got the name of the guy I played in my second game, but I've got a rematch lined up for next week, so I'll try to remember to get it then. He played a Blood Dragon force, with 5 or 6 knights supported by a thrall, a very tough matchup for my force, lacking anything but the character that could reliably go through armour. To make matters worse, he dployed well away from my grave markers, meaning that it would take until turn 4 or 5 before I could bring my hordes to bear.
I got the charge on his knights with my wolves and character, Knocking Down one and Stunning another, while marching my Guard up behind, looking for supporting charges later. Our characters ended up in a duel, his losing a wound before I got flanked by a couple of knights, and a Killing Blow took my character out of action.
After that, though, my Guard got involved, and their S6 took care of the rest, though my mob of halberd-zombies did manage to take down a knight as well.
My crossbow-skeletons did nothing in either game, though I only had one in the first game. The second game I had about 10, and I'm just not impressed with them. Needing 6's to hit makes it too unlikely that they'll do anything, especially with my rolling - in a practice game against Xris, it took 4 turns of shooting with 11 of them before I managed to score a hit, and then rolled a 1 to wound. I think I'll stick to zombies against anything above T3 from now on.

Overall Thoughts:
I had a lot of fun this week, and for the first time in what seems like years (and very well may be ;)), I'm enjoying the process of converting and painting my models, and not just playing. I'm a couple of models ahead toward next week's 500 point skirmish games, and I think I'll take tomorrow to get everything converted and primed, leaving me 4 days or so to paint ~ten models.

I'll post my tentative 500 and 750 point lists in a while, and I'm always open to cool conversion ideas, as long as you keep in mind that I'm trying to be as WYSIWYG as possible, and remaining in the theme of an undead Empire province.
In that line of thought, does anyone have any of the greatsword-arms from the Empire Militia box that they aren't intending to use? Hit me with a PM or Email and we'll work out a trade of some kind.

Apologies for the double post, but if I just edited the earlier one, nobody would know it. Hopefully I'll get some replies before next week, as I don't want the topic to just be me rambling on. :P

As I promised, here are the lists I'm (currently) intending to use for the next two weeks, in the hopes of maintaining my lead in the campaign.

500 point Skirmish game

I have a couple of concerns with the list though, and I'd appreciate feedback. First, with a predominance of immune to psych opponents, I'm really not sure if I want to spend the points on the banshee. It'd be good if I drew an opponent who it works against, but can it accomplish enough without the howl to be worth considering? I'd probably replace it with some Drakenhoff Templar, which requires more converting. Thoughts?

Also, I'm not really set on any of it except the character, so let me know if there's anything else that might work better.

750 point normal rules

Same basic concerns with this list, as well as the fact that my Guard are fairly weak against magic.
Stefan goes with the zombies, hopefully scaring off most weak opponents who would consider charging, and outcharging any small units of cav who think they can take out the Levy.
Again, all comments are welcome.

I like that list vriish. But maybe consider droping the banshee for some more fell bats. Maybe a unit of gouls. A have said on Ulriks site that the 1st list is hard. I will try the second one out tommorrow with my undead.

Ghouls aren't available in the Sylvanian list, unfortunately, and I haven't been too impressed with bats in my trial games. 3 knights, on the other hand, could be just the support the wolves need to take down bigger game.

The 500 point list is designed for a weighted flank style of deployment, with the infantry on one flank, preferably across from the faster elements of the opposition and with a grave marker about halfway up the table, with the intention of raising a mob of halberd-zombies in front to hold them up, giving the Guard the charge.
On the other flank go the wolves and character, sweeping around for a flank, hopefully able to pick their targets after the opponent is stuck in combat with the rest of the force. Depending on objective, it should do quite nicely.

Thanks for the testing you're doing, by the way. It makes it a lot easier to make a commitment on what I want to take.

I have managed to get a game in with some knights instead of a banshee and found the wolves much more effective for the knights. The Guard are going to need a bit of flank protection as once th quick elements are in combat you are vunerable. Will do a game with a banshee later. The army I used was the 500 point one.
P.S: It has helped me build my army as I know feel I can use the vc more effectivley.

Hmmm. I'd ordinarily say keep the banshee, as they're great. But if most of your opponents are immune to psychology, you may be better off with more wolves or grave guard.

Your 750 looks fine, though. Larger units are always better, but that can be fixed with raising via the grave markers.

Got any pics yet? :)

I don't have the USB cable necessary to get them from my camera to the computer, unfortunately. Hopefully sometime soon I'll remember to pick one up.

Thanks for the comments and the interest. :)

Week 2

Well, the second week of the campaign is now complete, and I maintained my grip on the first position. Apparently my conversion work (removing the barding from an empire horse and attaching it to a nightmare was the most complex this week) wasn't enough to justify a 3, though I'm not sure if the employees realised how much work it actually was...regardless, I got a 2 for painting, one composition point, as I didn't realise only ranks that you painted from scratch count, not continuing from partial ranks the week before...I also got a point for completing 500 points, and 2 for winning both of my games once again.

There was one person there who I really wasn't impressed with; he was playing Tomb Kings, and he decided to take a Casket of Souls because, going by the letter of the Skirmish rules, it would hit every model that could see it. He blatantly admitted that he took it to exploit a loophole in the rules, but he was allowed to use it. These are the kind of people I hate playing against, so luckily he didn't get matched up against me.

Anyway, on to my games.

Game 1: Richard's HE.
Well, Richard's army looked like a tough match from the start, what with having 2 RBT, a commander, a Dragon Prince, and somewhere around 10 Shadow Warriors. My vampire got hit by a big bolt, but his die came up a 1, so he lived. I was really lucky there, and on his rolls to hit for most of the game. I think 3 shots hit all told, and his commander got killed by a lone Dire Wolf, after charging and rolling 2 1's and a 2 to hit. The outnumber forced him to run, and the wolf was faster.
Stefan took out an RBT, and the other managed to kill both a wolf and a knight in combat, but he rolled a 10 at the top of turn 3 on his Rout Test, so the win was mine. I had plenty left to finish him off with anyway.
A good game, and he took all of his 2's well.

Game 2: Louie's Bretonnians.
5 Grail Knights, a Paladin, and some Men at Arms. Ouch. My character decided to take a page from the book of Richard's commander, failing to hit on the charge and getting Critically Hit by, of all things, a horse. Oh, the humiliation.
I think the only kill I got this game was against a Man At Arms, but I was raising plenty of zombies, and enough of them managed to pass their Ld4 tests that I outnumbered him at the end of the game - The store had to close with all of our units locked in combat, so we agreed to roll off for the campaign point for winning. My 5 beat his 4, so the win was mine.
I'm not sure that the rules we used were right, as he didn't think overrunning was available, but it doesn't really matter anymore. Next week is normal rules 750 point games, and I'm looking forward to it.

For those who are interested, this is the list I went with.

For next week I'll bring the knights and Bats to minimum size, bump the Guard to 15 assuming I can't find any more arms to make more of them, add a unit of 16 Zombies, and worry about any more points after that's done.

Oh, and for anyone who's wondering, skeletons with crossbows are not worth it. They're almost always hitting on 6's, so the points are better spent on zombies, as are Invocations.

This is really cool Vriishnack. I'm planning on getting a sylvanian army. I've wanted to get a VC army for ages, but never really knew which bloodline and how to start. But the sylvanian list really apppeals to me so I'm going to start soon.

Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that this is a big help, thanks a lot.

I have to disagree with the assessment of the crossbow skeletons.

They're the only way to deal with enemy fast cavalry, other than using our own inferior fast cav or our bats. Don't even mention using magic missiles...

Seriously, what else do we have against enemy flankers?

And why are they hitting on 6's? They should be hitting on 5's almost always. Where exactly are you raising them? You should be using them the same way you use charge diverters, except these are ones that can shoot. Granted, they hit on 6's when they stand and shoot... but are they meant to do that much anyway? They do happen to be free, in a sense.

And s4 shooting is nothing to scoff at. I can't think of a fast cav unit that has good protection against s4 shooting. And Large targets are easier to hit, 4+ is pretty respectable (again, it's the whole range thing... exactly how are you using them?) S4 makes it much easier to wound such targets than standard wimpy Elvish-level s3.

It may be weaker than most other shooting yes, but it does have its use.

The problem I have is that the markers are set before deployment, and they scatter. If the opponent sets up 21" away from them, they're guaranteed at long range, and if he holds his dice back, he can easily prevent you from raising for the first turn or two, until he's advanced far enough that you can't raise within 15.
If you place them in the middle of the table, your skellies will be in the middle of enemy lines, and easily dealt with. Basically, as useful as the markers are, they don't have the flexibility of an actual caster, and it's too hard to get the skeletons into a good place to shoot.

I agree that they can have uses, but in most cases they're simply too easy to nullify, especially with my inability to roll 6's, ever.

Out of curiosity, if you use the Invocation spells, do they summon Levy/Militia, or regular skeletons/zombies?

I think they summone Levy and Militia as there are no regular skeletons/zombies in the Von Carstein army. And for only ten points, you can also summon dire wolves :) .

Just an extra question, can you only summon units from the Grave Markers, or use the Grave Markers only for the From 'Death Awakened' spell.

F'lar

If you're casting the spell into an existing unit, it raises as the same as they are, as always. If using the basic Invocation to make a new unit, it's normal skellies/zombies, as the list doesn't say anywhere that it's different. I don't know if that was the intention, but them's the rules for now.

Not sure if it's what you're asking, but the Grave Markers are used to cast From Death Awakened, which can add to an existing unit or create a new one, same as Invocation. Only difference is that it's a bound spell and can raise the new units.

Vriish is right on both counts.

The markers also restore 2 Wounds.

I'm sorry to say that it looks like my campaign will be ending here; Xris has apparently decided that it's not worth playing unless he's going to win, and in order to continue I would need to make a 45 minute bus trip, two ways, alone, each week in order to play a single game of warhammer, not to mention the countless hours converting and painting. As much as I enjoy the game, and love knowing the fact that I can compete with any of the gamers who go to the store, it's not worth it just to have a chance at a free SOC book.

When I had a friend, and better yet, two friends going with me each week, it was fun. There was the big competition, some friendly competition within our group on playing and getting the painting and converting done, and the trips were enjoyable, even the points where we were all standing around without a game. Doing it alone just wouldn't be fun, and I think I'm not going to bother. I'll still try to convert and paint in my free time in the hopes of getting the army completed, but I can't say that it's likely to be a priority anymore, and I doubt I'll be coming up with much advice or experience regarding the army.

Anyway, my apologies to anyone who was enjoying this series of reports, and I hope that at some point I'll have some new games to report. Until then, I'll chip in with my ideas of how the army should work, but I won't be able to support it with new experience.

Aww thats a real shame. Oh well, hope you enjoy what you are doing instead.

Likewise. Best of luck- and if you still want those parts for conversions (this goes for you as well, Xarhain), let me know. I'm cool wid it.