[Micah]

Excellent guide, though assuming you'll be hanging onto flying in any major battle is somewhat optimistic. You also mention undead mastery without any reference to its value as probably the best possible counter against your vamps, and thus something to watch out for in a major way. 15 MR on the normal vamps isn't nearly enough to reliably resist the exact tactic you advise using (vortex/mastery spam) and this strikes me as a major oversight in an otherwise excellent guide.

Oh, and to quickly touch on why they are so often overlooked: Defense is < offense. If you've got enough spare resources to blow on a pure defensive force you're generally better off using it for something you can go hit things with instead. I think some sort of dom-pushing ability is pretty key to really leveraging your vamps to maximum value. (And if you're just building up it might be advantageous to opt for making more lords over more chaff, as they can help blood hunt, research or summon allies during peacetime...the chaff is vital, as mentioned, but all you can really do with it if no one is in your dominion is patrol)